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Posted by RBM on July 23, 2008, 4:56 pm
>
>> Hi, I have a couple of questions about my swimming pool light..
>>
>> We recently rebuilt a 40 year old inground pool. There was an old
>> light in the pool when it was new, deactivated years ago. The niche
>> was left in place and the cavity was covered over during a past liner
>> change.
>>
>> Now this spring we excavated the old niche, replaced with a new
>> Hayward plastic niche and Astrolite, 300 watt, 12 volt. New
>> transformer in the basement of the home.
>>
>> I hired an electrician to wire transformer and light, and we did not
>> have the instruction sheet for the light at that time.
>>
>> After receiving the instruction sheet, I find electrician has missed
>> several key points and i'd some opinions on how serious a problem I
>> have here.
>>
>> First, the instructions indicate the conduit from the niche must
>> continue all the way to the basement and terminate a foot above water
>> level. What electrician has done is no conduit, underground cable from
>> house to junction box at ground level on pool deck, and cut pool light
>> cable at that point and connected inside weatherproof junction box.
>> There is approximately 4 feel of plastic conduit from niche to the
>> junction box, sealed with silicon.
>>
>> Second, instructions indicate the niche itself should be grounded and
>> the ground wire encapsulated. This did not happen. I could easily
>> snake a ground wire through the conduit and into the niche, but i
>> cannot encapulate now since the pool is full of water and cannot be
>> drained down the niche level without risking pulling new liner out of
>> the coping track. Without encapsulation, the copper ground will
>> rapidly corrode and break, since this is a "wet" niche which fills
>> with water.
>>
>> I am very concerned about the safety of this install, and could really
>> use some opinion from
>> someone with more electrical experience than me.
>
>
> Did the electrical inspector approve this installation?
>
> According to the electrical code 680.24(A)(2)(c) Flush deck box. If used
> on a lighting system operating at 15 volts or less, a flush deck box shall
> be permitted if both of the following apply:
> (1) An approved potting compound is used to fill the box to prevent the
> entrance of moisture.
> (2) The flush deck box is located not less than 4' from the inside wall of
> the pool.
>
> However if the manufacturer provided very specific instructions that must
> be followed, than the installation needs to be redone. You could contact
> the manufacturer to find out if it is okay to deviate as long as the
> installation is code compliant.
>
> The most common type of pool lighting installation has deck boxes mounted
> around 8" high above the deck with the conduits coming into the bottom.
> They are usually located toward the back edge of the pool deck so that
> they are out of sight and to avoid a tripping hazard. By keeping the deck
> boxes 8" high there is no chance that water from the pool will get into
> them.
>
> I don't recall ever seeing underground cable being used in a pool deck for
> lighting. It is usually conduit.
>
> This circuit must be GFI protected.
>
> I hope that you installed the #8 solid copper bonding wire and mesh in the
> deck. The niche probably needs to be bonded to this with a #8 solid as
> well.
>
> Contact your pool company and ask them for suggestions.
I don't know of any exception that would allow direct burial to a deck box,
but as for the wet niche, if it's plastic, there would be nothing to attach
a bond to
>
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