At Wes Carver Electrical Contracting, customer safety and satisfaction are among our top priorities. We value your loyalty and trust and want to ensure you have the right information to safely and intelligently operate your home’s electrical system. That’s why we’ve put together the following list of safety tips, which can help you better understand the impact that proper servicing and preventative maintenance can have on your home. Please take a few minutes to browse through our most recent postings, and check back often for updated articles, many of which are featured in our customer newsletter. If you don’t already receive our newsletter, click here to be added to our mailing list.
- How important are Smoke Detectors & Carbon Monoxide Detectors in Your Home?
- Great Ways To Lower Your Utility Bills and Make Your Home More Comfortable!
- Proper Lighting for the Outside of Your Home
- Benefits of Using Dimmers in Your Home
- Benefits of Surge Protection in Your Home
How important are Smoke Detectors & Carbon Monoxide Detectors in Your Home?
Let’s start with the facts:
- 75% of fire losses occur in homes
- More Americans die from fires than all other natural disasters combined
- More people are affected by carbon monoxide than fire
To ensure your home and family are protected, we recommend taking the following precautions. Keep in mind that local codes may vary depending on your municipality and the age of your home:
Always have a hardwired, interconnected system
This means that if one detector begins to alarm, it will set off all of the other alarms that are connected to it. With this type of system, you’ll always be alerted of potentially hazardous situations, no matter where you are in your home.
Install and maintain smoke detectors
At a minimum, be sure to install one smoke detector in every sleeping area, and one on each level of the house near the top of the steps.
Install and maintain carbon monoxide detectors
This small device can detect and alert you to the presence of this deadly gas, saving the lives of your family and pets. The standard rule is to install one carbon monoxide detector per floor of your home.
Test your systems regularly
It only takes a minute to ensure they’re working properly. If you have an interconnected system, pressing the test button one device will trigger the alarms on all of them. Listen carefully to make sure each one is sounding. If your alarms are not interconnected, test every device individually.
Replace batteries annually
Even if you have a hardwired system, batteries can—and will—still need replacing. We recommend changing the batteries once per year to avoid any possible accidents.
If you have any further questions, would like to have your system professionally checked, or would like more information on installing a hardwired system, contact us today.
Great Ways To Lower Your Utility Bills and Make Your Home More Comfortable!
Spring and summer are on the way, but high electricity costs shouldn’t prevent you and your family from living comfortably in your home. Here are two helpful ways to lower your cooling expenses this year—and for many seasons to come.
Installing ceiling fans
There’s nothing quite like the year-round comfort of a ceiling fan. Not only are they a simple way to control your climate, they’re also a valuable part of any home energy conservation effort. Ceiling fans are extremely efficient appliances, using less energy than a 100-watt light bulb. And, they can lower your cooling costs as much as 40 percent, according to a study by Florida Power & Light (FPL). They can also help distribute warmth in the winter, making them the perfect complement to your existing heating system.
Ceiling fans should be installed or mounted:
- In the middle of the room
- At least 7 feet above the floor, or if ceiling height allows, 8-9 feet above the floor for optimal airflow
- 18 inches from the walls.
Depending on the situation, ceiling fan installation can be complex and difficult. Many manufacturers recommend installation by a trained electrician and Wes Carver Electrical Contracting is always here to help.
Installing attic fans
Trapped attic air can easily exceed 150°. Attic fans can remove this super-heated attic air, making any home more comfortable, whether it’s air conditioned or not. In homes that are air conditioned, attic fans can take some of the workload off your A/C, helping to maximize your power efficiency. Wes Carver Electrical Contracting recommends installing roof-mounted fans rather than gable-mounted versions. A roof-mounted fan allows you to place the appliance in a more centralized attic location, pulling air through more openings and increasing the fan’s overall effectiveness. For more information about installing any of these products in your home, contact us today.
Proper Lighting for the Outside of Your Home
There are many reasons for wanting to add outside lighting to your home—security, dramatic landscape lighting, and enhancing “curb appeal” are just a few. Each of these reasons requires different types of lighting and understanding the scenarios can help you choose the right setup for your needs.
Lighting for Security
Fact: A well-lit home is less likely to be robbed or vandalized than a poorly-lit home. Dark areas around your property give intruders more opportunities to lurk undetected. By eliminating these areas with timer-controlled or motion-sensing lighting, you can take away this risk and better protect your family.
Lighting for Drama or “Curb Appeal”
Effective landscape lighting is the best way to enhance the beauty of your home. Wes Carver Electrical Contracting can help you highlight the unique architectural elements of your home and create dynamic focal points with a balanced, functional lighting plan.
For more information on creating a custom outdoor lighting design for your home, contact us today.
Benefits of Using Dimmers in Your Home
There are many benefits to installing dimmers in your home, especially during the winter months, when fewer hours of daylight leads to higher indoor energy consumption. Whether you use individual dimmers, room lighting controls to replace multiple switches in a room or a whole house lighting control system, dimmers can:
- Save energy, by allowing you to adjust the power at which your lighting operates. For example, dimming the lights to 90% strength can help you save 10% on your electric bill
- Double the life of your bulbs, depending on how much you dim them. This can save you both time and money by cutting maintenance frequency and cost.
- Create ambiance, set the mood and change the look and feel of a room.
Benefits of Surge Protection in Your Home
As digital technologies become more integrated into our everyday lives, homeowners need to be wary of getting burned— literally. The average residence receives more than 2,000 transient electrical surges each year, resulting in approximately $26 billion in total yearly losses for North American homes and businesses.
But it’s not just incoming power lines that can cause problems. Electrical surges can also be carried through phone and cable lines. And while individual jolts may not cause noticeable damage, over time, they can weaken the structure within the microchips that power many of your household devices, including televisions, stereos, DVD players, AV equipment, phones, video game systems and computers.
Safeguard your home and your investments today by calling Wes Carver Electrical Contracting for a surge protection consultation.
Even large appliances, such as the refrigerator, oven, microwave, dishwasher, washing machine and clothes dryers are often controlled by little microchips and are susceptible to damage.
Safeguard your home and your investments today by calling Wes Carver Electrical Contracting for a surge protection consultation.
