Christmas is upon us again and more than any other time of year, it’s the time of year where people put strain on their electrical system.  The lights on your house and the beautiful decorations you’ve been storing in your attic finally are brought out and plugged in for your friends and neighbors to view and appreciate.  And, of course, the vast majority of homes you visit have at least one Christmas tree.  Since most of these things are electrical, it’s probably not a surprise to you that, as a top Dallas electrician, I start getting a lot of calls this time of year.  Though it’s always nice to have the business with Christmas so close, I thought it’d be great to share with ways to avoid wiring problems with your Christmas decorations this year:

 In general, there are a few important tips that can help you avoid wiring problems.  If your lights look frayed or dangerous, they should always be replaced or repaired before using them, frayed wiring are hazardous.  You should take care that your electrical source is safe before you even begin the installation process.  To avoid the potential for overloads, you should have dedicated circuits installed for your holiday decorations.

Most importantly, you should never try to supply power for your lights without contacting a top Dallas electrician to help you install the necessary equipment and make the necessary safety precautions.  Short cuts are potentially dangerous. I can remember one example where a customer had supplied power to their lights by splicing an extension cord directly into their circuit breaker box!  Even worse, they’d shut the breaker box door, pinching the cabling!  Left unchecked, even if this hadn’t started a fire, damage from a power surge or overload could have easily destroyed their whole breaker, meaning they’d have to spend thousands to repair the damage at the absolute worst time of year!

If your heater is not well-maintained, then you are at a much higher risk of encountering serious operational problems than you otherwise would be. When you have a professional heating technician inspect and meticulously tune up your home heating system, every component in that system will be working at peak performance levels. This not only helps to ensure that any minor issues are resolved before they can cause serious trouble, but also that any developing issues are caught early on.

Another great benefit of routine heating maintenance is the fact that you’ll be able to heat your home in an efficient manner. If your heater is not functioning properly in every way, then it is going to have to work harder than it should have to in order to heat your home. This will result in increased heating costs.

Not only will you likely be paying too much to heat your home, should you fail to schedule routine heating maintenance, but it is also very likely that you’ll be met with a subpar performance from your home heating system. If you want to pay as little as possible for the best performance possible from your heating system, just pick up the phone and dial our number. Great heating maintenance is just a phone call away.

As the winter months approach, it’s time to start making your plan for potential power outages that often come with the yearly DMV snowfall. With the Farmer’s Almanac predicting a particularly harsh winter, the sounder the plan is, the more comfortable you’ll be when the cold hits!

Perhaps the best strategy to prevent against home blackouts is to install a stand-by generator. A standby generator supply backup power to your home when the grid goes down, keeping your home toasty and warm against the cold outside. But what else can a standby generator help your home with? Let the experts at Kolb Electric help!

Obviously, the best thing about a standby generator is that it will provide electricity to your home when your power goes out. But aside from that, it has a few distinct advantages over your basic generator that requires a manual start. A standby generator:

Despite common conception, standby generators are actually very affordable. These days, there are standby generators available from as small as three kilowatts, which are both affordable and powerful enough to provide supplementary emergency power to essential electrical systems.

Standby generators are safer, more reliable, and less expensive to run than portable generators and require no input on your part—they start and stop automatically. If you live in Maryland, Virginia, or Washington, DC and want to install a standby generator in your home, call Kolb Electric today!