Grassroots Hot Tub Transporting

So SWMBO and I are in the process of having a vacation/rental cabin built about an hour away from where we live in a very popular hiking/climbing/nature area where we've gone and stayed at rental cabins ourselves for the last 3+ years. One of the things we've enjoyed most about our stays at the cabins has been that they have all had hot tubs to soak in, and by and large having one is a requirement of the rental group we'll be listing ours with.

Now a decent-size new hot tub will easily run $5000 or more, which while effectively a drop in the bucked compared to the cost of constructing the cabin itself, it's still a place we're hoping to save some money- and the plan to do so is to pick up a decent-condition used hot tub as there is never a shortage of them up for sale (or to be given away) on Craigslist.

Obviously any used one would need to be very thoroughly cleaned and gone over to ensure that it would work properly when being used at a rental property- but those are things that don't really worry me too much and are well within my comfort-zone for things to do. However, where I'm having difficulty is figuring out how to transport one. Pretty much every one that is large enough for what we want is also going to be like 7' one a side at a minimum- and I've so far not found any rental trailers that are wider than about 6' on the inside.

Does anyone have any experience with this and any advice to offer? Though the cabin will take some time to build, we're hoping to find and pick up a hot tub soon so I'll have time to make sure it's in good shape before we need to get it out to the cabin. Thanks!

Search Youtube.  There is lots of advice.  

Most hot tubs are trailered wide and then tilted on their sides for final movement around the site.  

Custom gray trailer with integrated red dolly:  

Small world, in another life, right out of grad school, ya know, long before I got a job actually "using my degree," I worked for the inventor of the Spa Toter. I did CAD/CNC and a lot of design work. I actually drew plans for that thing John Welsh posted pictures of. I took measurements from one of the original versions that was built way before they ever even thought about CAD, and got them in a format to easily reproduce them.

In reply to Ashyukun (Robert) :

Let me know when you find one you want, I have access to fairly big trailers if needed.  

Rent or borrow an open deck snowmobile trailer?

KyAllroad (Jeremy) said:

In reply to Ashyukun (Robert) :

Let me know when you find one you want, I have access to fairly big trailers if needed.  

Cool, thanks!

Thanks for the suggestions everyone! I'm just glad that I won't have to worry about getting the hot tub up the hill to the cabin itself- I imagine that the construction crew will be using some heavy equipment for that...

I bought mine off CL.  We rolled it on cut sections of PVC pipe to get it to the street.  Then I put it on my 4 x 8 trailer.  I just had to add some 4x8 braces to raise it higher than the wheels.  With straps, it was solid as could be.  Then we rolled it to my back porch on the same PVC pipes.  

In the past few years, I have only replaced the recirc pump (do this ASAP) and the circuit board.  If yours is newer than mine, the circuit board is probably just fine, mine was quite old and was blowing fuses. I also added a better drain line and replaced a lot of busted pipes.  The recirc pump failed when it was -10 and that let everything freeze and the lines busted.  

STM317 said:

Rent or borrow an open deck snowmobile trailer?

This seems to be how they typically get hauled around in my neck of the woods, but of course snowmobile trailers are pretty common in Minnesota.  :)

We moved a buddy of mine's by setting it upside down across the bed rails of his pickup truck.  It rode that way for a couple hundred highway miles with no issue at all.

The ones I've bought used were pretty small, so I was able to have a couple friends put it on its side and we used a heavy duty dolly to roll it out and then we just muscled it/rolled it up into the bed of my truck.  Fortunately it was a very low S10 so it was pretty easy.  Trailer is a great way to go as well.

Suggestion:  When buying one, take a look at the guts of it.  If you buy a self-contained one (like most are), many of them have very proprietary parts with custom installations.  If a part fails (or if its advertised something like "works well but doesn't get hot") you might be roped into buying expensive replacement parts from a manufacturer that no longer exists.  Sometimes you can modify things and customize, but sometimes its just bloody hard.  They do a good job of making you buy their stuff.

One of mine (freebie from CL) had a bad circ pump (the low volume pump that circulates water for heating).  It was a custom housing with cast-in plastic piping that attached much like a sink drain; a threaded ring kinda deal.  I nursed the pump along by rebuilding it with some epoxy and a replacement bearing from an old burned up circular saw, but it eventually died again.  I replaced it with a small water pump from HD and just cut the pipes in the tub and attached it with some clear vinyl tubing and clamps.  When the heating unit died, I got lucky and it used a standard heating unit like you would find in a residential water heater.  Some use a ribbon-type thing installed in the plumbing and it isn't easy to find.

I kept mine running with some creativity and $50, but used hot tubs are one of those things that can be very costly.

You can often get lucky and find a filter that will work since most of them just slide over a tube.  In a pinch once I used a gym sock to keep the hair out.  Not recommended. 

In reply to Curtis :

Yeah, I'm quite aware that hot tubs are kind of like cheap Porsches. :P But if we can get one for a fraction of what they are new then having to buy a few proprietary parts should still keep us under the cost of a new one.

I hadn't thought of flipping it upside down to transport it- one of the concerns of just putting it on the rails is that a modest number of the ones I've found have suspect enclosures that I'd worry about failing if loaded at a few small points vs. sitting on a wider platform. But flipping it upside down would mean that the tub itself would be holding the load, which should be more secure.

A few moving dollies, and a rental truck with a lift gate?   From what I see flipping it on its side is the way to go.   Along with a crew of muscle.

if you pick up a used hot tub look for one with the most jets (a 7x7 tub should have at least 40 jets)

as far as replacement parts websites like spaguts.com are great for replacement parts for way less money

other than the circuit board all the other circuits are pretty generic ie heater blower and pump the difference being 110/220

and hp ratings for the pumps

if you have a problem and it starts tripping the breaker simply disconnect one circuit at a time so you can isolate the problem

its not rocket science

uhaul truck. Low deck height, ramps, it's all you need

In reply to Ashyukun (Robert) :

Wait...you have a DeLorean and a hot tub? How many time machine starter kits do you need? What’s next, a police box?

Just realized that I had never posted any follow-up to this...

Given the challenge of getting the tub over the wall where it was originally, I opted to simply pay a moving company that specialized in moving hot tubs to move it from the seller's place to my house. The good: it went pretty quickly and they did a good job. The bad: it cost more to have it moved than I paid for the hot tub itself. Took this shortly after it was delivered- not much has changed since then other than the grass being much greener:

Unfortunately in moving it the movers found (and pointed out to me, not that I couldn't see it easily myself) that the lower wood frame on the tub is badly rotted- a common problem for older ones like it. So I need to replace the wood before I do anything else- something that will start getting tackled most likely in a month at the earliest with the other things I have on my plate.

I can't wait TOO long though as with the weather better work should actually be starting on the cabin, and I need to have it ready to move out there once they have the deck & subfloors done as it will be much easier to get up there then vs. having to potentially crane it over the completed cabin to the back side where it will be (will still potentially require a crane to get it moved... we'll see...).