Here is a question about a tanning bed that is older than half the visitors to the site!

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Dear TanningBeds.org,

Glad to find this site. I need help… Do not want to burn up tanning bed. In the past week I was given a Suntana SunSystem bed that came out of a tanning salon. It is a 1984, Model SB-3, 26 Amp, 120 VAC and 24 bulbs.

It has a 4 pin connector that plugs into the back with a Red, Green, Black and whit wire. Only the Red wire was connected to 2 smaller wies that were twisted together that ran up in the cieling. At the other end ( At the front desk) was a two bed timer…Also a Suntana with one Wire for bed 1 another for bed 2 and one bare wire. Can one wire be enough to start the bed or am I missing something that was hiding in the cieling ? Such as a transformer or Relay ? The bed worked fine before but will not power up without the timer.

Signed,
Bob
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Ok, just talked my friend Ron Murphy. He has been in the industry for 25 years, and verified what I first thought. There aren’t many of us still around that remember those beds! Fortunately, if you are handy or have access to someone who is, setting up won’t be too painful. You will need to do some quick tests with a volt meter, but it won’t be hard to figure out.

Of the four wires in the timer port, the green is ground, the white is neutral. The key is the red and black wires. One is the “always hot” leg, the other is the “switched leg” that goes to the relay to turn the bed on. To test this you have to test to see which wire is HOT when the bed is connected to power. Obviously, this is very dangerous if you don’t know what you are doing.

Normally that went to a powered timer (We sell similar ones for about $25 with no housing or knob). The timer itself is powered by 120V (thus the neutral wire and the always hot wire). When the timer is ON, then it connects the always hot wire to the other wire (either red or black, testing will tell) which turns on the relay.

The coil of the relay (the actual switching part, typically labelled A1 and A2 or similar) will have one leg always connected to neutral, and when it gets power from the trigger wire via the timer, it turns on. This allows the power from the Load side of the relay to go through to the Line side, thus the bed is on.

If you don’t have the original timer, you would have to make one. You can use a plastic box, say 6″x6″ and 3″ deep. You would buy the 120V timer first, for measuring. Also nice to get a fuse housing and a 3amp fuse. You would drill a hole in the center to mount the timer, and two small holes for the screws that hold the timer in place, plus a hole for the fuse holder (if used) and for the incoming cord. You would use SO grade cable (18 guage is plenty good, 4 conductor) that you can buy from any home improvement store by the foot. You would interupt the “always hot” leg with the fuse. You also want a strain relief for the SO cable.

Connecting it all together isn’t as hard as it may seem, and I would just call whoever you buy the timer element from once you know which color (red or black) is the trigger and which is the “always hot”. If you are using the bed at home, about 8 foot of the SO cable is plenty. If you don’t have a plug to connect the remote timer with (likely) then you will have to hard wire it.

Assuming you are pretty handy, this should get you going. It may take a little time, but that is a good bed and the company I work for has all the parts you need plus other parts for the SB-3, like hydraulic cylinders, etc. at 1-800-274-1744 (ext. 127 is Archie, who handles parts, or ext. 121 is Ron who really knows that bed) or you can check around with anyone else that sells parts. Good luck, and tell me how it goes!

Dennis