Most people do not see the need to upgrade their home’s electrical system when everything seems in perfect condition. It is essential to note that a poor electrical system can function as if it is in good shape. However, the system will break down when you do not even expect it. It is hazardous to have a substandard electrical system, warns RentSmartUSA.com, because it can lead to terrible incidents such as electrocutions, house fires, or even death.
Since the electrical system is hidden behind the walls and ceiling, most people tend to forget it until there is a sudden breakdown. It will be best not to wait for your electrical system to fail before updating it. Several undesirable things may occur before the system fails.
7 reasons you need to upgrade your home’s electrical system
1) Reduce electrical bills
An outdated electrical system may manifest as high energy bills and lower energy efficiency. That happens because old electrical wires have poor insulation and lose electricity through heat. As a result, the system will use up more energy. Upgrading your electrical system will help you lower your energy bills.
2) Enhance the home’s safety
Most of the house fires that happen every year in the United States are due to electrical faults that an update can prevent. Also, electrocutions are more common in homes with old electrical systems. That is because the cables undergo wear and tear. As a result, they lose their insulating abilities. However, you can prevent these hazards by updating your home’s electrical system.
3) Increase the lifespan of your electrical appliances
Outdated electrical cables fail to deliver the appropriate power supply to appliances. That is because they have poor insulation and lose energy to the surroundings. Devices receiving energy from such electrical systems will experience stress and perform below optimal levels. As a result, their lifespan will decrease. It would be best to upgrade your electrical system to maintain your appliances’ lifespan.
4) Take advantage of home renovation
We advise homeowners to perform an electrical upgrade during home renovation for several reasons. It is easier to perform updates during this time because the walls are torn down. The electrical upgrade will not be expensive during this time because the electrician is not the one taking the walls apart. Also, adding an extra room or footage will require electrification. All these make it beneficial to perform an electrical system update during renovation.
5) Bring the home’s electrical system up to code
Building codes undergo regular updates. With the implementation of new safety standards, building codes may vary in an area over time. Your home may need an electrical upgrade to bring it up to code with the current building regulations. Although these updates do not happen every year, significant changes to building codes will occur once every ten years.
Updating your electrical system to the current building code will prevent you from code violations if you are a landlord. It is also essential to upgrade the electrical system if you want to sell the property soon. An infringement of the building code can obstruct the sale process.
6) Add new outlets for convenience
Your home’s electrical layout affects how you arrange the furniture and electronic devices. Homes with fewer electrical outlets limit how you can organize them. You may want to put your television on a wall, but there is no outlet to supply it.
Also, the designer may have implemented a specific layout you do not like. You can solve this issue by adding new outlets. Doing so will make it more convenient to rearrange your interior according to your taste. It is advisable to upgrade your electrical system to add circuits and outlets for convenience.
7) Meet the demands of new appliances
Older homes built before the 2000s did not have consideration for modern needs. With the sharp increase in electronic devices in homes, the power demand is also rising. According to data by the US Energy Information Administration, an average household consumes 10,399 kilowatt-hours (kWh) annually or 867kWh monthly.
Having an old electrical system in your home will not meet this demand. Instead, the system will experience stress or will overload. This will cause electrical fires or circuit breakers to trip off frequently. It is advisable to upgrade your home’s electrical system to avoid this overload.
How to upgrade your home’s electrical system
If you are considering an electrical system upgrade, here are things to do.
Upgrade the electrical pane
Since the power requirements for modern homes are surging, you need to bring more power from the utility into your house. You can achieve this by replacing old or obsolete electrical panels, circuit breakers, and meters.
Install additional circuits
Extra circuits will help distribute more power to your appliances.
Replace old electrical fixtures
You will also need to replace your old electrical receptacles, wires, and outlets.
The bottom line
Unless you are an electrician, it is not advisable to tamper with your home’s electrical system. Electrical upgrades are not DIY projects. We recommend hiring experts who will access the property and make professional inputs.
A typical household spends around $1600 per year on electric consumption. Some homeowners even spend much more while a few may spend less. In my opinion, any amount is too much! Did you know that a large portion of what you are paying for in your electric bill is never used? Let us put it in other words: Energy is wasted month after month right at your very home. Thus, you are spending on something that you never even use. For example, when you leave home, your air conditioner or heater is probably working. What about the closet lights that you forget to turn off?
To make up for this, here are the changes you can do in order to get the most out of every cent you pay for in your electric bill:
Turn off unnecessary devices. If you are not watching your television, never leave it on. This also goes with your stereo. Learn how to turn them off if you don’t need them. Turn off the lights if you are leaving the room as well. Also switch off the air conditioning system if you don’t plan to return for a while. In the summer, I like to push my AC thermostat to the 80 degree mark. That may sound hot but according to EnergyStar, you can save up to $185 a year by adjusting your thermostat whenever you leave your home for 8 hours or longer. After all, there’s no need to heat or cool your empty home to the same temperature as when you’re home, right? Heating and cooling system consume a large portion of your electric bill so you might as well do some necessary changes with them. If for instance you do not want to enter a cold home, you can purchase an inexpensive programmable thermostat (way less than $185) for your heating and cooling system. In this way, you do not have to leave the heating system running all day. All you have to do is to set the time when you want your heating system to work and you will save a lot of money.
If you don’t use your computer monitor, turn it off. It’s not enough to rely on your screensaver. It uses energy too. Like the television, it consumes electricity when you are not using it.
Keep your receptacles free. Unplug all your chargers. Yes, they consume small electric current but if you leave them plugged in day in and day out for months, you will feel their effects on your electric bills. Remember that these little things, when piled up, can be big.
During cooler days, use the sun to warn up the house. Yes, I said the sun. Passive solar energy is one of the best ways to heat your home during the cool fall and cold winter months. The sun is free so open your drapes and windows and let your heating system rest for a while. Close the windows and drapes at night.
If you don’t want to turn the lights on and off every time you go in and out of the room, you might want to get some timers, dimmers and motion sensors to do the job for you. They are worth the investment.
Refrain from using hot water when washing your clothes. Also, it will save you money if you wash full loads as compared to partial loads. Concerning your dishwasher, make sure you wash full loads as compared to a partially empty dishwasher. Just don’t do like I do and overfill or you will truly “pay” the price. There is a reason that I have been married 32 years.
Doing these things doesn’t mean you deprive yourself from freely using the electricity you need. It only means that you are wisely spending every cent you pay for in electric bills.
If you have an electrical problem, give Ozburn Electrical Contractors, Inc. a call today at 1-770-784-1618. Visit our website at www.OzburnElectrical.com.
If you think that finding a “good, reliable” electrician is easy, ask an electrical services company.
These days finding a reliable electrician can be hard. When it comes to your home, Ozburn Electrical Contractors, Inc. wants only the best, high quality electrical work done for you. Although this article is about how you, as a home owner or general contractor can find a good electrician or electrical services company, we want to let you know that even finding a good, solid electrician as an employee can be difficult sometimes. At Ozburn Electrical Contractors, Inc., of Covington, GA, we only hire the best because our customers deserve the best.
One way to find a good electrician is by word of mouth or in marketing terms, “repeat and referral”. Word of mouth is the best way that any trades person can be advertised. Because word gets around very fast to other people. Check with your relatives, friends and neighbors to see if they can recommend someone to you that does good work and that has did quality work for them. This is a good way of finding a reliable electrician to do work in your home.
Look online for good reviews or a good reputation. It used to be where you could pick up your local paper and look for advertisements for electrical work done in your area and the surrounding areas where you live. Nowadays, hardly anyone looks at a newspaper because of social outlets on the internet. Do a Google search for “electrician near me” to see what is local to you. The results page should give you good enough information to at least get you started on finding a good electrician or electrical services company. The internet offers a variety of good ways to check the electrician out before hiring them to do work for you.
How ever you find someone to do electrical work for you, make sure they come from a reputable company. It is best to check that the company will do the type of work that you are needing. And if they can start the work you need in a good time frame when you want it done. Check from them that their work is guaranteed and that they will stand by their work. Ozburn Electrical Contractors, Inc. offers a 1-year warranty of their work and they’ll stand by that with integrity. Get a quote in writing and compare it with other company quotes. Check how long they have been in business and if they have a good reputation and are an established company. (Ozburn Electrical Contractors, Inc. has been in business since 1984!) And make sure to ask them if they are carrying insurance. All of these things will help you to find a good reliable electrician.
It is good to check out an electrician to see if he is good at his work and reliable. Ozburn’s employees have been vetted and have completed IEC Electrical school or are in the process of taking electrical classes at IEC. IEC stands for “Independent Electrical Contractors” and abide by the rules and regulations as set forth by the Department of Labor out of Washington, DC. If you would like to read more about the IEC, click here.
There are those people that do not run a legitimate business and are not dependable or capable of doing the job. These will be the ones that you definitely want to avoid. You need to find this out before you go and hire someone like this. They are usually pretty easy to spot.
Here are some of the things to look for if someone is not running a legitimate business.
There only phone number they give is for their mobile phone.
They try and talk you out of doing the job right because they see a easier way of doing it.
They make the work sound way more complicated then it really is.
They won’t give you a written quote for the work in writing.
They won’t give a firm price to you for the work being done.
They have no references from jobs they have did.
They can not show you any paper work of any certificates they have or any qualifications that they have for this type of work.
These are the things that you need to watch out for when hiring a electrician or you can just give Ozburn Electric a call today at 770-784-1618 and bypass all of the worry and stress.
Ozburn Electrical Contractors, Inc. services the metro Atlanta area and also Covington, Conyers, Marietta, Alpharetta, Stone Mountain, Greensboro, Lake Oconee, Reynolds at Lake Oconee, Madison, Loganville, Snellville, Eatonton, Monticello, Jackson, Stockbridge, McDonough, and more! Call us today!
Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay as seen at https://pixabay.com/photos/let-it-snow-winter-christmas-design-1918800/
Winter is the coldest season of the year as well know this where days become shorter and nights become longer. Winter days also consider a holiday and festive season where people use to celebrate Christmas and New Year eve party and also do some bit amount of lighting decoration in their houses or public places that can lead to the electrical problems or issues.
Winter days also consider a holiday and festive season where people use to celebrate Christmas and New Year eve party and also do some bit amount of lighting decoration in their houses or public places. During winter days, most people use electrical heating systems e.g. electric heater, geyser, appliances and clothes so that the body can get enough heat, in our site. But it can harm and lead to serious electrical problems.
Let’s talk about some more electrical problems and its solutions to learn what precaution we should take in winter days for getting safe and secure electricity at residential, commercial and industrial places:
Electrical Circuit Or Outlet
In the winter season, the electrical circuit can be overloaded frequently, for which you will have to repair it, which will be chargeable. In winter, people use it more because of the cold. As a result, electrical outlet becomes overload and the chances of fire increase.
Circuit overload is not good especially for a house where a family lives together and forever. An overloaded circuit can get fire anytime and that’s not good. Nobody wants this to happen even when there is a celebration all around and people are enjoying the winter, a holiday season.
We should pay attention to the electrical circuit so that there is no electrical problem. If this happens, contact the electrician near to you immediately.
Electrical Wires
Electric wires are made up of metals and plastics which get damaged due to low temperature in cold winter. Metals become hard but liable to break easily and for electric wires, it could be an electric problem because hard electric wires remain unchanged and unable to bend excessively.
Plastic behaves in the same way as metals do in the cold temperature especially in the winter season.
Make sure that electric wires are made from the best quality metals and plastics that can withstand cold temperature in winter when buying or repairing the electrical wires. Otherwise, it can be dangerous, for which you may have to bear heavy losses.
Not sure and no idea about this, take help from certified and licensed electrician near to you.
Electrical Heating
Electrical heating, a process where electrical energy gets converted into heat energy and we use this electrical product as an electric heater, an electrical heating device that converts an electric current into heat.
We use electric heaters for space heating at one place in our houses or else for heating water, cooking etc. in winter.
Tips:
Don’t forget to unplug the space heater when it is not in use even at night and when you leave the space.
Connect space heaters directly into a wall outlet; avoid using extension cords or boards etc.
Make sure electric space, liquid and the industrial heater have an automatic shut off feature if they fall over.
Replace the electric heater if you think it’s gone bad.
Electric heaters can get the electric fire on a large scale because these are rarely energy efficient. Henced it must be properly equipped for the winter season.
Power Outage
On cold days people often use electric appliances to keep their homes and themselves warm, which consumes a lot of electricity Which causes a sudden power cut.
In the winter season, the power outage may impact particular houses, buildings, society and economy too. Nobody wants this to happen but it happens if we do not pay attention to the power outage.
Tips:
Freezer and refrigerator need to be closed most of the time whenever possible it is in cold weather.
Keep power generators outdoors and away from windows and living places of a particular house or building.
Unplugged electrical appliances, heaters and electronic devices to avoid electrical surges.
In winter days, check the electrical breakers and the power lines of a house. If it’s gone bad, stay away and contact 24-hour emergency electrician near to your immediately.
Follow the above basic tips to get protected from the sudden power cut or outage in winter due to cold weather and low temperature that changes frequently.
Flickering (Blinking) Lights
You must have noticed flickering lights in winter, a cold-weather season when you turn on electric lights, it takes time to light up well. Flickering happens when the electric current goes up and down. Or else it is caused by loose wire and holder.
So, the electrical lighting and its wire connection should be in the recommended way so that there is no electrical problem otherwise it can get the electrical fire, short circuit or something else. What we need to do is, nothing, just pay attention and when found flickering of lights or bulb, contact the nearest electrician in your area and tell them about this electrical problem and take help.
Outdoor Lighting
For electrical problem whether it’s a industrial, commercial or residential electrical problems or issues in Atlanta during the winter days, Get in touch with Ozburn Electrical Contractors and its Electricians for electrical services e.g. electrical installation, repair, inspection and maintenance services in Atlanta, Georgia (GA) the United States and its nearby surroundings.
There are so many electrical problems that needs to be fixed first for a safe and secure living. Some are minor and some are major electrical issues.
For minor electrical problem, you can fix it by yourself but for major electrical faults, it is always preferred to take help from a certified electrician in your area that provides electrical repairing services. So, let’s talk about the most common electrical problems and issues to fix it asap:
Loose Electrical Outlet Plug
It is one of the most common electrical problem we found in houses. It seems minor initially but it could be so dangerous as it lead to a electrical fire or short circuit one day in future and can harm your house badly. So, it’s very important to pay attention to get rid off such problems and issues whenever you saw.
Broken Electrical Switch
Another, the most common common electrical problem to get it fixed as soon as possible. Broken electrical switches are dangerous as it can give the unexpected electrical shocks if someone gets in touch with the damaged switch by mistake, so for safe and healthy life, we must pay attention to get it fixed asap with the help of licensed and certified electricians nearest to your location, place, region or area.
Electrical Short Circuit
There could be so may factors in a house for electrical short circuit such as high voltage, overloaded wires, electrical appliances, electronic products (TV, Refrigerator, Laptops, Mobiles etc), damaged wires and much more. We must fixed sort out electrical short circuit problem for safe and secure life at home by paying attention on it. If you think, it not under your control and don’t know how to get it fixed, contact a licensed residential electrician as they will fix problems and issues related to electrical short circuit.
Damaged Electrical Extension Cord
Sometimes, your home appliances and electronics products extension code gets damaged and it becomes risky and serious problem for the house owner as it can leads to a unwanted electrical shocks someday when someone will touch the broken electrical extension cord by mistake. So, never ever try to ignore this minor issues and try to get it fixed as soon as possible, even a person can fix it and for doinf this, he doesn’t need to be a electrician at all.
Dimming Lights
Dimming lights is yet another the most common electrical problems and issues we faces in residential houses, industrial and commercial buildings, apartments or places. It happens when there is poor electrical connection that can lead to an electric arc, spark, fire and overheating. So, for safe, secure and solid lighting, there are some tips that can reduce dimming lights problems e.g. electrical wire, connection, current and its voltage that needs to pay attention when doing electrical work. Take help from certified electrical contractors or electricians to fix dimming lights problems and issues as they have better understanding, expertise and knowledge of electrical system and its process.
Dealing with the most common electrical problems is not like playing a game as it can harm you badly. Without the proper electrical tools, experiences and necessary knowledge, it’s impossible to deal with the common electrical problems and issues. So, don’t ignore the potential electrical dangers and contact licensed electricians and certified electrical contractors near by your location.
