Spa rated breaker?

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Jnewell

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I have a customer who GC’ed his home build and fired his electrician, the inspector called for not having a spa rated breaker on a hot tub. Is anyone familiar with this? I called the local Square D supplier and they didn’t understand either. Is the HACR rating is the same as Spa rated?
 
No, breakers are GFCI. It’s a fancy beach city inspector. Nobody I have talked to has heard of that. Only thing I can think of is they aren’t HACR or he’s being a jerk on purpose.
 
Every inspection I had that was dinged for some infraction had either a code article or a local amendment cited.
That would be my first question to the inspector.
You can’t fix what you don’t understand.


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Maybe he’s trying to teach a lesson to HO wannabe GCs, who fire subs mid-project.

You just install what’s required, he signs off, and the HO thinks you worked some magic.

Just a WAG.
 
The only spa breaker I have seen is inside the control panel but that doesn't mean it is spa rated. It is a breaker designed for the controls of the spa.

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Dennis Alwon said:
I wonder if the inspector is confused by the sale of spa panels at Lowes and other box stores. They are not spa rated they are just sold as spa panels with the gfci breaker.
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Sounds reasonably like I was thinking also.
Is the Inspector looking for a "spa panel". Or is he looking for the nearby disconnect within sight, that a lot of the time has the GFCI within, also seen as a "spa panel"?
 
Jnewell said:
No, breakers are GFCI. It’s a fancy beach city inspector. Nobody I have talked to has heard of that. Only thing I can think of is they aren’t HACR or he’s being a jerk on purpose.
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All listed breakers made since the 90s are HACR even if they are not marked. The standard was changed in the late 90s to require all listed breakers to pass the testing that was required for the HACR marking.
 
Seven-Delta-FortyOne said:
Maybe he’s trying to teach a lesson to HO wannabe GCs, who fire subs mid-project.

You just install what’s required, he signs off, and the HO thinks you worked some magic.

Just a WAG.
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I once took on a small project as a GC that involved pouring a foundation for an electrical building. On the inspection before the pour, I had an inspector insist that the foundation anchor bolts I was using had to be “American made”, because they (I think he) had read a report that Chinese and Indian made anchor bolt threads were pressed in a mold, not cut with a threading machine and thus too weak to hold up to California earthquake standards. Total BS, but my concrete truck was there churning waiting to pour and he was saying no. I jumped in the truck and went to the building supply to ask if they had American made bolts, they had the exact same ones I already had from another source, made in India. I told them the story and they laughed, they had never heard that before. I found a burlap bag of landscape spikes that said Made In America, bought 30 more anchor bolts, put them in the sack and showed up at the job site. Inspector saw the American flag on the sack and after we swapped out the EXACT same bolts, the job could proceed. Silliness…

Afterward, I took the burlap sack back to the supply house and returned the other bolts, told them the story and paid them a $5 “rental fee” for the sack, telling them they should keep it handy in case that idiot flexed his muscle again. That was 20+ years ago, I went by that supply house last year, the sack was nailed up on the wall with a sign saying “$5 rental”, which they told me had prompted a lot of laughs over the years in retelling that story.
 
Jnewell said:
No, breakers are GFCI. It’s a fancy beach city inspector. Nobody I have talked to has heard of that. Only thing I can think of is they aren’t HACR or he’s being a jerk on purpose.
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HACR stands for heating air conditioning and refrigeration. Pretty much all miniature style plug on breakers for the past 35 years or more have all been HACR rated. It's been about that long since you could actually find some that were not HACR rated when they needed to be, in new product anyway.
 
Jraef said:
I once took on a small project as a GC that involved pouring a foundation for an electrical building. On the inspection before the pour, I had an inspector insist that the foundation anchor bolts I was using had to be “American made”, because they (I think he) had read a report that Chinese and Indian made anchor bolt threads were pressed in a mold, not cut with a threading machine and thus too weak to hold up to California earthquake standards. Total BS, but my concrete truck was there churning waiting to pour and he was saying no. I jumped in the truck and went to the building supply to ask if they had American made bolts, they had the exact same ones I already had from another source, made in India. I told them the story and they laughed, they had never heard that before. I found a burlap bag of landscape spikes that said Made In America, bought 30 more anchor bolts, put them in the sack and showed up at the job site. Inspector saw the American flag on the sack and after we swapped out the EXACT same bolts, the job could proceed. Silliness…

Afterward, I took the burlap sack back to the supply house and returned the other bolts, told them the story and paid them a $5 “rental fee” for the sack, telling them they should keep it handy in case that idiot flexed his muscle again. That was 20+ years ago, I went by that supply house last year, the sack was nailed up on the wall with a sign saying “$5 rental”, which they told me had prompted a lot of laughs over the years in retelling that story.
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I had a building plan reviewer turn down the prints on two new pole lights we were putting up, he required the anchor bolts be straight instead of an “L”. He said the “L”’s would pull out! He was from California.
 
hillbilly1 said:
I had a building plan reviewer turn down the prints on two new pole lights we were putting up, he required the anchor bolts be straight instead of an “L”. He said the “L”’s would pull out! He was from California.
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The science involved works different in CA though.
 
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