In this day and age saving money on energy bills is always a nice touch but how much does insulation play in the running costs of a spa? In fact it represents the largest proportion of the costs of running the hot tub, at approx £17 to heat up initially depending of capacity of the spa, you want to be sure that maintaining this temperature is cost effective to minimise the total cost.
The first thing to bear in mind is the cover of the spa, this is the most important part of the insulation as the heat will rise from the body of the water in the form of steam. To stop heat escape via steam in its tracks Canadian Spa Co. uses a 5″ tapered down to 3″ premium cover, whereas the rest of the industry typically uses 4″ down to 2″ ( household equivalent = loft insulation)
Next we look at insulation around the shell, there are three types of insulation you can have here – no foam, full foam and partial foam. In the case of no foam as the ambient heat of the spa transfers through the shell and is lost to the surrounding – this is the quickest heat loss style and is a cheap way around not insulating normally quoting ease of service later. Next we have the full foam option which would be a fantastic idea if your spa had no pumps or components – unfortunatley spas have lots of heat generating components so to full foam them in represents a massive fire hazzard so most manufacturers using this method will house the components in the steps – which looses any possibility to use the waste heat as a heat exchange as a transfer to the spa water. Finally we look to our own insulation which is partial foam with a twist. Not only do we spray expanding micropocket foam onto the shell forcing heat transfer to convert rapidly between conduction and convection, but on the panels we incorporate a second layer of foam fronted with an infrared reflecting material to bounce back heat to the shell. In addition to this we also insulate the floor . This triple micropocket foam protection caters to second most source of heat loss (Household equivalent = double glazing)
Finally lets look the finally energy saving feature – smart sensors on the heater. When keeping the water hot theres nothing cool about wasting money by keeping the heater running when the spa has reached full temperature, our spas will maintain the temperature within a half a degree, meaning when your spa is at temperature your not paying to heat the spa.
All these features make the Canadian Spa Co. hot tub a spa for any climate, and a proven contender in the ring for energy efficiency.