There is a 30 AMP braker on the main panel, going to the pool. A 20 AMP breaker on the pool panel for the pump, 15 AMP breaker for the lights, and another 15 AMP breaker for the heater, which I have just replaced ( had an old hayward 400K BUT, but it develop a crack, and I replaced with a Sta-Rite SR400HD, which was working pretty good until this happened
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So, the ligths have been giving me some headaches for the last couple of years. They used to work fine, but all of a sudden, now, they work for about 3 or 4 minutes and the breaker trips. I did not think any of it, and did not fix it, or tried to fix it, because I do not use them that much ( not much night swimming ). I think it could be because when the pump and the ligths are on at the same time, they might be drawing more juice than they need, but in that case, I would expect that the main breaker on the main panel would trip, but it does not. So, I am working on replacing the breakers on the pool side to see if the problem is a faulty breaker.
NOW, I got the new heater, it was installed, working fine for about 3 weeks. Had some friends over, tons of kids in the pool, swiming late, filter is going, spa is on ( bubble jets ), and the heater is OFF. On its on breaker. Heater worked fine the day before.
Turned the ligths on, for the kids, they all got excited, but 4 or 5 minutes later, breaker tripped
Oh well, nothing new here. Went to turn on the heater, and it goes through the normal startup procedure, but when the electric pilot is supposed to ignite the gas on the chamber, it does not, and the "Service light" comes on
The next day, I took a look inside, and there is an Led for diagnostics, which flashes 3 times constantly, indicating "Ignition Lockout".
I might be crazy here, but the heater was working fine, until the lights tripped the breaker, and now it does not. The heater and the lights are on different breakers. This does not make sense to me
One thing that might have made a difference is that the heater can run at 220V or 110V, and the breaker initially installed was a 2 pole breaker, and one of the poles was off when the ligths breaker tripped. Do not ask me how this could have happened. I turned the breaker heater breaker off and on, and the problem continued. Because the heater is running on 120 V, I later swtiched the breaker to a single pole, 15 AMP, and the problem is still there.
I am calling Sta-Rite, as I believe my ignition control module might be faulty, but I am trying to understand how the lights tripping, could influence on the heater's operation.
Any ideas ?
Thanks,
Henrique