Do you or does someone that you know have a Federal Pacific Electrical panel in their business or home? There are a number of reasons that these panels are unsafe, which means that they should be replaced as quickly as possible. One of the first reasons is simply because they are so old. Federal Pacific panels have not been installed in many years. The main reason that they should be replaced by your electrician in Los Angeles is because the circuit breakers in the panel may not always trip whenever they should. This can lead to some very serious issues with your home’s electrical system.

An Example

A couple years ago, one of our technicians were called out to inspect a circuit wire that appeared to have bubbled up. Whenever he arrived at the location, he discovered that this particular circuit had been overloaded so far that the sheath covering on the cable started to boil. Upon further inspection, he found out that the power for this particular cable came from a Federal Pacific electrical panel. What happened, was that the homeowner’s air conditioning unit was experiencing issues that caused it to seize up, continuously pulling more and more power from the panel. Rather than tripping like it should have, the circuit breaker remained on, leading to the boiling cable sheathe.

Although we were able to correct this problem relatively quickly, it could very easily have turned out much worse. This overloaded wire could have caught fire, or remained unnoticed and poorly insulated until it came into contact with a person or with another item that led to serious electrical shock or other injury.

The moral of the story is to have your home regularly inspected by a Los Angeles electrician for proper safety. For more safety tips or information about unsafe electrical panels, visit The Electric Connection at www.theelectricconnection.com.

When it comes to crime, it’s evident that there’s an appeal to darkness. Less visibility means less chance of getting caught. The 2014 National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS)—an annual Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program publication that’s released by the FBI—includes detailed crime data, such as time of day and type of offense. More than 18,000 law enforcement agencies participate in the UCR Program and provide data voluntarily. NIBRS’ Crimes Against Persons data shows that of the 1,093,466 incidents reported in 2014, 562,104 (51.4 percent) were between the hours of 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. Crimes Against Property data shows a lower—yet significant—39.4 percent of 3,493,904 reported incidents taking place between those same hours.

In an attempt to lessen crime and increase energy savings, many cities and businesses have started replacing traditional high-intensity discharge (HID) lights with LED bulbs, light engines, and fixtures. These actions have paid off. In 2008, Los Angeles began a project to retrofit 215,000 lights with LED lights. Since implementation of the project, color-rendering indexes (CRI) than HID fixtures. CRI refers to how accurately a light source reveals the true colors of objects, people, and surroundings. The CRI of an HID bulb can range from zero (high-pressure sodium) to about 65 (metal-halide). LED fixtures are capable of having CRIs of 75 and higher. Lights with a CRI of 80 or higher are considered to show colors most accurately and increase visibility, which is especially important for security purposes and parking lot surveillance.