For all intents and purposes, electrical wires are like the arteries of your home since there’s no major device or appliance that will work without them. That means it’s prudent to ensure that your Merritt Island, FL home’s electrical wiring is in good shape. Certain signs may help you to spot if your wiring needs repair and whether it’s time for whole-home rewiring services.
1. Flickering or Dimming Lights
Flickering or dimming lights aren’t an automatic sign of serious underlying electrical problems. However, repeated instances of this problem are another matter. The same applies to an even greater extent if you’ve experienced numerous power outages.
2. Circuit Breaker Trips Frequently
As with the issue of flickering or dimming lights, a tripped circuit breaker is not always a surefire indicator that it’s time to replace your electrical wiring. Circuit breakers should keep you and the devices in your home safe from the consequences of electrical power surges. That means they should only activate when a genuinely overwhelming electrical surge happens.
That should be a rare event. A circuit breaker that trips repeatedly or inexplicably should at least get you thinking about the state of your home’s electrical cables. One serious possibility that you should consider is that your wiring may be old and no longer able to handle the kinds of power loads that contemporary homes typically deal with.
One can say much the same thing about blown fuses. If you only see a blown fuse once or very rarely, your wiring is not likely to blame. If you see it repeatedly, despite taking precautions to prevent it from happening, your wiring should undergo an inspection soon for possible replacement.
3. Buzzing, Dead, or Damaged Power Outlets
It’s hard to imagine a clearer sign of electrical dysfunction than your devices’ failure to power on after you’ve plugged them into wall outlets. This is an immediate sign that power isn’t flowing normally, possibly because of some sort of physical damage to your wiring.
Charred outlets and strange buzzing noises emanating from wall sockets are similarly clear signs that something is seriously wrong. We strongly urge you not to try and investigate the source of such problems on your own, since electrical accidents can have dangerous consequences. Instead, you should call a licensed electrician and request electrical repair services.
4. Any Form of Damage to Cable Insulation
Electrical cables should have an insulative coating on them, usually made of rubber, whose purpose is to prevent electricity from traveling beyond the strict confines of each individual wire. Insulation also works to keep electricity from coming into direct contact with water, metal, or any other kind of conductive substance. The consequences of such contact could be disastrous since electricity that touches a conductor will move much faster.
For those reasons, you should never allow any electrical wires with torn or damaged insulation to remain as they are. Instead, call a licensed professional electrician as soon as you can and ask them to resolve the problem. In the meantime, you should strive not to allow power to flow through insufficiently insulated wires.
When a licensed electrician arrives to deal with the issue, they will replace the damaged insulation or switch out the damaged wiring entirely. Particularly serious versions of this problem warrant a complete electrical rewiring across your entire home.
5. Your Wiring Is Simply Too Old
Any home that is more than 40 or 50 years old is probably overdue for a rewiring, regardless of the apparent condition of its electrical system. Not only will the wiring itself wear down and corrode after so much time, but wiring technology is bound to change, develop, and improve. Older wires will struggle to transmit amounts of power that newer wires could easily handle.
No electrical system is eternal or impervious to damage, and the one in your home is no exception. If you’re wondering if your home might need a rewiring, call Extreme Air & Electric, LLC today and ask for our whole-home rewiring services in Merritt Island, FL.
