Hello!  Welcome To Electrician Greenville SC

My husband and I own our own home.  This is the second home we have purchased in South Carolina and we have learned a lot about home repairs.  While we have traditional roles in our relationship, I am the one who completes home repairs.  There is one repair that I will not touch for safety reasons: electricity.  I will replace outlet plates, but that is the extent of my knowledge.  Whenever I am doing a home repair, whether it is re-caulking a sink or hanging curtains, I will watch a how-to video on line.  I wanted homeowners and consumers to have a place to go to look at videos of simple electrical repairs as well as to be able to find a quality electrician in their area.  And so Electrician Greenville SC was born.

Like any homeowner, we have had many repairs done on our home.  We had a fix-it man over at our house one day fixing odds and ends that I could not fix myself.  I mentioned that the lights above my sink were not working and he said he could take a look at it.  It only took a few minutes for sparks to fly!  We very quickly realized the importance of hiring an experienced, licensed, bonded, and insured electrician in Greenville SC so as not to put my family in danger.  So how do you find a master electrician?

You have come to the right website for finding a professional electrician who is licensed and insured.  My first tip is to not expect that your problems or needs will be diagnosed over the telephone.  A professional electrician will want to come to the site of the job and troubleshoot the problem.  Always ask for a free quote, estimate, and references before the electrician begins the job.

Electrical Basics

Wiring is something that professional, licensed, insured electricians do everyday.  It takes no time at all for them to safely install the proper wiring and receptacles in your home.  Having your electrical wiring done correctly is important for your safety, as well as the proper operation of your appliances.  If you want to try a job on your own here are some electrical basics.  The 120/240 volt wiring is normally used for clothes dryers and kitchen ranges.  The 240-volt line is for the motor of the appliance and the 120-volt is for the timers, lights, or any other controls you have on the appliance.  There is a difference between wiring, color codes and receptacles.  Since most lay people do not understand these differences, it is always better to have professional electricians in Greenville SC do the job.

Ceiling fans are a beautiful and functional addition to any room, but the installation is not as easy or simple as you may think.  Ceiling fans need the proper wiring to work.  This will include the wiring, switch plate, and connection to the breaker box.  You want the wiring in the attic to be safe and secure, since fires in the attics are undetectable and can cause extensive damage if a fire starts due to faulty wiring.  If you install a ceiling fan with lights, you may want a dimmer switch for the lights that also turns on the fan.  To have a safe and proper installation you may way to contact a professional, licensed, insured Greenville SC electrical contractor to do the work.

Trying to move or repair light fixtures is not a project that should be attempted by homeowners.  It is important that experienced electricians handle these projects, as the risks of becoming hurt or starting a fire are high.  Many homeowners like the idea of performing their own repairs on their appliances and light fixtures.  However, not having the skill or knowledge needed to make these repairs can often lead to more harm than good.  When a light fixture is replaced, it is necessary to disconnect all of the wires that connect to the light.  When homeowners attempt to replace or repair these fixtures themselves, they often make the mistake of not knowing how to reconnect the wires.  This is especially true if the fixture is an older model and uses different color codes for the wiring.  Since you will be working with live wires, it is imperative that you leave these repairs to electricians in Greenville SC who are qualified for the job.  If you make a mistake you may run the risk of damaging your lights, your home, or hurting yourself.  If you want to have your light fixtures replaced, it is a good idea to choose the new replacement fixtures.  Then call a qualified, independent electrical contractor to perform the installation.  When it comes to electrical work, it is better to be safe than sorry and to ensure that the work is done correctly the first time around.

Upgrading from fuses to circuit breakers is an excellent idea for the following reasons.  Fuses usually control the entire home but you are limited to how much power you can use at one time.  With a circuit breaker, you can run an entire home and not worry about tripping the breaker when you run more than one electrical item at the same time.  It is much more convenient to have a breaker box than a fuse box.  Fuse boxes tend to blow when you create need for too much power at one time.  With the breaker box, it is rare to trip a breaker if everything is installed correctly.  Depending on the wiring you have in your home with a fuse box, you might need to upgrade the wiring as well.  If you need to upgrade to circuit breakers, calling a professional residential electrician in Greenville SC will ensure the safety of your family.

Electrical violations are not something any homeowner wants to see.  Violations that deal with electrical work might include improper grounding, no covering for the electrical paneling, using an unlicensed electrician, not having a permit, and not doing the wiring according to requirements. These violation fines can be costly depending on your area.  To prevent the violation of using an unlicensed electrician, you must use an electrical contractor that is certified, licensed and insured to do the work.  In most states, the homeowner can do the work himself or herself, if they know what they are doing. All work must be up to code.  Getting a permit before you start an electrical project only insures that a building inspector will inspect the work.  It must pass or you will have to correct the issues.  If the outside electrical wire should come detached from your electrical service in your home and you need to have it hooked back up, you will be required to bring your inside wiring up to date before the electrical supply can be turned back on to your home.  All electrical violations must be corrected. To avoid possible violations, you should hire a professional, licensed, insured electrician in Greenville SC to do the work.   This will prevent any future problems with the building and housing authority, which can be very costly depending on the violations.

Whether you are a person who believes in hiring the professionals, or an adequate home electrician who needs help, there is going to come a time when you want to find a good electrician in Greenville SC. Here is how you can do that:

Preplan. If at all possible, you should write down what work you believe you need done. Try to be as detailed as possible, include areas of the house, materials, equipment and so on. This list, or plan, is going to help you have an idea of what to expect when you ask the electricians later on for an estimate.

Reviews. Ask around with friends, relatives and neighbors if they happen to know any good electricians in Greenville SC. You should also check with your local building inspector, building supply store, and better business bureau for good electricians in your area. Compile a list of the names that each give you, and compare them. The names that appear on at least two of the lists are the better ones, since they have a reputation for quality work.
Interview. Narrow the list that you compiled to three. Call up each and ask them to come over to take a look at the work that you have planned. As you are talking to them, hand them the list you made before, and ask them for an estimate in writing of what they believe the work is going to cost. Compare each one that you get, and go with the one that you believe is going to be best for your needs.

Contract. Once you have decided which electrician’s services you are going to utilize, you should draw up a contract. This contract should have all aspects of the project clearly written out, to include time schedule, materials, cost, etc. and what is going to happen if the cost, or time is overrun. These contracts are designed to help protect both you and the electrician from any misunderstandings.

I hope you like our site Electrician Greenville SC and we encourage feedback to help make our site better!

Electrician Greenville SC: How to find a qualified electrician.

I do plan on recommending an electrician that I have experience with but that should not stop you in doing your due diligence when looking for a qualified electrician in Greenville.

The following article is from an outfit located in San Diego. I was out there last year and know them to be a reputable firm and the information in this article is quite good and relevant to those looking for information on hiring an electrical contractor… so why reinvent the wheel and get carpal tunnel writing a big long article when the work has already been done for me? lol

Anyway, there is good information here so give it a read:
How to Find a Qualified Electrician
By Ryan Frank

As a homeowner, you are responsible for making sure that all the electrical wiring in your house is sound and up-to-date. Faulty writing poses several hazards, not least among them a potential fire, which should give you more than enough impetus to make sure that when you need an electrical problem fixed, you hire an experienced and qualified electrician. Poorly designed or poorly repaired circuits can cause damage to electrical appliance motors by delivering the wrong amperage. But how do you make sure that you get a qualified electrician to work in your home? If you know what to look for, it is not all that hard.

Licensing

One of the basic ways to assess the professionalism of an electrician is check to see if he has a state license. Master electricians have to pass a rigorous, standardized test and must provide proof of having been working as an electrician for at least two years. He must also be knowledgeable of the National Electrical Code and keep up to date with any modifications made to it. A sate license means that an electrician is qualified to plan, design, install and maintain electrical systems.

The other type of state licensing is that of the journeyman electrician. A journeyman electrician is one who has not yet qualified for a master’s license, but who (as required by the state) works with a master electrician. The law prohibits that journeymen electricians design electrical systems, but they are allowed to install wiring and equipment.

Permit

Before hiring an electrician, also think about asking if he has a valid permit issued by the local building department. Before a building inspector issues a permit, he checks the electrician’s work to see if it stands up to regulation standards and building codes, so this is a good way to gauge if an electrician you’re thinking of hiring is really reliable.

Choosing the Right Electrician for the Job

Like many other contractors, electricians usually specialize in a specific field. Some do new construction sites, others go out only on service calls and others concentrate on commercial property work. Electricians specializing in remodeling, for example, know certain techniques specific to working with pre-existing wiring and electrical systems, techniques like snaking wires through finished walls, evaluating the power of circuits already in place and deciding whether to add service panels to handle increased power demands.

Recommendations

Lastly, another good way to find a good, reliable electrician is to ask others. Contractors usually have a list of reliable electricians that they usually recommend to clients. So if you’re having a new room built and need an electrician, ask the contractor you used for the room to give you some recommendations. Another good place to find the contact info of recommended electricians is by going to your local home-builders’ association or an electrical-supply store near you.

When you sit down to interview an electrician, ask to be shown a copy of his state license and proof of insurance and check that they are current and that he has minimum liability coverage of $500,000. And remember to check his references.

In this section of the Electrician Greenville SC website we will go over an average home electrical system and how the electricity gets from your local electrical provider to all the various electrical appliances in your home.

Most residential homes in the US, and certainly the ones in Virginia Beach, have a main electrical line coming in from their power company to a meter on the outside of their house.  This “line” actually consist of two 120 volt wires and a neutral wire.  In the electrical biz, these two 120 volt wires are called “hot” wires.

From the electrical meter, the wires are routed into a main distribution area called an electrical panel.  Depending on the size or electrical load of the home, you could have additional panels off the main one called “sub panels”.  If you’re old school, you may call this panel a fuse box.

Inside your main electrical panel are safety devices called circuit breakers, or if your home is old school too, fuses.  You will have a breaker (or fuse) for each circuit in your home.  These circuits are called  branch circuits.  A typical branch circuit might feed all the outlets in a bedroom for example.

Most circuits in your home carry one hot leg of 120 volts, a neutral wire and a ground wire and are named, conveniently enough, 120 volt circuits.  Other circuits carry two wires, each with 120 volts, and feed large appliances like your stove, water heater or air conditioner.  These circuits are called 240 volt circuits.

The majority of things requiring electricity like lamps, televisions, toasters and your child’s Play Station video game console use 120 volts.  You get this 120 volts out of the outlets that are located on walls throughout your home.

If you look closely at the electrical ratings on these devices however, you may notice that some are rated for 120 volts while others are rated for 115 volts or even 110 volts.  What’s up with that?

Each of these electrical devices are designed to operate off of the standard voltage in your home, which of course starts out at 120 volts at the electrical panel box.  As the current flows through the wires to various outlets, the voltage drops a bit and as the electricity finally reaches the furthest outlets from the electrical panel you will lose a few volts which is completely normal.

The electrical current that flows through the wires in our home is measured in volts, amps and watts.  Voltage is simply the pressure being applied to the electricity as it is being pushed through the wire… much like the pressure of the water being pushed through your water pipes.

And just like water, we can say that the amount of electricity being pushed through the wires is called wattage… with water it is gallons.

You get the amperage rating by dividing the voltage by the wattage.  So, if you have a 120 volt lamp using a 100 watt light bulb you will be drawing .83 amps.  Most of the circuits in your home can handle, depending on the wire and breaker size, 15-20 amps.

So, we are back to circuit breakers.  Circuit breakers are important safety devices that will cut power to a branch circuit should it start to draw to many amps.  To many amps can cause the wiring and electrical components to overheat and cause a fire.

So, when your teenage daughter has all the lights on in her bedroom as well as the television, stereo, computer, curling iron and blow dryer, you can see how each appliances amp draw adds up until you have reached the circuits capacity to deliver electricity and it trips a breaker.

Without circuit breakers and fuse protection, teenagers all across the world would be burning down their parents homes!

Now, you may have noticed that in your kitchen and bathroom there is an odd looking outlet that has its own safety device installed in it.  It has a couple of buttons that you can push and will sometimes trip at the most inconvenient of times.

These outlets are known as GFCI outlets, or ground fault circuit interrupters.  They are designed to protect people as well as the homes electrical system and are used in areas where moisture is present… like in a bathroom next to a sink.

Should you happen to drop your blow dryer in a sink full of water, you will cause a short circuit and your typical breaker would overheat and shut off the electricity.  However, if your foot was in that sink of water for some odd reason, a typical breaker would not trip fast enough to keep you from getting a heck of a shock!

That is what the GFCI is used for. It is mighty quick to fill the power should it detect even the faintest hint of moisture in the electrical system and you absolutely need to have these outlets in your bathroom as well as the kitchen.  Yes, they cost a few more dollars but they can save your life!

Here is a video on everything GFCI: