I am going to try to make this as nuetral as possible. I won't even mention the spa company I work for
. I work in product development for a portable spa manufacturer. Do your research before you buy any unit from a big box store (Costco, Home Depot, Sams...) Many of the manufacturers that have supplied spas to these stores have gone out of business or changed hands in the last few years and dropped service and warranty contracts. It's been a tough industry in the last 3 years. Most spa companies have dropped slaes by over 65% in that time. We have been lucky to not even be close to that number. A buddy of mine's father in law purchased a Home depot spa a year and a half ago and it had major control and pump issues within the first 6 months of it's install. I would love to hear feedback on the Costco spas.
When you do your home work look for Gecko or Balboa controls. There are a ton of other control companies out there that seem to come and go. These two have been around for along time and you WILL be able to service them. Do not shop for the highest number of jets possible! 80 percent of the time people end up soaking in thier spas on low speed. You want to sit in the spa and make sure it fits your body size and shape. Ideally you would sit in the spa wet and choose the jet layout that best suits your particular needs. (Unless your just looking for a hot bowl of water to sit in, which some people are) The stereo units and speakers on these big box spas are going to cause you problems. I have tested every marine/spa stereo on the market and depending on your climate you will be lucky to get a year or two out of them. If the speakers pop up out of the shell, run. I would recomend an Aquatic AV stereo unit or possible (data is still being collected) a JBL Black box unit (no CD, only runs Ipod, USB and radio). We have had good luck with Bose outdoor speakers.
There is no such thing as a 360 gpm pump for spas! I once had a spa salesman tell me that his pumps generated 500 gpm. His spa used the same pumps that we do, but I have over 50 pumps from different manufacturers and non performed such a number. Our $5k ultasonic flow meeter puts that pump at 185 gpm at 10 psi. Add more jets and you can increase the flow to close to 200 gpm. but you lose pressure and end up with a dog of a spa. Add diverter valves and you rob GPM further. One of the top two spa manufacturers publishes flow data for thier spas 50 gpm greater than what my flow meeter says thier spas run. (yep I had thier spa for over a year at my house). With two pumps the spa could only put out a total of 300 gpm. If the spa uses diverter valve( which I can not recomend), make sure you look over which jets wil be running when diverting water. The two competitor spas I tested did not allow all the jets to run in a single seat at any given time. I could get half the jets in each seat to run, but then would have to divert water to the other jets and lose the original ones. Kind of like not being able to lock your front axle until you unlock your rear
. Look for Aquaflow/gecko pumps. Some Waterway pumpshave good history behind them. Run from any used spa that has Vicko or GE pumps (75% failure rating).
Insulation... We fully foam. There are spa companies out there that will tell you that partial foam or some thin radiant barier is all you need, but my experience shows that a fully foamed spa will be cheaper to heat and stay warmer longer. Very few spa companies have met the new California Energy code requirements without fully foaming thier spas...and you know how crazy those Californians are. I had a sales person explain that they did not fully foam so that the heat from the pumps running would heat the whole shell and thus the water of the spa. While I have no doubt that heat transfer from pump to the water happens, how inneficient is your motor if it is generating that much heat. I want my pump to pump and my heater to heat.
Don't even get me started with chemicals for spas. There's a lot of snake oil out there. In the end it all boils down to the fact that only chlorine and bromine are approved to kill bacteria and other yucky stuff. Since sweat is basically like your body urinating, keep your chemicals in check. I hate to hear about people getting sick just because they didn't take care of thier spa water.
Sorry for the long post. There are a lot of good spas out there from many different manufacturers. Do your homework and enjoy. $4k for a 6 person spa is a very good deal. The sales department would kill me, but don't rule out used spas. It's like cars, you drive them off the lot and they lose value. With spas you can run a heavy duty spa cleaner through the system and several flushes later all the nasties from the PO are gone. I have seen 1 yr old name brand spas sell for less than half of retail. Some of the spas I have seen come through Costco have been alright on most accounts. Again, let me know how things are going 6 moths after your Coscto spa is hooked up. No spa is perfect or without the possibility of having problems, even your top spa company units. Lastely it goes without saying, keep an eye on your kids if you let them in your spa.
