Fluorescent ballasts are used in many industrial warehouses as they offer cheap and efficient lighting. These ballasts can last decades but depending on the type of environment (extreme cold/extreme heat), may be subject to a shorter lifespan. Check your ballast fixtures for these warning signs to see if it is time for a ballast replacement.

There are several signs that can indicate to you that it is time to replace your ballast these include:

If your ballast fixtures have any of these signs, it could mean that they are in need of replacement. Before scheduling and planning to have your ballasts replace, replace the bulbs with brand new bulbs. At times issues can relate to a specific bulb and not the ballast, giving off false symptoms.

For many handy people, they will feel confident in replacing a ballast themselves. If you are replacing a ballast yourself, please use the proper protective equipment and ensure that all power to the ballast is turned off to prevent electrocution. As part of the ballast replacement you will be required to cut and rewire the electrical wires. This can be technical and a mistake in the process can result in damage to the new fixture, bulbs, and possible electrocution. If you are not comfortable or knowledgeable with the process of ballast replacement, we would highly recommend that you contact a licenced electrician to complete the installation for you. This way you can be sure you will be left with a working ballast that is correctly installed and safe.

If your workplace, garage, or home is in need of ballast replacements, contact Expert Electric at 604-681-8338. One of our licensed electricians can help to diagnose the issues being experienced and bring everything back to working condition.

Using a warm white or RGB COB (chips-on-board) LED, these flood lights emit up to 1,000 lumens of illumination in a wide 120-degree beam pattern. The weatherproof LED fixtures have a low-profile die cast aluminum housing with an integral heat sink and a tempered glass lens. An adjustable mounting bracket is also included to direct illumination where it’s needed.

Homes that were built more than 10 to 20 years ago are likely not equipped with the much safer grounded-fault circuit interrupter outlets in the kitchen and bathroom areas. GFCI outlets are ideal for use in areas where there is potential for an appliance to be exposed to water. Everybody knows water and electricity don’t mix. But, we need our gadgets and just try to be extra careful. Unfortunately, accidents happen. A Los Angeles electrician, like those at The Electric Connection, can help you protect not only yourself, but your family members from suffering serious injury when one of those little accidents happen.

The difference between the standard outlet and the GFCI outlets is the safety feature that cuts power to the appliance the second there is an interruption in the flow of electricity from the outlet to the appliance. The breaker will be tripped if the circuit does not flow along the correct path and is interrupted by your body for example. This protects you from suffering an electric shock. If you accidentally drop the blow dryer into the sink while the water is running, it could be an extremely dicey situation if the dryer is plugged into one of the old-style outlets. Power will continue to run to the dryer until the water shorts it out. You would risk receiving an electric shock if you tried to grab the blow dryer out of the sink while the electricity is still flowing.

If you would like to protect your family from these kinds of accidents, call an electrician. Los Angeles homeowners can have current outlets in the kitchen and bathrooms replaced with GFCI outlets without a lot of hassle. These outlets are great for anywhere in the house and can also prevent shock from wires that have been damaged by rodents chewing through or that have been ran over by the vacuum. Give The Electric Connection a call today and schedule your outlet upgrade.

The energy saving power of lighting has quickly grown over the years, and still is to this day. In the commercial and industrial lighting space, a lot of companies are making the switch over from older technology lighting fixtures like metal halide and other HID lights over to LED fixtures.

On top of the energy savings LED can bring over older types of lights, commercial dimmers can yield even great energy reduction and thus a greater reduction in your facilities utility bills month to month.

So what is a dimmer, do dimmers save energy, and should I use a dimmer switch? Let’s find out!

A dimmer switch for LED lights gives you the control through a simple panel to change the amount of light that a lighting fixture (or fixtures) produces. You can dim lights as low as you so desire or as high as your light was designed to allow.

By having a commercial dimmer switch at your disposal, you can change the lights to match the mood, atmosphere, or even time of day to your needs and facilities guidelines.

Now onto the question you’ve all been waiting for, do commercial dimmer switches save energy?

The short answer is yes, dimmer switches do save you energy. But let’s discuss the history of dimmer switches and how far they have came.

Back in the day LED dimmer switches did not reduce energy because of the way they worked. Instead of reducing the amount of energy being used, they simply converted the energy not being used into heat instead of full illumination capability of the light bulb. Nowadays, dimmer switches for LED lights work by actually reducing energy used and only uses enough energy that it needs to power the light bulb at the setting of your dimmer.

Some of today’s dimmer switches use something called a “Triac Switch.” This Triac Switch works by cutting off power to the light fixture up to 120 times (variable) per second. Thus, the human eyes cannot detect a flickering and just see’s a constant flow of light. But while triac switches are used for smaller bulbs, bigger lighting fixtures use something called a send us a message and we will for sure help you out with that decision!