Your Residential Electrician and Child Safety

Your residential electrician in Phoenix can also help in a surprising way: to keep your kids, and you, safe.

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Residential Electricians and Electrical Safety

Mixing children and electricity together is a disaster waiting to happen.  That's why it's a good idea to have a residential electrician in Phoenix inspect your home's wiring at least once every decade. It isn't just frayed wires that you have to watch around your kids; a residential electrician can also keep your kids safe by helping to childproof your home.

Childproofing outlets is a great idea if you have kids. Plastic plugs, for example, are ineffective and can be a choking hazard. In addition, a lot of the tamper proof outlets do not completely seal the opening. This means that a child could still put a stick pin into the socket. A residential electrician can help the parents choose the protection that is best for their family and install them.

Children are especially vulnerable where electricity is concerned. They often don't understand the dangers of electricity. Since they're smaller and have thinner skin an electrical shock that would be dangerous to an adult could be fatal to a kid.  That's where a residential electrician contractor comes in.

A residential electrician can inspect is the condition of cords and wires used in the home and can recommend strategies to fix them.  For example in high traffic areas, the cords can be put under non-conductive wire guides. Another danger with kids is too many extension cords.  They can be a fire hazard.  If necessary, it would be a good idea to install extra outlets.

More Electrical Safety Tips

GFCIs, or ground-fault circuit interrupters, are another safety feature that a residential electrician can install.  If there is a dangerous change in the current, these outlets will shut it down.  They're required equipment in new homes.  Installing a smoke alarm may not seem relate to electrical safety, however, it can keep you and your family safe. However, ultimately electrical safety is something that you as a parent have to teach your children.  Teach them at an early age to be careful around electricity and reinforce your lessons all the time.  That way your kids don't end up being a statistic somewhere.

So remember, electrical professionals aren't just someone who can install things.  They can also be your first line of defense where electrical safety is concerned.

In addition to your children, you want to keep your family safe from fire and intruders...

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

Living Room Lighting Tips

Here are some helpful tips about living room lighting from  your electrician in Phoenix.

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Living Room Lighting 101

People spend a lot of time in their living room.  So you want to choose your lighting sources carefully, and have your residential electrician in Phoenix wire it all up. The right lighting can have a dramatic effect on your living room. It is as important if not more so than the color of paint that you pick.  With properly placed lighting it can make your living room look larger if you have a small space, or more intimate if you have larger space to work with. Layered lighting for example is a great idea.

What is layered lighting? Well, each room has three layers: ceiling, walls, and floors. Overhead light fixtures can illuminate the entire room easily. For direct lighting, use table lamps and floor lamps. These are useful for reading or any other activity that needs a light source nearby. Alcove lighting or accent lighting is usually at wall level and is used to draw attention to something. A good thing to realize with lighting is that it should reflect your needs as well as what the design of the room needs to reflect your wishes.

Overhead light fixtures near a flat panel TV aren't a good idea as it will reflect off your television and detract from the picture itself. A good trick is use floor level accent lighting that illuminates the wall behind the television, particularly if you install a dimmer switch. That way you can dim the lights and have a proper home theater system. A good thing to remember about living room lights is that you want an electrician to wire it. If you have an older home, your wiring is probably starting to get a bit brittle. You also want to make sure that you don't mix and match incompatible wiring together, such as copper and aluminum.

A Residential Electrician Contractor is Your Go To Guy

If you're doming home improvement projects, some of them don't require an electrician.  If you're going to paint your living room, you need a painter.  New plumbing for the bathroom?  A plumber of course.  However, when it is time to do any sort of wiring, such as rewiring your living room, then you need to call a residential electrician in Phoenix.

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

Electrical Projects: Using Alcove Lighting

 Alcove lighting can remodel your home without decimating your budget.  First off, let's look at lighting choices.

Types of Alcove Lighting

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In our last article, we covered swimming pool lights.
As your electrician in Ahwatukee, however, we feel that some areas of the home can also do with a bit of electrical remodeling. One area that is a good way to remodel is to do alcove lighting. There are two types of alcove lighting, incandescent bulbs and LED.  While CFL bulbs are around, they look odd in accent lighting.  After all, unless you get the bulb variety, a CFL bulb looks rather like a soft-serve ice cream cone.  LED lighting has the advantage that you can save a bit of money on your electric bill and they last for anywhere between 3 and 5 years.  LED light, however, can often be a bit bright for an alcove  unless you get a lower wattage.
Like LED bulbs, if you wish to use incandescent bulbs in an alcove, you also want to use lower wattage. Remember, an alcove is essentially accent lighting. You want to highlight a feature of a room, not overpower the room, which leads us to our next point: using colored lights.

Less is More with Alcove Lighting

Remember, where alcove lighting is concerned, less is more. You don't want your alcove to be overpowering. If you want to use colored lights, just remember that if you're not careful, too many colors in an alcove will look garish and unsettling. Avoid color-changing LED lights. You want a nice alcove, not a circus tent. If you're going to use colored lights in your alcove, use either a neutral color or a complementary color. Sepia and amber light look good almost everywhere, red, green, blue and purple, not as much.
Another thing to consider with this wiring project is the advice of a professional. You want to make sure that you get the right type of recessed lighting for your alcove. You want to make sure that it is compatible with your current electrical wiring as well as practical concerns such as whether or not it will melt with high watt lights. Some plastic light fixtures can warp with even the heat of a light bulb. The bottom line of lighting is that you want to use lights that are below 60 watts. You want your lights to accentuate not be too bright to see. When you're ready to install your lighting, be sure to call an electrician in Ahwatukee.
Alcove lighting is only one type of lighting that you can play when you're designing your living room lighting.
Dodge Electric
781 South Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225
(480) 926-1033
Contact Us

Swimming Pool Lights

Electric wiring in your swimming pool may not seem like a good idea.  After all, electrical wiring and water obviously don't mix.  However, if you do it safely, you can totally transform your pool

Replace Your Swimming Pool Lighting in Ahwatukee| (480) 926-1033

An Electrician in Ahwatukee and Life in the Foothills

Ahwatukee is a part of the Phoenix area, and as such is home to dozens upon dozens of swimming pools. Considering the fact that Arizona has some of the hottest summer temperatures of anywhere else in the US, a swimming pool is a welcome source of relief from the hot sun of the Arizona desert.  But what about October when the weather's much nicer?  First off, what a lot of people don't know is that you can swim a lot later here than your friends and family back east.  Unless you have a heated pool, however, fairly soon you're going to have to stop swimming.  That is of course, unless you're a member of the Ahwatukee chapter of the Polar Bear club.  You know, those people back east who get their jollies from swimming in icy rivers and lakes.  So if you need to stop swimming, what do you do with your swimming pool?

Well, when it is the time that you're not using your pool, it is the perfect time to do some maintenance.  Drain your pool, and check out the surface for any cracks in the cement.  You also call an electrician in to look at your swimming pool lights for a lot of reasons. The first is safety.

Rewire Your Pool Now, Get Ready for the Summer

Take this time of year, and rewire your swimming pool. If you have the money and the desire, if your pool isn't heated, this may be the time of year to remodel and make your pool a heated pool. That means swimming all year round. In the winter, it feels really nice to swim in warm water with the cool autumn air. However, another reason to rewire your swimming pool is electrical safety. If your swimming pool's lights are below the water surface and they have any cracks or damage to them, someone could jump in the water and suffer from a potentially fatal electrical injury.

So let's see if we have this straight. Electrical safety: check. Improved functionality: check. And an overall better pool: check. All wonderful reasons for calling an electrician in Ahwatukee to work on your swimming pool's wiring.

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

Electrical Wiring and Home Improvement

Electrical wiring involves hiring the right person for the job. First off, you want to go with someone local whenever you have a home improvement project.

Electrician in Ahwatukee | Call Us Today | 480-926-1033

Hiring an Electrician in Ahwatukee: Why Local Pros Matter

If you're looking to hire an electrician in Ahwatukee, it's best to go with someone local. First off, if you hire a locally owned business, more money stays in Arizona, which in turn makes the state more prosperous. Dodge Electric is a locally based business that proudly serves the Ahwatukee area as well as the greater Phoenix area. Ahwatukee is in the southeast corner of the valley bordering Chandler, Tempe, and Phoenix. Dodge Electric has a staff of professional electricians. We can do any wiring you need, and at competitive rates, and most importantly of all, we're licensed.

What difference does a license make? Well, without one, you run the risk of someone who doesn't know what he is doing that may cause a problem with your wiring. In fact that is one of our biggest sources for new business. It usually happens something like this. Our customer calls someone that isn't licensed in an attempt to save money. The 'professional' does something not only wrong, but very wrong, such as mixing aluminum and copper wire together or mixing the wrong gauge of wire. There's some damage, and then we have to fix it. So what started out as a simple repair job for the customer ended up being more expensive in the long run. Another reason to go with a pro, is that with them being in the industry, they're also more aware of new technologies to help your home be not only wired but wired safely.

Electrical Wiring

It's just wire, how tough could it be? Well, first off, what gauge of wire are you working with? Do you need a GCFI installed or not? What type of wire do you need for your job? Do you need home network wiring? How about a dimmer switch? Will a dimmer switch work with a CFL bulb? Questions like these can turn your project into a boondoggle, not a triumph. The right Ahwatukee electrician can literally make the world of difference. And what's more we're big on electrical safety.

So remember, some jobs require a professional. If you want work done on your car, you call a mechanic. You want someone to work on your teeth. And for wiring? You call an electrician in Ahwatukee.

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