YouTube is an amazing place to learn how to do things. I love to learn new craft techniques, and gardening tips and my husband loves to see automotive rebuilds. If I screw up and make a mistake, I’ll be out a package of seeds, or some material, but if I try to DIY my electrical repair, I may be out a lot more than just a bit of material and the experience can be truly shocking.
You’ve dragged your feet around on the carpet and then touched a friend and laughed as they were shocked and you’ve probably also rubbed a balloon on your hair and then stuck it to the wall but this static electricity is a different story than alternate current (AC) electricity.
We all want to save money and do our own repairs so there are some things you need to know before you follow that wire and do your own work.
1) There are different colored wires in an electrical system and when tied together different things happen. One thing that commonly happens is a lost neutral or you use a plug tester and it tells you there is no neutral. This can occur naturally as your system may be older and no neutrals were actually used or they can be tied together with a different circuit. How do you know why you have no neutral, you can’t just coast to an answer for this one.
2) There is no ground, well what does that really mean? There is ground, I am standing on it using my plug tester! In actuality the “ground” is what keeps you from getting electrocuted when lightning strikes or power surges, or water touches electricity. Older systems had what is called a two-wire system and there was no ground so when you try to plug in that three-prong cord into a 2 prong you can’t. Changing the outlet to a three-prong outlet does not add a ground it just makes it so you can plug it in but does not get you the safety of grounding. Many of today’s appliances require grounding to keep the electronics from burning up or you getting burned up using your electronics. Your home is most likely grounded with a 10 ft long copper bar buried in the ground and connected to your electrical panel. Imagine how much fun it was to get that copper bar 10 ft into the ground. This is a different ground than what is at your outlet and will not protect your expensive computer or audio/video set up. Before the introduction of GFCI outlets there were 800 deaths a year from ground faults and now that number is down to 200.
3) There is a North Pole and Santa lives there. In your home there are also poles which create polarity and when a switch or outlet is wired wrong the polarity is reversed. What does this really mean for you, well you might not have to clean house for a while because the vacuum may not run when the polarity is reversed. Consumer products that get plug in caused approximately 180 injuries last year.
4) Your light does not work and you think, “I didn’t like that light anyway so I’ll get a new one. I can do that no problem I watched the video on YouTube”. Then you take the old light down and as you disconnect the wires you realize that there are more wires than the tube video showed. Eek, what do you do now. “We’ll just cap those wires off because we don’t need them”. At best your light might not turn off and on at the switch or an outlet may not work now but at worst badly done electrical caused more than 140,000 fires each year. Approximately 400 people died and 4000 were injured because of these electrical related fires. The cost of these fires is estimated to exceed $4 billion annually. Don’t be a victim.
In Washington state, anyone can do the electrical in their own home legally with or without YouTube help. In Washington state, a handyman, general contractor, your friend, or someone you know cannot do the electrical in your home. If you hire an electrician who does not own an electrical contracting business, he risks losing his license and livelihood to help you do your project. Last year 2021, LNI fined more than 5000 people for doing work under the table. Your 18-year-old child can get a contractor’s license in the state of Washington, do you want him to wire your brand-new home? NO, Washington state protects their citizens by requiring that all electrical and plumbing be done by a licensed electrician or plumber if not done by the homeowner themselves. It takes 4000 hours of training one-on-one or one-to-two with a licensed electrician to become licensed. By the way that is two years not a 10-minute video. You also have to pass two tests to show that you know how to do electrical safely and correctly. Does electrical repair sound like something you should be doing after watching a 10 min YouTube video? That choice is always the consumers to make but the outcome may surprise you.
1) The amount of electric shock from AC power on a simple circuit is dependent on the size of the circuit and the size of the person being shocked, and the burn you receive is dependent on that, but it doesn’t end there. If you are on a ladder and you get shocked and you startle and fall of the ladder you could end up with a debilitating head injury that destroys your family’s future. This is a real-life story not some made up fiction.
2) Your house burns down and the fire is traced to bad electrical done by you and now you not only have no home or a badly damaged home and the insurance may not pay you for the damage because you caused the faulty wiring. If you choose as a homeowner to do your own wiring be sure to pull a permit and have your work inspected by LNI so you are protected.
3) We’ve all watched the funnies where they throw the toaster in the bathtub and buddabing it’s all over, well this is not what you want and correctly wired circuits won’t allow a death from a toaster or a blow dryer because theGFCIwill cut off the power to that circuit. Children love to explore and put things into holes and lick and suck on things. Tamper-resistant outlets make it so that they can’t put a penny in the outlet and if they suck on an abraded cord plugged into a GFCI they won’t get an electric shock.
Before You Think of Doing Your Own Electrical Repairs, Call Shocking Difference
Being handy is wonderful but know your limits and don’t be afraid to ask a professional, don’t let your wife be the one that calls us. Sometimes the cost of a licensed professional is well worth it.
A generator transfer switch – or a transfer switch – transfers electrical power from one source to another in the case of a power outage or when switching between a primary power source and a backup generator.
The team at Shocking Difference LLC is ready to help you install a home generator in Olympia, WA. Call us today at (360) 754-4542 or contact us online for more information.
Putting labels next to all of the breakers in your electric panel is an important step toward keeping your house safe. Call (360) 754-4542 for any electrical concerns.
Being handy is wonderful but know your limits and don’t be afraid to ask a professional. Before you think of doing your own electrical repairs. Call Shocking Difference (360)754-4542.
If you have uncovered walls and consistently have something plugged into an outlet in that area you may want to take a peak and make sure no one is starting their babies there.
Images provided on this website are for personal, non-commercial use. Republication, retransmission, or reproduction of such images is strictly prohibited.
