Tag: safety tips

Holiday Decorating Safety Tips to Keep Your Family Safe this Winter

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With the holidays fast approaching, many families are starting to put their decorations up in their homes. While this is a fun and willing distraction from the problems the COVID pandemic is bringing us, it’s important to keep decoration safety in mind. If you don’t know what that means, keep reading this blog about holiday decorating safety tips from the pros at Roman Electric!

1. Use GFCIs

First things first, it’s important that you use ground fault circuit interrupter (GFCI) outlets. GFCIs can monitor the flow of electricity using sensors—if they sense electricity spiking or flowing down the wrong path, they will shut the plugged-in appliance down. GFCIs can prevent electrical fires and electric shocks, which is why it is important you have GFCI outlets, especially outdoors, in your kitchen and bathroom. If you don’t have GFCI outlets, get in touch with your electrician to install them.

2. Use LEDs

If you want to ensure safety as well as savings, make sure you use decorative LED lights. LEDs use at least 75% less energy and last 25 times longer than their incandescent counterparts. They also don’t heat up like incandescent bulbs, meaning they are okay to touch and won’t risk overheating.

3. What is Indoors, Belongs Indoors

If you’re thinking of stringing up indoor lights or using indoor extension cords outdoors, think again. Indoor decorations are not as durable as outdoor ones and are vulnerable to moisture and extreme weather. If you want to use décor outdoors, make sure you get material that has been rated for outdoor use—check the packaging to be sure as it will safe “Safe for Outdoor Use” or something similar.

4. Use Fake Candles

While candles add a nice touch, they can certainly be dangerous and pose a risk of fires. That’s why you should consider using fake candles—they create the same effect without the fire and danger!

5. Do Not Hammer Nails

When putting up your lights, be sure you don’t hammer them in with nails or use staples as this can damage your light’s wiring. Use safe, plastic hooks or clips to put them up instead.

6. Don’t Use Broken Lights

Broken lights or those with exposed wiring can not only look bad but they can also be dangerous and lead to overheating and electrical fires. Before you put them up, make sure the lights are intact and the wiring isn’t exposed or broken.

Have any more questions about holiday decorating safety tips? The pros at Roman Electric are here to help you out. Whether you need assistance with electrical services or even plumbing, heating and cooling, our team of professionals will be here to provide you the best service possible! Call us today at 414-369-3798 or schedule a service with us on our website! We are looking forward to hearing from you and working with you.

4 Electrical Safety Tips for Your Garage

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Observing proper electrical safety throughout your home is important no matter what, but you might not have put much thought into making sure your garage is safe. There are plenty of various electrical hazards that could be lurking in there, and we want to help make sure you and your family stay safe.

Here are a few electrical safety tips for your garage from the electrical experts at Roman Electric. We pride ourselves on making sure our Milwaukee neighbors enjoy friendly, reliable service year-round, and we’d love to help you and your family.

Test Your Circuit Breakers in the Garage

Arguably the most effective safety check you can make is to ensure that the power supply to your garage is operational and safe. Check the circuit breakers that provide power to the garage and make sure they’re working like they’re supposed to.

Diagnosing a Short Circuit

Figure out which devices are hooked up to the different circuits so that you don’t overload them and inadvertently cause a power surge. Also be sure to keep in mind the voltage load that a circuit breaker can handle, because you can limit the amount of devices attached to a circuit but still plug in things that require more power than the breaker can handle.

Store Smart

Garages, in addition to being places we can park our cars to escape the elements, end up being ideal storage spaces as well. But you need to be smart about how you store things in there. Since there is so much electricity present in your garage, you need to be careful to avoid storing anything there that could present an electrical hazard.

  • Avoid storing flammable things close to anything that uses electricity. All it takes is one wayward spark to ignite objects like cardboard or gas.
  • Always unplug devices and equipment when you are finished using them. Never leave electrical appliances attached to an outlet unless you’re using them.
  • Don’t let any spills in your garage linger. Clean them up immediately to ensure that your electrical equipment can’t use liquid to create a short circuit.

Double-Check Extension Cords

Every now and then, inspect your extension cords for fraying or other problems. If you notice any defects in the cords, then get rid of them immediately and get some new ones. It might seem like you can ignore small issues with extension cords because you’ve used them before, but all it takes is one slip-up for something as dangerous as electricity to cause serious harm.

Ensure GFCI Outlets are Installed and Operational

GFCI outlets are specially designed outlets that will automatically cut the power off as soon as they detect a change in the power level of the current traveling through it. These outlets are usually installed on exterior surfaces and on places near water sources to prevent short circuits from occurring, and you should have them in your garage.

The Ins and Outs of GFCI Outlets

If you do, make sure they’re primed and operational. If not, call a professional to see about getting a few installed. It’s painless and quick, and these outlets are significantly safer than regular ones.

Roman Electric: Keeping Milwaukee’s Residents Safe since 1929

Hopefully these electrical safety tips for your garage have helped you make a mental checklist of ways to make your home a bit safer! Here at Roman Electric, we pride ourselves on providing reliable, efficient service, and that includes jobs that help you and your family feel safer.

No matter the job, we’re the ones to make it happen. Give us a call at 414-369-3798 to speak to one of our friendly team members today!

Tips for Observing National Electrical Safety Month

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It’s always a good idea to practice smart electrical safety. It never hurts to refresh yourself on the steps you can take to keep you and your family safe, but it’s especially prudent this time of year. May is National Electrical Safety Month, and here at Roman Electric we want to make sure our neighbors stay safe during the quickly approaching summer.

Since the end of the school year is almost here, it’s important to make sure your kids know how to be smart around electricity while they enjoy their few precious months of freedom. And it isn’t just limited to children, either! Everyone in the house should go over these electrical safety tips to help make this National Electrical Safety Month an educational one.

Don’t Ignore Wiring

According to the U.S. Fire Administration, electrical issues are responsible for more than 65,000 fires and more than 450 deaths every year. Some of these can’t be prevented, but you can do your part to limit the potential for one to happen in your home by making sure your wiring is intact.

Have an inspector take a look at your home’s wiring to see if it all checks out. While most wiring is designed to last for a significantly long period of time, smaller issues can go undetected until they become serious problems all of a sudden. And if your home was built in the 1970s, it may have been fitted with aluminum wiring, which is particularly dangerous.

Smart Electrical Cord Care

We all use electrical cords to power our appliances and devices, so it’s critical to ensure they don’t pose a risk at all.

– Make sure they aren’t frayed or damaged at all. Even a tiny crack has the potential to quickly grow, which will expose wires and present a heightened risk of short circuiting or shock.

– Hide electrical cords so that they can’t be tripped over and so that the hands of curious children can’t find them. Place them under a rug or behind furniture so they’re out of the way.

– Use plastic outlet covers when your cords aren’t plugged in to keep prying fingers out of them.

GFCI Outlets

You’ve almost certainly got a few outlets around your home that look different compared to the others. These will have a reset button and are usually located closer to water sources. GFCI outlets are designed to shut off automatically in the event they detect a potential short circuit, which is more likely around water.

Make sure yours are all primed and ready – and be sure that you’ve got GFCI outlets installed in the first place.

Don’t Overload Power Strips

Few devices are as useful as power strips are. They can handle several electrical cords all at once, and they protect your valuable electronics from dangerous power surges. But, like everything, they can only support so much.

If you stick too many plugs into them, the power strips might not be able to sufficiently bear the load you need. Spread them out among a few power strips to evenly distribute the power and avoid straining one power strip too badly.

Roman Electric: Milwaukee’s Electrical Safety Experts

This National Electrical Safety Month, let the pros at Roman Electric help you and your family double-check your home to make sure everything’s safe and sound. Whether you need an electrical safety inspection or need someone you can trust to re-do a wiring job or anything in-between, we’re here to help!

Give us a call at 414-369-3798 to see how we can help today!

What to Do When You Have Frozen Pipes

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Few things have the ability to stop us dead in our tracks like finding out we’ve fallen prey to frozen pipes. Whenever you’re unfortunate enough to discover that your faucets and shower aren’t producing water any more, your mind starts racing. What should you do? How do you thaw them out? Should you call a plumber?

All good questions! Frozen pipes are one of the more annoying nuisances you can experience. However, if you accidentally deploy the wrong strategy to combat them, you can cause serious damage to your pipes. Here are a couple of ways that you can work to thaw your frozen pipes from the plumbing experts at Roman Electric!

Ways to Thaw Them Out

If you’re already stuck in the middle of a frozen-pipe situation, reading about how to prevent them in the first place isn’t helpful. You need immediate help, so we’ll cut right to the chase.

  • Open cabinets and your faucets. The key here is to introduce as much heat as possible to your frozen pipes. To do this, remove any obstruction between the pipes and warm air by opening under-sink cabinets and opening faucets. It probably won’t make a big difference immediately, but it’ll gradually heat them.
  • Heat them. An easy way to make sure the pipes get hot is to… heat them! Obviously! But you’ve got to be careful here. One way is to boil some water, then pour the water on towels that have been wrapped around the frozen pipes. Another is to place a heat lamp close to the pipes to introduce a passive heating element.
  • Call a plumber. Sometimes you just don’t have the time or resources available to put toward a pipe-thawing effort. When that happens, a plumber’s expertise might be your best bet. Call your go-to plumber (like Roman Electric) and have them come take a look – they’ll know what to do.

What NOT to Do

However, in the race to blast your frozen pipes with as much heat as possible, there are a few ways you can slip up and cause more damage. For example, although you may think that a tool that provides a blazing-hot flame would be helpful – like a blowtorch – it won’t. A blowtorch or any other open flame can accidentally catch other things on fire. Then your problem has suddenly become much bigger.

Tips for the Future

Once you’ve got your frozen-pipe conundrum behind you, take some time to safeguard your home from this problem occurring in the future. Insulate the pipes and the area around them to trap heat and keep cold air out. Start dripping water from your faucets when the temperatures drop so the water is always flowing, and make sure the garage door stays closed.

Frozen pipes are no fun for anyone. But with these handy tips, you’ll be well on your way to returning to normal. Now, sometimes the cold is especially harsh, and you’ll need expert help to thaw the ice. When that happens, give Roman Electric a call!

Get in touch at 414-369-3798 for more information!