How Your Electrician Can Help

Electrician in Chandler | (480) 926-1033

Whatever side you are on in the ongoing debate about climate change and the environment in general, there is no debating the fact that we are becoming more and more dependent upon energy.  In the developed world, electricity is being used for more and more purposes.  From tablet PCs to home networks, the modern home is wired to a degree that has never been seen.  With increased demand, the price for electricity is also going up, and with the rising costs, the need for energy efficiency is also increasing.  With that said, who do you think does the wiring for these energy efficient homes?  Your local electrician, obviously.  However, wiring a home is only one of the jobs that such a professional can do.

Did you know that by simply installing dimmer switches can help you save money on your electric bill? Residential lighting makes up about 15 percent of  your monthly electric bill. Dimmer switches reduce your electricity usage and save energy  as well, all without sacrificing comfort. Although dimmer switches create mood lighting, they also help manage consumption, and ultimately lower your utility bills.  And with skyrocketing energy costs, every little bit helps.

Electrical Upgrades: Now is The Time

Fossil fuel reserves such as coal, natural gas, and oil are rapidly being depleted all over the world.  Hydroelectric power in Arizona is starting to decline because of drought.  While alternative energy methods such as solar, tidal power, and wind are making inroads, there’s still a long way to go.  As demand on electrical grids increase, so do the prices.  Electricians will be in high demand as consumers scramble to find ways to save money on high electric bills.

Don’t lose hope however.  We have a lot of serious problems ahead of us in the years to come, but we are an inventive and ingenious society.  As such, there are solutions out there.  And your electrician may be the one to help you find them.

Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
CONTACT US

Listen to Your Licensed Electrician Here

Don’t Mix Your Wiring Gauges, Call an Electrician | (480) 926-1033

In our last article, we covered why you shouldn’t mix aluminum and copper wiring.  Now we are going to talk about why you shouldn’t mix gauges of wire.  First off though, a wiring gauge is not a device for detecting a wire.  Wiring gauge refers to the size of the wire and how much electricity it can carry.  If  you don’t believe that electrical wiring has different gauges, have  you looked that the power cord for your dryer lately?  The cord to a dryer is vastly different than one leading to say, your floor lamp.  Think about it, you wouldn’t want to use an electrical wire designed for charging a cellphone to the back of a flat panel television.  If you think you can do that, call an electrician so that he can set you straight.

An Electrician Knows Wiring Gauges

There’s a very good reason why electrical wiring is made in different colors and has printing on it.  It’s not for decoration.  For example, do you know what a white wire is made of?  What about a black one?  What does a green and yellow striped wire mean?  Don’t know?  Don’t worry, your electrician should, just as we do.  Oh, for the record, a white wire means that the wire is is made of silver, and a black one means it is made of brass.  Green and yellow wiring indicates a ground wire.  There, see, we didn’t leave  you hanging.

A wire’s gauge is often written on the side.  This is part of safety and electrical codes, so never disregard them.  Make sure that you know what you’re doing with electrical wiring, or call someone who does: a residential electrician.

Aluminum Wiring: An Electrician’s Dilemma

Get an Electrician Contractor | Call Us Today | (480) 926-1033

First off, from the perspective that only an electrician can offer, we have nothing against aluminum wiring.  It has been proven to conduct electricity better than copper, it is more affordable than copper is and it is durable. Utility companies have used aluminum wire in their power grids since the early 20th Century. Aluminum costs and weighs less than copper, and it  is still the preferred wiring standard today.   The problem lies in when you try to mix and match copper and aluminum, and for older homes that were wired in the 60s and 70s, as this Wikipedia article excerpt shows:

Electricians and Wiring Replacement

Electricians are often ambivalent about aluminum wiring because of potential issues. Another issue is the joining of aluminum wire to copper wire. As aluminum and copper are dissimilar metals, galvanic corrosion can occur in the presence of an electrolyte and these connections can become unstable over time. Aluminum wire used before the mid-1970s has a coefficient of expansion that varies significantly from the metals common in devices, outlets, switches, and screws. Many terminations of aluminum wire installed in the 1960s and 1970s continue to operate with no problems. However, problems can develop in the future and some connections were not made properly when installed, including not wrapping wires around terminal screws and inadequate torque on the connection screws. There can also be problems with connections made with too much torque as it causes damage to the wire. [READ MORE]

Ok, what if  you have aluminum wiring?  First off, it’s not a coiled snake or a time-bomb, so take a deep breath and relax.  If you are really worried, call in an electrician contractor to replace the aluminum wiring with copper.

If you’re worried about aluminum wiring call in Dodge Electric to check out your wiring before it is a problem. Dodge Electric is a professional electrician contractor serving the Greater Phoenix Area.

Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
http://www.dodgeelectric.com

Electricians with Ties to The Valley

Your electrician in Phoenix, AZ | (480) 926-1033

When you are looking for an electrician, you don’t want one who views you as a number.  You want someone who views you as a neighbor in the community.  Like Dodge Electric’s co-founders Preston Dodge and Mike Storer.

Call Dodge Electric for All of Your Electrical Troubleshooting

The Weird World of Electricity from your Electrician Contractor

In an earlier post, we discussed the famous electric eel.  Did you know that the electric eel only looks like an eel?  It’s actually a knifefish.  Hmm, must be an electric knife.  Sorry, more electrician humor there.

The electric eel is not the only electric fish out there, there are also electric catfish, and electric rays.  Electric catfish, hmm? This is scary, speaking as an electrical contractor, as instead of frying up the catfish for dinner, the catfish may fry you instead. A weird thing about electric catfish is that they’re only found in Africa, and the ancient Egyptians used them to treat neurological disorders.  As an electrician, I think that’s cool.  Some electric fish don’t radiate electricity at all, but they are aware of electrical impulses.  Sharks for example can detect more than just blood in the water, they can also detect electrical current as well.  Speaking of cool electrical fish, read this Wikipedia excerpt:

Electrical Troubleshooting in Nature

Eigenmannia is a weakly electric fish that can self-generate electric discharges through electrocytes in its tail. Furthermore, it has the ability to electrolocate by analyzing the perturbations in its electric field. However when the frequency of a neighboring fish’s current is very close (less than 20 Hz difference) to that of its own, the fish will avoid having their signals interfere through a behavior known as Jamming Avoidance Response. If the neighbor’s frequency is higher than the fish’s discharge frequency, the fish will lower its frequency, and vice versa. The sign of the frequency difference is determined by analyzing the “beat” pattern of the incoming interference which consists of the combination of the two fish’s discharge patterns. [READ MORE]  Detecting current is an important part of electrical troubleshooting.  In a way some of these fish do troubleshooting naturally by adjusting their current.  It just shows you how strange nature can be.

This concludes our three part series on electricity. We’ve had fun putting these up and we hope you’ve enjoyed them.  As your electrician contractor, we look forward to consulting with you on your next electrical project, or if  you have any questions.

-Preston Dodge
Your Licensed Electrician

Preston Dodge is the owner and operator of Dodge Electric, an electrician contractor serving Chandler and the Phoenix Metropolitan Area.

Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
http://www.dodgeelectric.com

Electricity Info from Your Neighborhood Electrician

Electrician in Chandler | (480) 926-1033

Did you know that a bolt of lighting lasts less than a second but it can deliver a charge of up to 3,000,000 volts?  Shocking, we know! (Sorry, we couldn’t resist a bit of electrician humor).

Did you know that static electricity can carry a charge of up to 3,000 volts? We did, but we are electrical contractors, so um, well?  Makes you a little more reluctant to shuffle your feet on the carpet to shock your cousin now, doesn’t it?

Your Electrician’s Blast from the Past

Did you know that both watts and volts were named after people who contributed in some way to energy?  The watt is named for James Watt, one of the inventors of the steam engine, and the volt is named for Allesandro Volta, who invented one of the earliest batteries. Hmm, as electrical contractors, we hope he didn’t have pennies in his pocket at each terminal…

Did you know that there may have been a battery invented more than 1000 years before Allesandro Volta?  The Baghdad Battery may have been a primitive battery used to electroplate items, and may have even been capable of being re-charged.  Good thing, because it would be a LONG time before a hardware store opened that carried them…

We knew a lot of this stuff, but then again, we’re electricians, so we kind of have to.  Anyways, we hope you enjoyed part two of Electrical Fun Facts.  Part three is coming up, so be sure to come on back and check it out.
It’s all part of the service from your local electrician.

Preston Dodge is the owner and operator of Dodge Electric, a Chandler based electrical contractor.

Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
CONTACT US

Call your Chandler Electrician today | (480) 926-1033

An electrician works with electricity on a daily basis, but then again, so do you, just in a different way.  A lot of people take electrical power for granted, so here are some fun facts for you to think about regarding electricity.

Fun Electrical Facts From Your Electrical Contractor:  Speed it Up!

An electrical contractor learns about the speed of electricity as part of his training.  Here are some fun facts about the speed of electricity.

• Most people don’t know that electricity is fast, traveling 186,000 miles per second.  To give you an idea how fast that is, if you could travel as fast as electricity, you could go around the world at least seven times in the same amount of time as turning on a light switch.  Whoa! no more long lines at the airport.
• The moon is roughly 235,000 miles away from Earth.  If you had a light switch in your bedroom connected to a light bulb on the moon, there would be a slight delay between when you flipped the switch and when the light came on…of slightly more than a second.

An Electrician’s Guide to a ‘Shocking’ World

There is a lot of electrical misinformation as any electrician in Chandler can tell you.

• Surprisingly, it was not Benjamin Franklin who invented electricity.  That was actually Thales of Miteus in Ancient Greece, who discovered static electricity.  Benjamin Franklin actually proved that lightning is a form of electrical energy.  As he conducted it via a form of wire, that would make him one of the first electricians.
• Thomas Edison didn’t invent the light bulb either, that was actually Humphrey Davy.  Thomas Edison just  invented a light bulb that stayed on for more than twenty seconds.  While he didn’t invent the light bulb, Edison did event things that are still used today, such as fuses, switches, power sockets, and meters.
• An electric eel is basically a swimming battery, with its head the positive terminal and its tail the negative terminal.  Contrary to popular myth, an electric eel’s discharge is not universally fatal to people unlucky enough to find one, most people could survive one discharge.  Multiple discharges however, could be fatal.

Part two of this series will explore even more fun facts, so stay tuned and thanks for reading from your residential electrician in Chandler

Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
Contact Us

Call an Electrician and Don’t Be a Statistic

Avoid Electrical Injuries | Call an Electrical Contractor | (480) 926-1033

According to this report from OSHA,

Shock-related injuries include burns, internal injuries, and injuries due to involuntary muscle contractions. The most common shock-related injury is a burn. Burns suffered in electrical incidents may be one or more of the following three types:

Electrical burns cause tissue damage, and are the result of heat generated by the flow of electric current through the body. Electrical burns are one of the most serious injuries you can receive and should be given immediate attention.

High temperatures near the body produced by an electric arc or explosion cause arc or flash burns. They should also be attended to promptly.

Thermal contact burns occur when skin comes in contact with overheated electric equipment, or when clothing is ignited in an electrical incident.

To read more of this report, please visit OSHA’s site [HERE].  As if these burns weren’t bad enough, there is also involuntary muscle contractions and other health problems that can be caused by accidental electrical contact.  Electrical injuries are just one reason why you want to call an Arizona electrician rather than endangering yourself and others.  There is also the danger of fire.

An Electrician Can Also Help You Avoid Fire

It all starts out so innocently. You do a ceiling fan installation, you think you follow the instructions carefully, and you turn it on, then you hear a pop and smell an ozone smell. You get annoyed, then panicked.

A little electrical troubleshooting could have prevented this, or better yet, if you had a professional install your ceiling fan. What started out as a simple household project ends up with you sitting outside while the firetruck pulls away, and call friends and family for somewhere to stay until you can get your insurance to remove the smoke damage.

All of which could have been avoided by calling in a licensed electrician contractor.

Dodge Electric is a licensed electrician expert serving the greater Phoenix area.

Call Dodge Electric today, and take advantage of our many electrician contractor services
Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
http://www.dodgeelectric.com

Circuit Breaker Tripping | Call (480) 926-1033

Electricians are busy people.   They install new wiring and put in fixtures.  They can help you with energy efficient lighting, and home theater installation.  The most notable thing that electricians do, however, is repairing electrical problems, like when a breaker is tripping.

Causes of Breaker Tripping

First off, be aware that breakers are in place for your safety.  Breakers protect both the wiring and your house as well.  So if you have a tripping breaker, don’t just discount it, pay attention, and call an electrician ASAP.

Loose electrical connections are one of the most common culprits where tripping breakers are concerned.  A good rule of thumb is to reset the breaker one time, and one time only.  Do not just keep resetting the switch and hope that the problem will go away on it’s own.  The tripping breaker is a message and it is trying to tell you something.  An electrical contractor would need to be called in to fix it to keep you and your home safe.

Why Do I Need an Electrician For a Tripped Breaker?

Tripped breakers can result as a result of loose wires, or maybe because of a system wide brownout or blackout.  Electrical storms can also trip your circuit breakers too.  However, while the power grid and the storm related causes are easily determined, loose wiring is a bit more serious.  Remember, you aren’t just dealing with wires.  You’re dealing with the electricity that goes through them as well, and the connections may be high-voltage and high amperage as well.   One mistake, and  you increase the chances of an electrical injury or a fire. An electrician takes electrical safety very seriously.

What to Watch Out For With Breaker Tripping

After a breaker has tripped, lightly tough the panel.  Breakers should not feel hot to the touch. If it is hot, it indicates a serious problem and should not to be ignored.  Do not turn on the breaker.  You could blow every circuit in your  home.  Instead, call in an electrician as soon as possible.

When selecting energy-efficient lighting, it’s a good idea to understand basic lighting terms and principles. Also, it helps to explore your lighting design options if you haven’t already. This will help narrow your selection.

Types of lighting include:

• Fluorescent-Fluorescent lightbulbs use 25%-35% of the energy used by incandescent bulbs to provide the same amount of light (efficacy of 30-110 lumens per watt). They also last about 10 times longer
• Light-emitting diode (LED)-The light-emitting diode (LED) is one of today’s most energy-efficient and rapidly-developing lighting technologies. Quality LED light bulbs last longer, are more durable, and offer comparable or better light quality than other types of lighting.

To read more of this article please  click here.  When selecting the best type of energy efficient lighting, get an electrician in the loop.  A professional electrical contractor would be quite adept at helping you pick the right sort of energy efficient lighting for your home or your business.

If you don’t believe that you can benefit from energy efficient lighting, think again.  Savings can be as high as 30% per year.  To put it in the form of a costs-saving analysis, f you have a $210 monthly  energy bill, energy efficient lighting would knock $70  off the cost each month.  Over the course of a year, that’s $840 per year.  Getting energy efficient lighting installed is only one part of saving energy.  There’s a lot more to it than that.  A lot of appliances are more energy efficient nowadays.  Whatever methods you wish to apply to save money, get the right personnel to help you.   An electrician can help you find the devices that are silently kicking your bills up, and provide a solution for you.

Need an electrician?  Dodge Electric can help.  We serve all of the Phoenix metropolitan area.

Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
4809261033
http://www.dodgeelectric.com