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Surge Protectors are designed to protect electrical devices such as computers, televisions, ect.
from high voltage spikes. By installing surge protectors in your home/office this can attempt to limit the
voltage supplied to the electrical device by blocking or shorting to ground any unwanted voltages above a safe threshold.
To learn more about how to protect your home/office visit our line of Eaton products and their benefits to you as a
home/business owner.http://myhome.eaton.com
Every home should be equipped with smoke detectors the real question at hand is which one will better suite your
family’s needs.
Dependability – Battery-powered alarms will eventually run out of power and stop sounding off the alarm.
The amount of time it will sound off depends on how much battery life it started with. In homes with thicker walls
or if you are not home at the time it starts going off you may wish you had a battery with a longer lifespan. However
hard wired alarms will keep sounding until they are manually turned off.
Combining Systems – Battery powered alarms stand alone in case of emergency, where as a hard wired alarm
can be linked together so that if one alarm sounds off in your home they will all sound off. Which will allow everyone
in your home to be alerted of a potential problem. Most if not all alarm companies will also connect your fire alarm
up to there system so in case of an emergency the authorities will be alerted.
Battery Back-Up – Hard wired alarms also have a battery back-up in case of a power outage. Battery powered alarms do
not have a back-up battery source which means if you do lose power for a substantial amount of time your smoke detectors will not be able to warn you in a emergency situation.
Maintenance – Smoke detectors have a certain amount of life, depending on the manufactures specifications, owners need to be aware of this. Most often when you visually see that they have yellowed in color it is usually a hint that they need to be replaced. As always follow up with the manufacture.
Incentives – There can sometimes be insurance benefits to a hard wired system, so always check with your insurance agent to see if these benefits apply to you.
At the end of the day you need to determine which option best serves your family’s needs. As licensed electricians we know that hard wired smoke detectors are a better way to go, but like always installation and maintenance expenses should be considered.
In summer cooling position, the ceiling fan is supposed to pull the air up along the exterior walls, then to the center of the room where the ceiling fan is located, and then push it down in the center of the room. Think about the fact that you may have a window on an exterior wall that is open. As the air is lifted, it grabs outside air, hopefully cooler than what is in the room, and then pulls it to the center and blows it down to aid in cooling you and the room.
Now in the winter months, the ceiling fan is reversed and the air is drawn down from the the ceiling along the walls, that forces the air to move towards the center of the room where the fan draws it up in the middle of the room. This process uses this warm air overhead to warm the walls , especially the exterior walls where drafts are commonly found, thus eliminating cold spots in your room. The fan actually balances out the air in the room.
Think about where you are hanging a ceiling fan before installing it. Airhart Electric does not recommend them in kitchens or kitchen/dining room combos, and here’s why. The greasy residue you find on you range and hood fan, will also be found on the blades of a ceiling fan in this location. It’s a real mess to clean and just try cooking on a gas stove while a fan is blowing on it. I think you get our drift, right?
By using your ceiling fan in the ways listed above, you’ll know how to keep your house warm and you’ll find energy savings and comfort throughout your home. Isn’t this a cool tip?
Digital Lighting Management (DLM) is like having a personal energy manager in every room. Switch your thinking to digital and get a higher return on investment! DLM offers consistent, optimal energy-efficient performance right out of the box. All with about half the installation time required for conventional controls.
The above video shows why DLM is the fastest, easiest way to install lighting controls.
Wattstopper’s sensors provide convenient, energy-code compliant control. Choose from a wide range of options:
No matter what type of building you’re looking at, there are areas where specific lighting controls are the perfect solution. Room layout, common operating characteristics and usage patterns can virtually compel a specific control solution.
Check out Wattstopper’s Control Six Quick Selector which shows the most common applications that all have a “best fit” energy-efficient lighting control solution. This means the products suggested will deliver maximum energy savings, easier code compliance, and increased convenience and productivity.
The holidays are a time when many people adorn their homes with strings of lights and other electric decorations. However, power outlets can only handle so much voltage. According to the Electrical Safety Foundation International, holiday decorations cause more than 1,000 electrical fires a year. Here are a few tips you should follow to keep your home safe this holiday season:
Respect the Power strip
Let’s face it, homeowners love power strips – we see them as the answer to all our electrical dilemmas. Since power strips allow you to power more decorations at once, they can actually be very dangerous. For example, plugging power strips into two adjacent outlets or “piggybacking” one power strip into another could lead to a fire, we recommend one power strip per outlet.
No Overcrowding
Without a doubt, you’ll be tempted to be naughty with your electrical wiring by plugging most or all of your decorations into one outlet…..we see this a lot. However, forcing so much electricity through a single outlet can easily lead to an overload. For the sake of your safety and home electrical system, you should plug decorations into several outlets throughout your home – better to be safe than sorry. When using extension cords make sure they’re out of the way and don’t pose a tripping hazard.
Don’t be Naughty, Be Nice
If you’re nervous about your outlets in your home (especially if it’s an older home), you should hire a licensed electrician to inspect your system. Think of it this way; would you want your home to be in tomorrows front page news? – always think like this and it will influence you to make wise decisions. A skilled electrician should be able to spot all faulty connections and help you better understand the power capacities of your outlets.
Every year our customers in Rhode Island ask advice on outdoor outlets for their holiday lights. Airhart Electric his happy to answer all your questions
To learn how your home’s electrical system will cope with holiday decorations, contact Airhart Electric at (401) 397-3415. One of our skilled electricians will perform a thorough inspection of your system and identify potential problem areas. We can also help you understand how many holiday decorations you can safely plug into the various areas of your home.
Under Floor heating (also known as UFH) is about the best heat distribution terminal arrangement in your home space. The energy sources electricity, warm boiler water or solar energy may be used in the system as media for generating heat under floor for this purpose. Naturally therefore, the three types adopt three different technologies.
Further, of the three, electricity is generated most of the time with non renewable resources such as fossil fuel. The boiler hot water is too generated mostly using natural gas, LP gas, or oil due to convenience and availability. Only solar energy is truly a renewable source of energy.
However, analysis by the industry show electricity is undoubtedly the cleanest and most efficient (a near 100%) at the point of usage.
Efficiency of Electrical UFH
It is surprising to note the observations of independent experts that since the year 2003 the price of gas has risen by 92%. In contrast the cost of electricity has risen only by 54%.The reversal of this trend in the near future is unlikely due to the electricity generation from renewable fuels and the so far untapped technologies that are currently being pursued.
Typically a bath room which is generally heated for most of the time of the day (say for example 10 hours) will consume only about 2 units (kW-hr). And annually the power needed will still be less than 1kW. As things stand today, the annualized cost for gas is 1.5 more than for electricity according to the industry.
Can Electrical UFH efficiency be further Improved?
• Use of proprietary insulation boards have shown to reduce the operating cost by as much as 50% in an electrical UFH system. The saving is said to have been achieved by reducing the heat up time by about 60%.The savings would enable you to payback your investment in about 2 ½ years which is really good.
• A special advantage available with electrical Under Floor Heating system is the flexibility in manipulating the operation or adopting the system.( All controls in any system for that matter use electricity for powering it) .Microprocessor operation makes a lot of hard tasks being made easy. The use of sensors and a timer for monitoring or programming temperature at different locations is easily possible in the electrically operated heaters due to this. This would further enhance the efficiency. The zoning of the building is easily possible for convenient and energy saving usage of each. Come to think of it, you would only need to add a programmable thermostat to get all this.
• A good thermostat would further make it possible to accurately monitor your room temperatures. No more under heating or over heating to waste costly energy. Maintain your unheated rooms (for eg. Living room, visitors areas etc. in the morning) at 15 0 C, Heated Rooms (such as wet rooms like bath rooms or kitchens} at 21 0 C and the other heated rooms like bed rooms at 18 0 C will easily be possible while drastically reducing your energy consumption. This setting can be easily programmable to a different one in the evening or seasonally. In the alternative the whole automation may be over ridden if the necessity arises.
Electrical under floor heating is a viable option for your high energy bills .The reduced energy consumption contributes considerably towards a smaller carbon foot print. The power losses of the grid distribution are beyond you and whether you use grid power or otherwise the losses are an inbuilt constant. But you can certainly use a clean, near 100% efficient electrically powered under floor heating system in your home in order to manage your home energy and green house gas emissions effectively.
Five smart things to look for when hiring an electrician. Plus a couple of good ways to help avoid scams.
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