Is 40 Amps Enough for a Whirlpool Walk-In Tub With a Dual Drain?

No. An Ella hydro massage (whirlpool) walk-in tub is not designed to run on one large 40 amp circuit. Every jetted Ella tub is built for dedicated 20 amp, 120 volt circuits with ground fault protection, one circuit for each labeled power cord, and the therapy package you choose sets how many of those circuits you need, as Can I Reuse My Old Hot Tub Wiring for an Ella Walk-In Tub? explains. The dual drain your contractor keeps hearing about is Ella's T-type drain body with four 2 inch ports. It sits on the side of the tub opposite the door and lets the house drain connect from either side or both.

Why a 40 Amp Breaker Is the Wrong Size

The circuit a hot tub or an older whirlpool left behind is often a 40 amp line, and it is tempting to treat the larger breaker as extra headroom. It is not. The control boxes on an Ella tub are labeled to connect only to a branch circuit protected at 20 amps or less, so a 40 amp breaker is outside what the equipment is listed for, and your electrician should not feed the tub from it. The breaker and wire that served the old equipment were sized for that equipment, not for your walk-in tub, and nothing about them is known to match the tub until they are checked against the published requirement.

That requirement is the same for every jetted Ella tub: each labeled cord leaving the equipment compartment equals one dedicated 20 amp, 120 volt circuit with ground fault protection, shared with no other appliance, and ending at a receptacle the cord can reach inside the compartment. A licensed electrician makes five checks on any existing circuit before anything is plugged in:

1. Voltage. Every Ella requirement is written for 120 volt equipment, so a circuit wired for anything else is rewired or replaced rather than adapted.
2. Breaker rating. The published standard is 20 amps, so a 40 amp breaker is replaced with a correctly rated one, or a new line is run.
3. A dedicated circuit. The tub may not share its line with a bathroom outlet or any other load.
4. How the ground fault protection is arranged, since every circuit feeding the tub must have it.
5. Where the circuit ends, which must be a receptacle the labeled cord can reach inside the equipment compartment.

Why not go the other way and use a 15 amp line? On a hydro package the pump and the in-line heater run at the same time, and a 15 amp line can overload when both draw current at once. Ella publishes two exceptions: the Flow is the one Ella tub specified at 15 amps, and a soaking tub whose only electrical item is the heated seat and backrest needs a 15 amp, 120 volt line because it has no pumps.

How Many 20 Amp Circuits Your Package Needs

Because every labeled cord gets its own circuit, the number of circuits follows the therapy package rather than the model name. A plain soaking tub with no jets and no heated seat needs no outlet at all. A hydro massage tub needs one or two dedicated circuits depending on the package, and the fullest packages on the ShaK, the Big4One and the two seat tubs call for three lines. The MicroBubble pump shows why the count matters: it runs on its own independent 20 amp circuit, so it can be completely dead from a tripped breaker while every other jet on the tub works, which is the first check in MicroBubble Pump Will Not Run: Dedicated 20-Amp Circuit, Air Hose, Fan Screw and Breather Cap.

The master control box video shows what those cords feed. A master control box takes the water pump, the air pump, the heated seat pads and the LED chromatherapy light, with the push buttons connected to it by small air tubes, and it has one power inlet. On one of the two boxes in the video that inlet is an ordinary three prong plug, and on the other it is a true 20 amp plug with one horizontal blade, the kind that only fits a 20 amp receptacle from an electrical supply store. Whichever plug your tub carries, the published rule for the circuit behind it does not change. Ella's guidance for its Pet Spa, which runs on the same kind of dedicated 20 amp, 120 volt GFCI circuit, is to press the test button on the ground fault device and confirm it trips, then reset it, and to leave the power off and call a licensed electrician if the device will not test or will not reset, as Why Won't the Pump on My Ella Pet Spa Turn On? describes. Your electrician can prove out the walk-in tub's new line the same way before the tub arrives.

What a Dual Drain Is

A standard bathtub in a house drains through a 1.5 inch line. An Ella walk-in tub instead carries two 2 inch drains, each with its own opener and each operating independently, and a 2 inch pipe carries four times the volume of water of a 1.5 inch pipe. The installer in the dual drain video opens the panel to show the two drains side by side and describes what the pair feels like in use: open drain one and the tub empties at a good pace, open drain two as well and the water leaves far faster.

Mechanically, the dual drain is a T-type drain body with four 2 inch ports. Each drain has a port on both sides, so the drain pipe can be installed in either direction. The house drain connects on either side or both, and the two ports that are not used are closed with the 2 end caps that come with the tub. The drains sit on the side of the tub opposite the door: a right-side door tub has its drains on the left, and a left-side door tub has its drains on the right as you face the tub. Choosing a door side therefore also chooses the drain side, which is the opposite of the Pet Spa, whose drain stays in one place on every unit, as Where the Pet Spa Drain Is and Whether the Door Side Changes It explains.

What the Dual Drain Means for Your Contractor

• Bring the house drain to either side of the drain body or to both, and cap the unused ports with the 2 included end caps.
• Where the tub's drain line meets a 2 or 3 inch house drain, a Y fitting is preferred over a T.
• Clearance under the tub is set by the leveling legs, which leave about 3 inches between the floor and the frame, enough room for 2 inch PVC.
• An existing 1.5 inch house line is normal. The installer in the video answers the common worry directly: two 2 inch drains work on an ordinary house drain, and the second drain simply speeds the emptying.

Ella does not send technicians. The drain parts arrive with the tub, a local licensed plumber makes the drain connections, and a licensed electrician runs the circuits. The team at (800) 480-6850 answers your contractor's questions about either step.

A Pre-Delivery Checklist

1. Confirm the therapy package on your order and count the labeled power cords it will have, since that is the number of dedicated circuits.
2. Have the electrician run one dedicated 20 amp, 120 volt, ground fault protected line per cord to a receptacle inside the equipment compartment. The old 40 amp breaker is not reused for the tub.
3. Note the door side on your order. The drains will be on the opposite side.
4. Have the plumber plan the run from the T-type drain body to the house drain, with a Y fitting at a 2 or 3 inch line and end caps on the unused ports.
5. Confirm the drain route fits in the roughly 3 inches under the frame before the floor is finished.

Related Guides

• Electrical requirements by model: dedicated GFCI circuits for your walk-in tub
• How Many GFCI Circuits Does My Walk-In Tub Need?
• What Size Water Heater Do I Need for My Walk-in Tub?

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