Proven Electrical Services
60 Fairfax Crescent T8N 1Y1 Saint Albert, AB, Canada

Mike built this panel today for a calcium plant sump pump in the recovery berm. Work in progress but I think he did a great job so far.

A gift from the Council in Gjoa Haven years back now. I was working there on an infrastructure project and helped out with some HVAC issues at the communty centre. It's quite a place to visit, and some wonderful people. I hope to visit again one day.

Canada's National Flag day was on Saturday. We were out on a chilly day installing sub metering system. I brought along this flag from Lions Club in Chilliwack, a gift from the club when my Father passed away. It was also Alberta Family Day weekend. I hope you had a good weekend and a chance to spend some time with the Family.

Checking and repairing an aluminum wired house today. Found this neutral splice in the main bath room. Inside the marrett was very cooked. Likely this has been burning for a while. Down the hall in a spare bedroom I found some poor repairs to a similar situation in the ceiling light outlet, wires so short it was tricky to re-splice. I saw quite a few repair attempts throughout the house. The main intent, for me, is replace marretts which are not rated for aluminum to copper c...onnections, re-splice as necessary, coat aluminum wires with anti-oxidant compound, extend copper pigtails to devices rated for copper wire only, and identify all branch circuits at the panel. This includes every outlet throughout, lights, plugs, switches, appliances, exhaust fans, dishwashers etc. It's not a difficult task but it is a time consuming task. An experienced electrician will perform the task effectively while identifying and correcting potential hazards. See more

I received a message today, I thought I would share. This Global news video explains some test results recently conducted in the Calgary area. I have researched this topic previously and encourage you to check out the Canadian Government website at https://www.canada.ca//take-action-radon-health-canada-201

Some creative wiring we found. The tape job really added flare. I think the installer misinterpreted the rule " all splices to be within a box".

Check your fixtures and be aware Energy Efficiency Alberta has announced energy efficiency programs starting to be implemented. Take time to register for the programs to receive updates.

Check your smoke alarms. 'tis the season.

We installed a new panel and meter socket for a St. Albert home earlier this week. As part of the job we installed new combination arc fault/GFCI breakers. The house is wired with aluminum wiring, mid 70's. We "pigtailed" everything last year. At that time we checked the panel and all the circuit breakers reset normally. The panel was very old however and required upgrading. So three of the new arc fault circuit breakers would not reset. So temporarily we installed normal br...eakers and they reset normally. We found on one circuit a receptacle had some nicked wires. The whites were touching ground. The new breaker detected the fault so it would not energize the circuit. Once corrected and arc fault reinstalled, the breaker reset normally. One down two to go. The second and third fault circuits as we discovered had a common trouble. One circuit could operate on an arc fault breaker providing the other circuit was connected to a normal breaker. We checked a receptacle which was previously noted as a possible problem as it had three cables in the box but only the neutral was being used from one of the cables. We traced that cable and discovered it was coming from another circuit. So somewhere the neutral was open on the plug circuit so the original electrician cheated and used the closest neutral available. We continued tracing the open neutral and found a junction box buried in the wood chip attic insulation. The box was packed full of wood chips and had a cover plate installed. Can you say "attic fire waiting to happen". We continued tracing and found the cable with broken neutral. We replaced the cable, reinstalled the arc fault breakers and the breakers reset normally. The moral of the story is when you find something not right you need to investigate why and if you find a broken circuit fix it, don't just put a bandaid on it. And, just because the breaker resets doesn't mean the circuit is safe. If you have older wiring I highly recommend changing out those old breakers for the new arc fault type. See more

Just heard on Now Radio this location is open to Fort McMurray evacuees!

http://www.nasa.gov///image/alberta.a2016124.1950.250m.jpg An interesting link to the Fort McMurray fires. http://www.nasa.gov//fort-mcmurray-wildfire-in-alberta-can

http://www.albertafire.com/kevan-jess-writes-about-fire-al/

Earn a free ticket to the Calgary Stampede! Go to HomeStars and submit 2 reviews: http://homestars.com//2014-calagary-stampede-ticket-in-cal

Lighting is complete for a warehouse retro fit project in Edmonton. The commercial tenant space was converted to a 4800 sq.ft. freezer. We used an 8ft T5 HO fixture with 6 54Watt 4ft 4100k lamps, 11 fixtures total. The fixtures, from Visioneerring Corp. are enclosed in a water tight housing and include cold temperature ballasts. Operating temperature of the freezer is -20 degrees Celcius (typical Edmonton temperature,hah) Originally, we were tasked with installing some 2ft sq...uare Metal Halide box fixtures. We discussed the energy savings with the client and we're happy to receive approval for the our proposal. The client is satisfied as well especially considering the enery savings and "instant on" feature of the fluorescents compared to the delay with typical Metal Halide lights. For controls, we installed a single switch controlling a lighting contactor, only 3 120V 15A circuits were required due to the low power consumption of the lights. See more

They said, someone was recently changing some bulbs in the sign...sigh. Nice job, Not! Luckily the circuit breaker tripped, it's not that old, most of these old buildings have breakers so old and worn out. There was obviously some flames going on before it did trip. I could tell from all the splices in the wiring that this ballast is not old. What is it lately? Who is doing this work? The whole building could have burned down! Take some advice and ask for credentials when you call for electrical service in you home and office. Or, beef up your insurance! Seriously, it's no laughing matter.

Congratulations to all our Canadian Athletes in Sochi. You have all accomplished so much so far. We are all proud of you.

Further to the bad termination... They really got it wrong here! The whole panel is switched by a contactor, controlled by a time clock. The idea, I suppose, is to de energize all the baseboard heaters at night and re energize in the morning. Definately an energy savings since the baseboard heat is supplemental to the main heating system. Trouble is the electrician installed the contactor inside the panel, where the main breaker option would be installed. And..installed power... and control wiring for the time clock through the panel. This is not allowed...unless you obtain special permission and a special inspection for modified equipment. If this panel had caught fire and burnt down the building it would have been the fault of the electrician. There is no reasonable cause to do this since you can easily purchase a separate enclosure for the contactor and accomplish the same goal...safely. I would never even consider doing this type of thing. So, anyway... 1000 bucks later, disruption to the business, a whole day of work, and we fix it. It really doesn't seem fair to the client who paid for the original work to be done correctly and expected that the work would done properly and likely assumed the work had been inspected. Btw, the building is only 8 years old. See more

What do you do if the lugs are too big? Someone came up with a not so clever idea! They doubled up the wire by bending it over! So, this is a termination for a 100A distribution panel. The wire size is #3AWG Copper, the terminal is rated for conductors sizes #6 thru 3/0. So why exactly did they double it up? Not sure. The result was that the connection started arcing at some point and created high temperatures, enough to melt the inside of the lug and transfer enough heat to the adjacent contactor to overheat it as well. Please don't bend over wires in order to make them fit into a terminal. Just tighten the terminal on the cable properly or get another lug kit which accepts the conductor you are using. This poor decision caused the client to have no heat and a significant bill to repair the installation.

About Neutrals! Well, it's sad. Two service calls in a row at commercial retail locations with power troubles on their branch circuits, plugs & lighting. In bot...h cases the circuits had been wired for a Three Phase Distribution System yet the distribution was not three phase, they are Single Phase. This is very dangerous on many levels. I say if you are working in the electrical trade and don't know the difference then perhaps you should consider another trade..please. Perhaps underwater basket weaving. lol The basic difference is that a single phase, 3 wire system has two phases or lines and one neutral. A Three phase, 4 wire system has three phases and one neutral. The neutral carries the balance of the loads on the two or three phases. If you connect three circuits to a single phase panel and only use one neutral you are connecting two "same phase" circuit conductors to one neutral so if both are drawing 12A then the neutral is carrying 24A. Presumably the neutral would be the same size as the circuit conductors so you will be overloading that wire by double! If you do this the neutral will burn and adjacent building material may ignite causing a fire. This is serious folks, get it right and if you're not sure ask for help. Besides the basic burning down the building thing, incorrect wiring like this causes a ripple effect over time. Many trades people may be servicing the electrical or upgrading components over the life of the installation. If a trained trades person sees a Red, Black, Blue, and White in a field junction box, they will assume the system is three phase...but its not! Unless they take the time to measure voltage relationships between wires or take a good look at the panel, they will have no idea. They will continue to extend wiring in the same incorrect fashion which could create serious overloading issues. So how does this happen anyway? How could such a major mistake be made in the first place? I can only assume the person was seriously lacking observation skills and the job was never inspected. Get a qualified Electrician for your projects and ask for a copy of inspection reports. It is sad to say that although this is a first (and second) for seeing a single phase panel being wired for three phase, I have seen alot of wiring with mixed up neutrals. It really is a very common problem. If you connect more than one circuit which are on the same phase to one neutral then you will be overloading the neutral. So perhaps this opens other discussions about: 1. If you are not an electrician do not install electrical wiring unless you do your homework, have help and get it inspected. 2. If you are an electrician, before you randomly connect loads to existing circuits, check it out. Take some measurements and look at the panel. Make your best effort to identify the circuit breaker, panel and existing loads connected. Make up a drawing showing the new work completed and include all the information you observed while doing the work. maybe another day. Be safe!

Merry Christmas to all of our friends and customers! Enjoy this holiday season with the people you love.

Which half is half? Scratch head! Installing an electric heating cable for floor warming shouldn't be a hassle! Measure the space, calculate the heating demand and select the appropriate "cable set" from the supplier, right?

Further to the PVC on roof top comment, this is the result of the inconsiderate installation. You can see the adhesive has failed and the LB fitting has pulled away from the HVAC unit entry point. The conductors are now exposed to the weather, UV rays, rodents and insects. This is not really a maintenance issue since the original installation did not conform to the Canadian Electrical Code or manufacturers recommendations. In this case the wiring is low voltage so there is no...t an electricution hazard however these types of electronic controls are very sensitive and the wiring will fail, hopefully not when it is -20degrees with a meter of snow on the roof. Had the client stipulated an SCO inspection was required or hired a consultant this could have been prevented. We will propose repairing the installation for them asap, mostly because I do not want to do it in January,lol. Fyi, I say "inconsiderate" because its quite likely the client paid the contractor well for installing the controls and now will have to pay again for repairs. See more

Installing RPVC conduit on roof tops! Here's a good picture of what will happen. This conduit was installed by a controls contractor installing a digital control system for existing roof top HVAC units at a local store. Since the ceiling height inside the store is quite high and the floor space is not really "man-lift" freindly due to shelving and product displays, I can understand why they chose the roof to install the wiring. Problem is that the temperatures which the condu...it is exposed to will cause the PVC to expand and contract excessively! The CEC and manufacturers provide rules for such installations and expansion/contraction coefficents to help us with calculating pipe supports and expansion joint requirements, neither of which were considered by this installer. Also, the exposure to UV rays will, over time, make the conduit loose its color, make the pipe extremely brittle, and sometimes dry out the adhesive for pipe joints rendering it ineffective. A better option would be Teck cable, Liquid Tight Flex or Rigid Galvanised Conduit. In my next post I will show you the result of this poor installation practice. See more

Considering LED type lighting? It's a great option. Most LED lamps can replace your existing lamps and there are many new lighting products available which incorporate LED type lighting. Be cautious when ordering LED lights however. Make sure there is a CSA and ULc stamp or label on the fixture or component. CSA and ULc provide certification of electrical products for Canada including safety testing for things like potential fire hazards, many products found on line Do Not ha...ve this cerification. "this picture is from an installation of a product we were testing for reliability, the strip lighting overheated at the connection points and the points along the strip where sections were soldered at the factory. There is no CSA or ULc certification and we could not find the company who's name was printed on the product. When the original supplier was contacted for warranty repair, they claimed the water proof coating was the failing factory but to date have not replaced or shown us evidence of improving the safe operation of the product. They also indicated they are not interested in obtaining safety certification for North America..yet they will sell their product to anyone on-line..be an informed consumer when purchasing these types of products on-line." See more

Renovating your basement? Here's an option for lighting. Recessed air tight pots lights by "Cooper Lighting". The housing is recessed to provide maximum ceiling clearance and has integral thermal protection and is air tight. Many trims are available with lamp type options. "We're going to use a relector trim and a dimmable compact fluorescent for this project, it will provide a nice white glow from the fixture and the home owner can dim it down when they don't want so much light. Congratulations to the Hollorans on their awesome new basement family room."

How's your Exit signs and Emergency Lighting? "Recently we've had a lot of service calls for exit signs and emergency lighting, it seems not much maintenance is being done on these systems. The old systems have incadescent lamps which fail quickly and batteries which need to be checked regularly and replaced after a few years in service. The new systems incorporate features like integral LED lighting which is rated for up to 50,000 hrs and batteries which are very small due to the reduced LED lighting load. This picture is from a recent project. The signs originally had the Running Man Icon which was not quite approved yet in Alberta so we had Dan from Creative Color in Spruce Grove make up a new insert for the Edge Lit LED Sign. It looks clear and simple and we can change the inserts back to the Running Man later. Thanks Dan"

Well, this home owner was surprized to find what they thought were new plugs installed were actually a potential fire hazard." ..all is well now, we identified all the circuits in the home, replaced damaged and failing devices, upgraded smoke alarms, and pigtailed all the old Aluminum wiring connections at the branch circuit devices. The home will be trouble free for years, and the owners are resting easy. If you have aluminum wiring in your home or business, call a professional to inspect the installation and provide you with their professional recommendations"

A recent retro fit for the old neon lettering. "The old sign neon operated at 10 000 Volts so the wiring had broken down to the point that it was arcing to the building structure and sign casing. We retro fit LED double row SMD strip lighting into the lettering which operates at 12 Volts DC. Alot safer and the sign looks great. The client was very happy with the brightness and they should be trouble free for many years to come."

Power and Communications service entrance to new home in Edmonton Belgravia area. "..it's a beautiful home with detached garage, since there is alley access to garage we brought all services in overhead from the pole facilities in the alley. Then we sub fed the home services underground. A little more elaborate than your average home but the owner didn't want any overhead lines in the back yard area. It worked over very well and even the inspectors were impressed with the installation."