Some of us have such poor DIY skills that we can’t even put up a shelf. However, there are some of us who feel we can turn our hand to anything, following the philosophy of “How difficult can it really be?”. That’s all well and good for many DIY tasks, but not when it comes to electrical wiring. Did you know that on average, it takes between four and five years to become a qualified electrician in the States? That should tell you that there’s more to mastering the art of electrical wiring than reading a DIY manual or watching a YouTube video!

In theory, installing some wiring yourself may not appear to be that complicated, but there is so much more that needs to be taken into consideration beyond making sure that a current flows from one end to the other.

For a start, all the electrical items in your home aren’t connected to one single circuit. There are multiple circuits, and each of them has been designed to deal with a specific, maximum demand in power. Circuits for lighting are designed to take far less power than those for the range in your kitchen, electric fires, floor sockets and the likes. If you wire power socket to a lighting circuit, you’ll probably blow the circuit or power breaker whenever you try and use it.

Power and circuit breakers are there to stop you from electrocuting yourself if, for some reason, you come into contact with ‘live’ current. However, these breakers don’t always trip if wiring overheats, especially if that wiring has been added by an enthusiastic DIYer.

Incorrect wiring can also affect the efficiency of the electricity distribution throughout your home and, if electrical appliances are not operated on a circuit that provides the correct power, severe damage can be caused. Saving a couple of hundred dollars on doing an electrical wiring job yourself could easily end up costing you thousands of dollars in the long run.

One important area that DIY enthusiasts tend to forget about is home insurance. If you do a poor job with electrical wiring in your home and this results in a house fire, chances are your insurance company won’t pay out. In addition, working with electricity is dangerous. You should also check all your insurance policies to make sure that if you electrocute yourself, that your insurance policies will still apply. We are not just talking about killing yourself, many people have severely burned themselves when working with electricity, which can lead to both huge medical bills, but which may lead to many weeks or months off work.

Here at A&E Air Conditioning and Heating all our electrical engineers are highly qualified and very experienced – we wouldn’t have it any other way. However, if you have a small electrical project and want to make 100% sure that it is safe for you to do the work yourself and for a modest fee, here at A&E one of our engineers will more than happily come out and see you and advise you accordingly. Why not give us a call and arrange a convenient time for a visit?