Every spring we plan our summers with trips, barbecues and updating the outside of our homes and the landscaping. The summer is filled with time in the sun taking care of the lawn, planting new flowers and creating gorgeous outdoor spaces that draw us outside to enjoy the beautiful weather. As summer nears the end and we think about fall and the coming winter, our attention turns back inside. Now it is time to take another fresh look at our indoor living space and think about the things we can do to make it a little more attractive, functional and comfortable. One of the options you should consider is a lighting makeover completed by an electrician. Santa Monica homeowners can count on The Electric Connection to help them transform their home by simply changing out a few light fixtures.

Gone are the days when a homeowner had to settle for the typical light fixture in the center of a bedroom or no lights in the living room. Today, modern lighting ranges from very bright to subtle and understated. Kitchen lighting has come a long way as well. Track lights are very functional and provide the entire area with a flood of light. An electrician in Santa Monica can install several tracks or one large one that will provide plenty of lighting for your workspace.

Living rooms don’t have to be dark any more when recessed lighting is installed. This type of light will stay out of the way of the flat screen. The lights are flush with the ceiling and will not hang down, blocking your view. Your Santa Monica electrician can install a couple or several lights depending on the size of the room and your personal preference. When you think about your fall projects, add a lighting makeover to the list and give The Electric Connection a call to make it happen.

L.A. City engineers originally hoped that the LED bulbs would save 40% on electric bills. By the end of 2010, with 20,000 street lights switched over, the City experienced a surprising 55% savings in electricity on the new bulbs. The city has also found that the LED lights create brighter and more uniform visibility, reducing pockets of dark shadow that conventional street lights sometimes leave.

This is the largest LED street lighting project of its type in the world. Mayor Villaraigosa commented proudly, “We’re seeing L.A. lead the way.” The project is being funded, in part, by Federal stimulus dollars as well as the Clinton Foundation. Sarah Potts of the Clinton Foundation said, “The Clinton Climate Initiative was excited to work on this project mainly because L.A. was willing to be a mover on this. They were willing to set the bar for where energy efficiency street lighting could and should go. They took on a project that was much larger than any other cities were considering.”

If you want to go greener in your home or business, you can take steps that range from quick and simple to more ambitious:

Let’s make L.A. the greenest city on the planet!

–Kim Hopkins, Owner

The Electric Connection

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If your electrical panel has fuses rather than circuit breakers, safety can be an issue. Even some electrical panels equipped with circuit breakers can pose safety hazards and need to be upgraded.

Another reason to upgrade your electric panel is if it’s too small. To say it’s “too small” means it doesn’t supply enough power. One sign of insufficient power is that fuses are frequently blowing or circuit breakers are flipping off. Or possibly, a contractor has told you that your home or business needs more power for a new air conditioner or other installation.

What is an electrical panel?

The power from the electric utility company flows through large wires to your home and into the panel, a large metal box with fuses or circuit breakers inside. The panel controls the flow of electricity throughout the house, cutting the flow with fuses or circuit breakers if power levels rise too high.

If you think of your home electrical system as having branches and twigs like a tree, your electrical panel is the tree trunk. From the panel, the current flows into major electrical branches which dwindle into smaller and smaller branches and twigs, serving every part of your home.

An electrical panel may also be called a:

These all mean the same thing.

How do fuses and circuit breakers work?

If too much power were to flow into the wires in your home, they could melt and a fire could start. If you were to accidentally touch a damaged overloaded wire, you could receive an electrical shock.

To prevent more electrical flow than the wires are designed for, your electrical service panel is supposed to detect the problem and stop the flow immediately. In older electrical panels, a fuse blows. In newer ones, a circuit breaker flips off. Both fuses and circuit breakers are designed to break the circuit and cut the power to wires. Properly functioning circuit breakers (or fuses) are vital for your family’s safety and the safety of your home. Click here for more information about how to get the power back on if a circuit breaker has flipped off.

How do I know if my electrical panel is too small and should be upgraded?

If circuit breakers are flipping or fuses are blowing often, it likely means that your electrical system needs enlargement, including possibly a panel upgrade. Here are common situations which call for enlarging an electrical system:

Fuse Boxes

Older electrical panels have fuses rather than circuit breakers. In the days when fuse boxes were installed, homes needed considerably less power. Many fuse boxes were designed to handle 30-60 amps of power whereas the appliances and electronics in today’s homes often require 100-200 amps of power or more.

Fuse boxes may become overloaded, blowing fuses and shutting down your appliances. This is an inconvenience, and there’s a temptation to buy larger fuses so that they won’t blow so often. But, oversized fuses can allow overloading and overheating of wires. Occasionally, someone will have put a penny in the opening to replace a blown fuse. This can really create a fire hazard because a penny can’t break the circuit.

A little known danger of fuse boxes is that homeowners can accidentally stick their fingers into the fuse opening, possibly while changing the fuse, and be electrocuted. The safe solution is to upgrade with modern circuit breakers.

Circuit Breaker Brands

Specific brands of circuit breakers, especially those installed in earlier decades, have been found to deteriorate with age and pose a safety hazard. You can go to the free website Inspectopedia  and search on the brand of your circuit breaker to check its safety.

If you want to learn more about electrical panels, including some unsafe brands, click here. You can also ask us to check out your electrical panel. Call us 8-5 at (800) 990-9490. The Electric Connection provides free over-the-phone estimates and free home inspections, including checking the safety and sizing of your panel, with every electrical job. We look forward to talking with you.

Kim Hopkins

CEO, The Electric Connection

There are a number of times when homeowners take up DIY projects; not only do these help you save money, but many people find the idea of doing some of this work around their home, extremely fulfilling too. While it’s okay to do some carpentry or painting work, it’s best to leave electrical jobs to the experts; and there are a number of reasons for this.

Many people feel that they may be able to handle some basic electrical jobs themselves; but the fact is that electrical systems and installations can be quite complex and it’s not easy to tackle them. Apart from this, it’s required by law that you hire a licensed and insured electrician for any work on your residential or commercial premises. Take a look at how and why DIY electrical jobs can do a lot of harm:

There are a number of wire sizes available; this is called the gauge of the wire and this determines the application it’s going to be used in. If you accidently choose and install the wrong wire, this can cause it to heat up and the circuit breaker may trip. This is why it’s important to use wires and devices that are rated correctly for the amperage that’s required in a particular location.

If the switches and outlets have been installed loosely, that can present a hazard once the appliances have been plugged in. If the wires come loose from the terminals, that can result in overheating and arcing.

The reason for an electrical box installation is to provide the connections the right amount of protection from the external elements. This is also why it’s extremely important to ensure that no electrical connections are made outside these boxes. The other thing to keep in mind is that the electrical boxes should only be filled to a certain capacity. Adding too many wires and connections in a single box can result in overheating; in some cases, it can also result in short circuiting.

This happens to be one of the most common causes of electrical fires. When fuses keep tripping or blow, property owners may end up replacing them with breakers or fuses of a larger size. If a fuse trips very regularly, it’s first crucial to identify what is causing it to trip; that root problem has to be addressed by a licensed and insured electrician.

The connections inside the fuse box should all be tight and when they are replaced, the positioning should be right. In case the connections come loose, you might find the lights flickering or being cut short. In severe situations, there could be overheating of the connections too. The precaution to take here is that before you start with any inspection, you should first switch off the breakers.

This is one mistake that many people tend to make; they end up overloading the powerboard or the outlet. It’s important that you check how many amps a circuit can bear and then plug in only the type of appliances that aren’t going to overload the board. Appliances such as air conditioners, dishwashers and refrigerators etc. can overload the circuit, if it exceeds the amperage of the board .

For more information, simply speak with the experts at Allround Electrical and take their advice on various aspects of CBUS installations. The number to call is 1300 169 263. You can also write to us at this email address. You may also reach us through this online contact form.

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