Electrical Panel Warning

If you have a  Zinsco ^TM or GTE-Sylvania^TM-Zinsco [or Kearney] electrical panel installed in your home serious electrical hazards may be present which could result in overheating,  fire, or inability to turn off the electrical power in the home. Zinsco are notorious for arcing and welding themselves to the circuit box. This causes a problem when they overload, they don't trip (shut off).You can't always see this by visually inspecting the box. Even trained inspectors are not required to remove nd check the circuit breakers.  A licensed electrician who is familiar with this equipment should be called to inspect the panel for immediate fire and shock hazards.

Photo by Ray Franco

Electric Vehicle Charger Installations

We’ve begun installing chargers for electric cars in Los Angeles and I have to say electric cars (electric vehicles or EVs) are fantastic.
Virtually every automobile company is scrambling to produce electric vehicles.  Right now, Los Angeles residents have a few electric cars to choose from.

General Motors new Chevy Volt electric car won the Green Car Journal’s “Green Car of the Year” award. American manufacturer Ford is coming out with the completely electric Ford Focus in 2012. The Nissan Leaf has a waiting list of over 20,000 buyers.

Unlike a hybrid car—which is fueled by gasoline and uses a battery and motor to improve efficiency—an electric car is powered exclusively by electricity. Historically, EVs have not been widely adopted because of limited driving range before needing to be recharged, long recharging times, and a lack of commitment by automakers to produce and market electric cars that have all the creature comforts of gas-powered cars. That’s changing as battery technology improves. Cars today can go 100 miles on one charge. By increasing energy storage and reducing cost new batteries have ushered in a new era of electric vehicles. The future is here.
Electric cars produce no tailpipe emissions, reduce our dependency on oil, and are cheaper to operate. Of course, the process of producing the electricity moves the emissions further upstream to the utility company’s smokestack—but even dirty electricity used in electric cars usually reduces our collective carbon footprint.

With Circuit Panels Neatness Counts!

 

An electrical circuit breaker panel is the main distribution point for electrical circuits in your home. It usually provides between 100 and 200 amps of power to your home, depending on your home’s load demand. When installing an electrical circuit panel neatness counts. It's important to be precise with each aspect of assembly from the tightness of the screws holding the wires to the labeling of each switch.

 

Circuit breakers are designed to "trip" and turn off power when any of the following dangerous situations occur:

• Overloaded Circuit
• Short Circuit
• Ground Fault

Circuit Panel Troubleshooting:

• The most common reason breakers "trip" is that there is simply too much plugged into one outlet or multiple outlets connected to one circuit.
• Move lamps, heaters, irons, hair dryers and other heavy power consuming devices to a different circuit that is not being used as much.
• Turn off some of the devices on the circuit to reduce the load.
• Loose connections are another possible cause. With power off check outlets for a loose wire and the electrical service panel hot wire connected to the circuit breaker to see if it has become loose. You may want to call an electrician at this point or re-tighten the connections as necessary.
• If these suggestions do not solve the problem, call an electrician, you may have a more serious problem such as a Short Circuit or Ground Fault.