Spa Panel Wiring

[RMessenger]

Yes it wrong. You need the neutral to your gfci for the bare minimum of safety. You need it going to the kettle to use gfci protection.

So to make sure I fully understand, I don't need the neutral coming into the panel, but I do need a neutral going out to the controller/elements, which also means that I cannot use a 3-prong outlet to plug in my controller? Thanks for all of your help, by the way!

 

[watermelon83]

Your welcome. If I was doing it, I would stick with the two lines and the neutral the whole way through. Drop the ground at the original outlet if you can't get cable with the extra conductor.

 

[RMessenger]

Your welcome. If I was doing it, I would stick with the two lines and the neutral the whole way through. Drop the ground at the original outlet if you can't get cable with the extra conductor.

I'm more confused. You're helping, but it's one of those the more you know, the less you know that you know situations. How would I drop the ground? Would I wire the ground to outlet #1 (the one that powers the charge station) and then do something different from there or is it how I route the wires in the spa panel?

 

[watermelon83]

How is your outlet wired? With what colors?

 

[RMessenger]

The charge station outlet is wired with 12/2 Romex (black, white, and ground). I wired the second outlet the same way. I originally thought that this was going to be as simple as wiring the two hot wires (black and white) and ground into the spa panel and then running the same wires out to add GFCI protection on the outlet. Boy was I wrong.

 

[satph]

The PJ diagram is for a NEMA 10-30 three wire dryer outlet, which is a non-grounding (hot-hot-neutral) outlet. But you have a NEMA 6-30 three-wire grounding (hot-hot-ground) outlet. Neutral ≠ Ground. This thread on Mikeholt says that a 240v GFCI needs the neutral line in to operate. That's why the pigtail is connected to the neutral bus bar. This jibes with your experience that the GFCI "is freaking out" when installed without a neutral. The circuit is wired with 12/2 + ground wire. So the third conductor is not insulated and cannot be used as neutral.

 

[watermelon83]

Yeah bad juju. If it were me, I'd call an electrician to run a dedicated circuit. You can wire this, but not safely enough to even consider using.

 

[RMessenger]

Thanks, folks! It's not what I wanted to hear, but it's probably best that way, anyhow. I've been waiting to find the money to upgrade our service (only 100 Amp and the drop into the house is not in good condition), so I guess I'll just have to add this to that project.

 

[z-bob]

I'm not convinced that the GFCI needs a neutral connection if there is no 110V load. In fact I'm pretty sure it doesn't; you could run it with just 2 hot wires and no ground and no neutral.

 

[Brumateur]

Just to be clear. You should have two hot wires and the neutral for a 240v element. If your incoming connection color options are red black and white then red and black are your loads white is your neutral.

Going to the panel you NEED those three, not the ground. If I follow you correctly, you want that green wire connected to white not green.

You don't need a neutral coming to element and if your controller is 240V only you don't need a neutral wire coming to controller either.
But in any case you need a ground wire to ground metallic part of a controller and a kettle.

 

[Brumateur]

I've finally had a chance to upload a picture of the instructions for 2 pole that came with the spa panel. They're not as clear as the instructions that I posted at the start of this thread, so I'm a little confused, but doesn't it look as if the instructions say to wire 2 pole the way Watermelon83's link says to?

You need to wire your panel exactly is it shown on your second diagram.

 

[watermelon83]

Gfci works off the neutral,no?

Edit: nm answered my own question, it does not. Apparently it will sense a difference between just the load lines and trip.

However, it seems the test button will not work without the neutral connected.

 

[Brumateur]

If you make a connection as on the picture above - test button will work correctly.

 

[RMessenger]

But doesn't the diagram above have two hot wires and a neutral? I don't have a neutral, just ground.

 

[watermelon83]

If you find an electrician that's over 45-50 yo, he will probably make it work. However, codes and standards have changed a lot since he learned his trade. What was once considered perfectly safe is now not.

You said that your not happy with your service connection or main panel rating. These are red flags, in my opinion, that trying to do this while skirting code violations is a horrible idea. Time and money savings here mean nothing if your home is damaged or (God forbid) someone gets hurt.

Edit: To answer your question, technically a ground and a neutral are the same conductor. In your main service panel they bonded together, but only there.

 

[RMessenger]

I had a rough weekend trying to figure out this spa panel. While disconnecting the wires in the panel in the cold garage I slipped, cut my hand, and broke a bunch of the plastic on the back of the breaker. I think that this is a sign. Considering that this breaker is shot and that I need a new dedicated 12/3 line to do this right, I think I'll just spring for a 20 amp GFCI breaker in the main panel.