Current Electrical Services, 1734 Zylstra Road, Oak Harbor, WA (2026)

Located in Oak Harbor on Whidbey Island.

11/06/2022

With this wind storm having done significant damage up and down the island, I would like to take a moment to address the natural reaction in seeking to have a generator installed at your home.

Please remember that you want to deal with licensed professionals in whatever trade may be required to completely install a Home Standby Generator. Typically, and minimally this will be an electrical contractor and a gas piping contractor (plumber).

All too often after a storm like this, we see hordes of handymen, and gaggles of general contractors swooping in and making sales and shoddy installations that prove troublesome for homeowners.

It is important to note that generators and their associated transfer switches should be sized to the load that they are going to be carrying. The National Electrical Code, and various rules and codes of Washington state go in to this calculation and need to be followed.

Please protect yourself and your home by seeking out licensed electrical contractors and licensed subcontractors to perform this work for you. Stay safe.

11/18/2020

It appears we have missed the big blow and have some time to regroup. I posted last week about standby generators and have received quite a bit of response via phone calls. I thought I would offer this advice before the next outage occurs.

Standby generators are designed for the most part come on once a week to run for 10 or 15 minutes to exercise the unit. Hearing this happen while you’re home is typically reassuring, for some people however it appears that this sound makes them think that they are wasting fuel or overworking the generator. Consequently many people it appears have turned the unit off instead of leaving it in automatic mode. This can, and has, caused the generator to not function when needed. My advice is to leave it in automatic mode and let it burn a little bit of fuel each week so that when needed it operates as advertised.

I have had quite a few calls regarding portable generators. Portable generators can become a problem if they have been neglected. This includes such areas as fuel gumming up and restricting flow to the carburetor, batteries becoming discharged and not being able to start the generator, another thing that can happen is that without use the field of the generator can lose its residual magnetism so that if it does start it will produce no voltage. So it would be wise to start your portable generator once a month let it run for 15 or 20 minutes. If you have a battery on your portable generator it would be smart to get a battery tender, or trickle charger, and hook that up so that there is always a fresh charge on your battery. Adding a fuel stabilizer to your fuel tank will help prolong its life. Also be sure and add fuel stabilizer to your extra fuel.

These are some of the items that I have addressed with folks over the weekend and through this week already.

11/15/2020

After an outage like this it seems to me there is a lot of talk about having standby generators installed. I would like to urge everybody to pump the brakes a little bit and be well informed prior to having somebody come in and install one of these units.

First off you should contact a licensed electrician with some familiarity with the installation of generator systems. While not terribly complex there are a number of factors to be considered for a safe installation.

Second determine what you need to run during an outage. The amount of load that will be placed upon the generator is primarily the determining factor for sizing. There are a number of ways to determine the load and a licensed electrician can help you with those.

In Washington state any generator installation will need to be inspected after the work has been done by a licensed electrician. No a handyman can’t do it, no a general contractor can’t do it, no the local HVAC company can’t do it, unless they themselves act as the electrical contractor and employee a licensed electrician to install the generator.

I have spent the past 24 hours answering numerous calls and dealing with service calls where generator systems were installed by incompetent people. It makes no sense to me that people want to save a buck on a system that is designed to burn fuel and create electricity in close proximity to your residence.

Please protect yourself and your family and ensure that a licensed electrical contractor, with a licensed electrician installs your standby generator system. There are plenty to choose from in the phonebook or online.

Address

1734 Zylstra Road
Oak Harbor, WA
98277

Telephone

+13609692381

Website

http://www.cesoh.com/

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