Category Archives: Electricity

Teaching Your Children The Value Of Electrical Safety

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Technology has developed so very much in recent years with computers, cell phones in every purse and pocket and many types of electrical equipment in the home. With this many electrical devices, we often forget about the need for electrical safety, in our homes and especially the importance of training our kids how to use electrical products (such as video games) safely. Experts say that approximately 600 people are electrocuted every year because of accidents that happen in or near their homes. In addition, there are 1,100 deaths and approximately 16,300 people injured in more than 200,000 annual house fires that are due to various electrical causes.

Fires caused by electrical hazards such as faulty wiring among others are very serious causes of death and injury. There are many ways that we can learn how to protect ourselves and our children. There are many courses that are designed to provide electrical safety tips. In addition, there are also courses that are more in depth and provide training for those who may not be electricians, but work around electricity, maybe home remodeling or working with other electrical equipment in and around the home. Some of these courses are developed and sponsored by OSHA and teach the National Electrical Code provisions that one needs to know before installing or repairing electrical circuits. However, it is far better to be safe and pay a little bit more for an electrician, who knows the proper codes to do any rewiring that might be needed, rather than suffer the physical consequences of an electrical accident. The professional knows how to handle wiring or rewiring.

Our bodies carry a charge or a small current of energy, and when other sources of energy find our bodies to be an easier path to the ground it will pass through us, causing extreme damage and even death if the source is not removed quickly enough. This is why it is very important for us to handle sources of electricity with extreme care. So with this in mind the following tips are given:

Protecting Your Child:

1. Plug outlets that are not used very often with “Child Safety Plugs” that are available at most department stores.

2. Make sure that nothing is on the floor that a child might put into an outlet or other electrical appliance.

3. Keep all electrical devices away from places where children might be able to get to or pull at them.

In the tool shed:

1. Check that the proper tools are available for the job.

2. Make sure all circuits are grounded

3. Do not overload circuits by using too many cords in one outlet.

4. Keep all tools dry and as clean as possible. This provides proper protection from shock.

5. Maintain proper care of cords while in use (away from high temperatures, oil, gas, and other hazardous substances).

6. Follow all rules concerning handling and maintenance for all power tools and electrical equipment.

In case of Electrocution

1. Refrain from touching someone who has been shocked to check for signs of life.

2. Remove the source of power from the device if it is at all possible, if it isn’t try to get the
object away from the person using something made of wood or a piece of rope.

3. Call 911 at once.

Power outages in the home

1. Should there be a power outage in the home remain calm and check that a circuit breaker that may have been accidentally tripped or turned off.

2. Never place foreign objects in broken or worn out circuits.

3. Be sure to stand in a dry place when resetting fuses.

4. Should the power not turn on, contact an electrician as soon as possible.

Electrical safety should be foremost in our minds, when children are present, when we are, camping and especially when we are at home working with power tools or appliances of any kind. There are many things that we can do to prevent the thousands of deaths every year that occur because of either electrocution or fire due to poor wiring or other preventable situation

How to Make a Choice of Electrical Courses

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Undertaking an electrical course is most essential when it comes to taking up a career as an electrician. This is because it is unsafe to work with electrical appliances unless you are properly trained. And that is where the relevance of a professional electrical course comes in – it serves to set your basics right and teaches you all intricate details about electrical home repairs.

How to select the best electrical course

Today you will find a plethora of electrical courses that could be taken up from different sources. For example, there are online electrical courses, regular ones offered by a local community college and also trade schools providing training in electrical fields. So, it entirely depends on you, which one you choose depending on the reasons for wanting to become an electrician.

To start with, there are basic courses dealing with wiring of buildings while there are also others teaching electrical safety and power generation. Because the job of electricians is becoming more and more competitive, you might face some problem finding the right training programs. But if you put up an effort, it’s no big deal to carve a career in electrical technologies, maintenance and installation.

If you have an affinity with gadgets and love working with wires and electrical parts, an electrician’s career is tailor made for you. There are diploma and certificate electrical courses that incorporate various degrees of intricacies and higher qualifications. These in turn could gear you towards a career involving industrial electrical works, electrical safety and management etc.

Tips to zero in to a specific electrical course

When it comes to choosing an electrical course, you should always turn to your career requirements. If you want to concentrate on safe home repairs, you could refer to a number of competent guides. But you must always look forward to a course that includes practical training in electrical fields and gives you scope to raise questions about how to handle special circumstances.

You could start your search with your local home center courses that mostly teach about electrical safety and working safely with electricity. These courses have the common objective of empowering people to take up self employment. If you go for the electrical courses offered by the local community college, you can learn both about basic beginner courses and professional electrician ones.

Again, there are trade schools providing short, specific courses for creating an electrician out of you in a matter of weeks or months. However, these courses require some degree of basic knowledge and are meant for professionals rather than homeowners. Undergoing an apprenticeship under a trained electrician is also a viable option.

However, completing an electrical course alone would not qualify you as a professional electrician. For that, you require a valid license that you can get after passing a test based on NEC or the National Electric Code. It is considered to be the standard mark of safety for conducting electrical work. The NEC incorporates the code for calculating load and the matching the capacities with the situations.

The Electric Radiator – Shedding Light on a Heating Issue

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Heating the home during the winter is an expensive proposition. More and more people are looking to use their furnaces less and keep areas warm confined to the rooms that are constantly in use. If you are looking for a supplemental heating source which is both efficient and portable, a great product to look at is the electric radiator.

They operate using electricity, which is more expensive than gas, but they can help reduce overall heating bills if they are used strategically. These units operate individually, thereby allowing you to control the level of heating in each room. Many are portable, needing only to be wheeled to a desired location. They can be programmed to turn on and off at specified times. They have adjustable thermostats.

The heating technology used in these new radiators is less wasteful than conventional electric storage heaters because they use microchips to control the use of electricity needed for the amount of heat output. Oil-filled radiators have a higher boiling point and can retain heat for a longer amount of time than similar heating devices that might contain water, so their use of electricity will be more efficient.

Some electric radiators come with covers to shield children from accidentally burning themselves. There is no fire hazard since there are no heating elements to ignite if overheated like there are in electric storage heaters. And they are silent because there are no moving parts.

If you choose to install more permanent radiant heat, you should know that radiators now come in numerous sizes, shapes and colors. They can be incorporated into the décor of a room and providing comfort and style as well. They are becoming eco-friendly, as they are being manufactured from recycled aluminum and streamlined for higher operating efficiency.

The modern electric radiator does not compare to the ones used in our grandmothers houses. Depending on how they are used, they can make a terrific add-on to an existing heating system, giving heat where and when it is needed.