What I wish I knew before buying a swim spa.

how the heck did you get started doing something like this grew up on a dairy farm so I always knew how to do everything Zach you're good if I can actually grab away this insulation I can pull it apart and I can access any Plumbing line on this unit like I said we're doing it Egyptian style finish it up by wiring it and filling it and putting chemicals but that's our job not the wiring part if she weared it we jump in [Music] all right guys we are making some changes let's just lay this out there your back is gone not completely but it hurts yeah what's going on with it osteoarthritis Hern discs I've had a couple of lesions take medication can't work out can't run can't do anything like I used to do and gaining weight which I've done a lot of makes it worse well because sometimes you be walking and you just kind of it'll make me stop yeah it'll make Burns it hurts yeah but we're not giving up we're going to get a swim spa we're going to pick one up we're going to take you guys along for the ride we're going to install it we're going to let you know how this thing goes cuz if you guys are having back pains don't give up on yourself when you when you stop using it you lose it that's what happened to my dad at least he got himself one of those little mobile chairs remember yep and I told him you're not getting one and he's like I want one get me one and I'm like no I'm not getting a mobile chair like he'd s in the chair he was like 72 3 years old MH he figured it out on his own he got himself his own mobile chair and and so we'd be in we'd be in Target with his Cane sideways in the front he'd be going down the aisles knocking everything off the shelves on both sides of the aisle I got in trouble by the nursing home because they're like uh can you come in we need to just we need to talk about your dad and I'm like what and I sit in like I'm going into school talking to the principal and they're like um your dad is offering all the nurse wheelchair rides good for him or any of them accepting him the sad part was he only lasted a month right after he stopped moving he he stopped walking and a month 30 days later he he passed away you got to keep moving I don't care if your back can't hold you up move in water at least that's what we're going to try to do never stop moving I hope you guys never stop moving and we're not going to stop moving because now we're going to head to master spot we're going to meet with Oliver and we're going to check these things out and try to figure out what works and what doesn't work and what may be the best what may work for you guys if you're in the market for one and blah blah blah but she's not she's not going with she's sending me on all the errands today I have my own errands my children yes my children all right let's go all right guys I'm going to jump in here because it's been a couple weeks since I've gotten my swim spot and two big things have happened one I made one mistake which I don't want you guys to make when I bought my swims spa and number two I almost made a mistake that I would have regretted the entire time I had my swim spot because the one I went in to buy is not the one I walked out of the store with and I am so absolutely grateful because if I would have bought the one were originally looking at I would have never been happy and I'm going to tell you why in just a few moments all right guys I'm at masterpol and Spa and one of the things I noticed and first up they're not paying me a dime to make a video at all in fact I'm paying them I'm buying the spa from them but one of the things I noticed when we were shopping for one of these things it felt a little like going walking in into a used car dealer guys this is Oliver Oliver what I'm saying to these guys is a lot of the places we walked into I would turn around and walk out within minutes because I felt like I was a piece of meat walking in sure I was getting eyeballed up and down I was like they're going to flip they're going to flip and dip me they're going to grill put me on the grill and they're just going to get as much out of me as possible and they didn't really care I didn't I never got that feeling from you that's when the first time I met Oliver I was I was pretty short with you wasn't I yeah real short oh definitely maybe three to four words yeah I was done I was done with sales people I was so done by the time my wife drugged me into this place that I sat here and I wouldn't even freaking look at Oliver I'm just like how's this guy going to screw me and I finally for the first time felt good about where I was at sure and then started to call you with questions and this guy was Johnny on the spot I called him yesterday we were digging in the line hey what kind of uh Power System well we need it's a 60% of this and blah blah blah and he's going over all this thing and I'm standing there with my electrician going yeah this is a good dude this is a good dude so if you're in Minnesota Master tooling Spa look up Oliver but what do we need to know because there's there is scams out there most definitely and it's really comes down to you know the different companies that are providing some that may not be what it what it really is and uh you there's it's a very competitive industry and you really have to go back down to the foundation of the product and kind of understand what you're getting on multiple different levels okay and so that's what we really try to break down to our customers or you know potential customers is hey you're getting this it feels like this we're showing you on the floor we have different videos across the board and we're very knowledgeable on our back end the problem is the spa that we're bringing in is 15 1/2 ft long or 15t long and the gate is 9 ft wide it's not going to fit in the way we want it to so we're going to have to do it on the end which means we're going to have to do it like the Egyptians used to do and put crap underneath it and roll it up and push it and pry it and heave and hoe and do whatever we got to do to get it to go through cuz it's not going to fit through this gate otherwise so we're not buying this based on price we're buying this based on a lot of the different factors that we have started to understand will you walk us through what those are yeah most definitely and I think uh you know going back down the foundation is the foundation of the shell this is going to hold up your entire water weight spanning from 15,000 lb to almost 25,000 lbs of water weight inside these units and so what do we need to know about the show why is that important a ton of companies and manufacturers what you're going to find is that they hang up the shell on the upper neck of the product so a piece of metal or 2x4 is actually hanging this from the top down and what Master spots is we build out a self-supporting shell so this entire footwell area of the product it's not going to bend to my weight it's not going to bend to the water and you're going to have something that's going to be structurally sound for the lightspan that you own it so what happens with the ones that are hung what what I'm going to show you here is if I step into this system and I were to jump into the middle of the shell what anyone can do or any consumer at a a dealership or you know a trade show can do is you can actually jump in the middle of the shell to see if it bends to your weight and what you find that if you're I'm about 200 lb myself is that you actually Flex the bottom of the shell because there's Plumbing lines or it's hung up on the upper neck here okay and so over time it starts to warp and kind of dissipate oh I I bet over time it it could crack too then it could crack yeah hairline fractures in the upper neck of the spa are are very common especially when you have jet fittings okay so you know what you're going to find is that you know a hairline fracture down to its weakest point is the hole in the shelf so if I pop out this fitting for example you're going to see that is's a hole in the Shell carrying that jet fitting and you're going to see the crack lead right to it okay if it's hung up on its upper neck instead of from the ground up okay I think we can do it so I said I made two mistakes when I was buying this hot tub well I made one big mistake and nearly avoided a complete disaster thanks to that guy all iiver but the mistake I did make I'm going to show you right now I decided to install this thing myself I thought it sounded like a fun challenge to try to fit a 15 and 1/2t Swim Spa through a 9 foot gate somehow because you know why not I like to do everything myself even stuff I shouldn't do so let's go there right now and see exactly what I'm talking about and then that near disaster I avoided I promise you I'm going to tell you what it was and I don't don't want you guys to do the same thing I did he's got his Forks there oh man man oh man all right guys this is Oliver yeah and this is Kevin how are you sir good are you nice to meet you you too how you doing that's Zach guys nice to meet you Oliver thanks for coming all right so we'll uh I'll show you all the way back you can just drive right straight back Kevin we got it all set up yeah awesome cuz when you jump into a shell that's not built to support the water weight for its lifespan you're going to see failures over time and that's coming down to a couple year product versus a 20 25 30e product right so huge quality differences there okay what else do we need to be aware of so the shell is one thing how it's constructed how it's supported sure sure okay but what else the insulation of the product right operating fost goes ownership right so what what Master Spa does is build an AR 38 installation Canadian icing on all four sides that's retaining heat open cell and so what you can come over here and take a look at actually it's a pretty weak way to insulate a spa nowadays so that's what other people are doing a lot of companies are running this or just a little foam board it's called perimeter insulation that funnels around the perimeter of the unit and and what you're going to see in a Northern climate or Pacific Northwest is that to not be very sustainable so I would imagine that if you don't have that heater cranked up right one that one mistaken night and you got a system that's blown out where's your installation yeah so I can show you on a hot tub here um and do you do all of them the same Oliver yeah every system has a full Canadian icine insulation on Canadian iine yep iine yep correct what the heck is that word you know that's that's a little past my pay grade I'll tell you that but uh what you're going to find here is you know I pulled out the lot to show customers but I can actually grab away this insulation I can pull it apart and I can access any Plumbing line on this unit so it's not hard cell it's open cell yeah oh I don't know if that rings a bell with you guys but that also means that the air can penetrate into this insulation which improves its insulation Factor correct so that's huge closed cell the air can't penetrate and that also makes it harder and brittle over time and that decreases its R value correct and then and on top of that you can't access anything on a hard cell without chewing it away with a back end or hammer or Sala so it's very timec consuming to to access it so your insallation looks the same but it's fundamentally different correct Zach I don't know if that's the best spot for you but it is what it is just he's good yeah yeah you're good Zach you're good yeah good thinking Zach good thinking abil that frecker has to go through that and we have that much space legitimately on each side of it so we may end up popping this gate off just in case we don't know yet what was that that F what does that show fat guy in a little jacket the heck is the name of that movie oh my God dud I do thank you yeah so he's got special Forks Kevin has he's they're just longer they don't depend on fork extensions and they get super thin at the end I guess they're he selected them for this kind of work and he's got pipe like I said we're doing it Egyptian style yep they are okay that's want to double CH yep for sure turn that way okay what else do we need to know yeah the components of the spa is is a really really big deal uh when you jump into the components of a system you want to stick with OEM so baloa and gecko components are the top two manufacturers for okay so we got to jump in here because yeah I I found out that a lot of the cheaper ones are also running the same components that you guys are running right and it's the greater components like a lot a lot of our swim spots are going to have variable speed pumps and connect to the motherboard a little bit differently and and what you're going to see there is is longer lifespans and then on top of that there are different on on every component manufacturer so just like you can get a cheap Ford F-150 you can also get the highend F1 King Ranch or a platinum yes so you can get the better one up exactly so it's not just the name of the components it's What level in those components that you're using are you saying you guys are using the highest end highest end components possible yep highest end okay possible so there's no grades above them that somebody else is using that you guys aren't relative in the spa industry yes okay so components what else do we need to know so guys Oliver doesn't normally do installs he's actually my salesperson I just invited him with to see if he wanted to come with Kevin is a oneman ban this is what this is Kevin this is what you do all the time uh yeah part of it how the heck did you get started doing something like this uh I grew up on a dairy farm so I always knew how to do everything my parents never uh okay we never hired anybody to do anything so you always had to learn yeah okay most of this is just math science gravity so for some reason I thought this would be a fun challenge to try to maneuver this swim spa in wrong I learned after the fact that I could have avoided all of this if I would have just hired a crane and it would have only cost cost me about 400 bucks to have this thing picked up lifted in and just set right where it needed to go and what you're going to find with a lot of you know more lower end or or scammy companies is a lot of small little bullet head Jets on the seat so you decrease the flow of the water right so if I were to jump into this hot tub this the Michael Phelps 900 very similar to our our Twi our Twilight series very similar to the back end of all of our swim Spas is every jet head's going to be 3 in up top and and five in and so you're going to see a ton of flow off something like this bigger Plumbing lines a bigger impeller off the pump more gallons per minute to those seats and a better massage on your back okay one last question Oliver for guys that can't come here and stand next to you and ask you questions sure what would you tell them if they're out looking for a spa I don't care what brand I don't care who it is sure what are the things that they need to know so they don't get screwed over because I I looked at spas that were Swim Spa that were half of the price sure and I'm I'm like no this is the one that we're getting because of what I've learned what would you tell them what do they got to do shell insulation components and then the filtration is a big one as well what do we need to know about filtration so filtration on the back side here uh Master spot majority of our swim spots you stand there stand you're going to find that we have a filter well cap here it's going to pop off okay very straight forward to take it out not a big debris plate Leaf grass anything that's a little bit bigger floating around your unit but it's pressurized it can do about 400 gallons every 5 to 7 Minutes through the housing here okay so you don't see scum floating inside your system and then running a nonproprietary pleat like pleat coal filter okay with a mineral system uh to to help with algicide and take away heavy metal in the system these are very very valuable okay so these thread right in you get a long lightband on a filter like this all the oil the bre the collection of the scum that's what these are made for and having that pressurized so so it's not something you see every day his girlfriend's appendix burst a few hours ago yeah Prett much middle of the night and if you look at if you look at Oliver's eyes they're bloodshot cuz he hasn't slept and here he is at my house working holy crap I'm like go home Oliver go to the hospital Oliver go do whatever you got to do yeah no she's fine oh yeah we're tough well I hope she's okay though yeah is how is she doing uh you I mean I haven't talked to her since the surgery but it's but yeah everything is good it's a pretty uh I think a straightforward deal you know so still freaking scarer than I'll get off so it's a push and pull Zach's going to be in one and I'll be in the other and the problem is is that that that machine the controls are crap like legitimately crap I'm surprised you grab that instead of the cast [Applause] motor we got to slide over Zach you're good you're good she's going to she's going to slide back on you and you're spinning on them yeah I know spin on those damn slat tracks and that lip yeah that could be a challenge I don't think the mini has enough power BL through thing either yeah it does the whole hot tub weighs what 2,300 lb mini look got 2400 2400 lb and you're not lifting it you're just picking it up pushing it but that lip sucks no matter what you're in right I would I would take the extensions off then you can get in further without being underneath the tub oh good idea and then uh then you can get up there yeah back out take you got to tip your for down they are down okay so so now we're out in the forks ah you can just go on the sides of them yeah that's fine or or I can pull them I got my bar I can pull up now let keep the forks down so that you don't run into the side of the problem is that back end of that's going to come up yeah that that's going to he's in a he's in a tough spot right there to push just back out Zach back out back out I don't want to puncture the tub if we've got to strap it and pull it we'll just strap it and pull it I don't know if that's going to work Kevin can we just strap the tub and pull it up the hill a little bit so cuz that he's he's on that lip where you don't wait we can but the frame's not really made do that oh okay we can't really push on it either uh if we had a if we had a piece of wood could we push on it or no h no you know there's a 2x4 frame that holds up the skirting you know every 16 in 20 in there uh um it just doesn't hold up the shell so it's pretty loose I would say if you're try to push on it Kevin if we took if we took a piece of wood here Zach you want to get the cast loader you feel better in that machine this will work this has got the power to push it up but the cast owner should push it up too don't matter it's whatever you feel best then well if we can't if we can't get it over this lip I'll probably get the cast P loer we I can just just use the front plate and just push it well we can't push on the frame I just asked okay and we can also get the miniac and and push that way too if we could but lift it with a strap or something there we go yeah we could all right let's see how that works it'll work now farm boy says it'll work no that's right just got to take that deep Boll out of there you just got to slap it and say that's not going anywhere down down oh you made it down now hold on right there pick it up a little bit come in a little bit more sorry try to hook that slat track should stop there lift it straight up please put the parking breake on so don't go back I got to be careful this thing launches the moon yeah the controls on this skid loader don't work…