Electrical

today we had a power issue (I didn’t get better title idea, lol)

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Today, while I was working in my home office, at around 4 PM, the light suddenly started dimming.

Without giving much attention, I continued my work.

Within a few minutes, my PC monitor also got turned off.

That time, I understood something was seriously wrong.

I immediately turned off my PC directly to prevent any further damage and went to our first house to ask my Dad what went wrong.

My dad is an electrical engineer, so he went directly to the second building meter box. And started checking Voltage in all phases.

That time, he told me in one phase, power was having some issues from the BESCOM. (I guess it is a single Phase, he told)

I asked if we needed to turn off the main power?

He replied, It’s better if we can.

But as he didn’t tell seriously, I didn’t turn off Mains.

If I turned it off, I again needed to go to turn ON.

So, I just informed all my tenants on our WhatsApp group to not use any important electrical appliances.

A few months before, we had a similar incident; the Neutral Wire got cut on the main pole. Within a few minutes, 3 chargers of our tenants were gone.

That time, my Dad immediately turned off the Main supply (ours has a different setup to turn off Mains) without thinking, or else even more damage could have happened.

When you order a meter box, you need to properly plan.

Just don’t listen to your electrical contractor. He always tells me what’s easier/standard for him to do the work. Not what’s best for you.

When the meter reader first came to take our meter reading, he praised the meter box setup. (credits goes to my dad)

In my electrical work guide, I shared a meter box setup best pratice so you could follow a much better setup than others.

A properly planned meter box helps during maintenance or when any issues happen.

How not to get an extra work monthly once

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Today, outside my home office window, I noticed that a construction building made two mistakes related to the meterbox.

So I opened my Electrical Work Guide to check if I mentioned that point or not…

When I searched, I noticed one point had already been added, but no images had been added, and another point had not been added. Now that also mentioned.

I went back to my second building, took a photo of the mistake they made, and added it to the document in the 5.53 section (redownload again to see updated content).

By the way, this is not their first building.

They recently built one beautiful house on the same road with great care. However, as soon as they entered the house, they sold the building within a few months.

That building not even completed 1 year.

I already written about it earlier. If you are interested in learning more, please visit this article.

Whatever mistake they make now will cause extra work for them monthly once they enter the house this time.

By this, I can conclude that just having construction experience is not enough to identify mistakes. We need to have an extra eye and thinking knowledge.

One way you can improve your ability to identify such mistakes is by reading the guides that I have written.

It’s not an encyclopedia.

It’s a simple guide with straightforward concepts shared with images wherever applicable.

Arun

Careless Tenants

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In one of our rental units, 500 rs of electricity bill came this month.

But the thing is, no one has stayed in the building for the past 20 days…

Moreover, even if they stay, their electricity bill usually comes to 0 rs because the Karnataka government offers some free units.

The student got suspicious, and we got to know something was wrong.

When the student/tenant was informed regarding the electricity bill issue, we checked to see if the meter reader had taken the wrong reading.

The reading looks correct.

The meter also shows that it is actively consuming electricity.

The tenant not yet returned from home. We asked our tenant permission to check inside the house, and he said ok, go and check like he gave permission.

When checked inside, the Geyser, Fridge, and Wifi router have been running 24*7 for the past 20+ days…

Careless Tenants.

Informed the student and switched off all the devices.

Before returning, I took a photo in that rental unit for another example to check whether the electrical contractor knew his work.

This is a good example that shows how careless electrical contractors who don’t know proper working methods can be easily identified by seeing their other works.

In the electrical contractor guide, I shared that image in section 1.5, example 2.

This issue happened in our first building when we didn’t know how to hire a good electrical contractor.

For the second building, we learned our lesson very well after dealing with this cheap & headache electrical contractor.

We not only learned just choosing a good electrical contractor, we learned a lot from this guy…

Every lesson I learned from this guy in a hard way is shared in my electrical work guide.

Arun

Ugly electrical boxes in the beam/wall

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A few days back, all our family members attended our relatives weddings.

In one marriage, we had to stay in the rooms available in the function building.

It’s quite a good and a new marriage hall, to say.

We got 3 room keys for our family. In one room, I noticed something that happened in our first building.

That is, some unskilled electrician did the electrical work on that building, which affected the finishing look of the room.

I wish I could have taken some images of that spot.

Anyway, the same thing happened in our first building as well.

We unknowingly hired some unskilled electrician to do the electrical work. Because of this result, the same kind of issues also happened in multiple locations in our first building.

Hiring cheap or unskilled labourers always costs more than skilled labour.

The first building’s electricians used many more electrical materials, like pipes, wires, etc., than our second building’s skilled electricians.

It’s not just about the money…

Those unskilled electricians put electrical boxes in beams/walls, etc., which cannot be hidden. We have a few such spots in our first building.

I initially thought that our first building electrical contractor was the only one who was unskilled to do such electrical work.

I felt wrong after seeing the similar work in that room.

So, I just added another point inside the Electrical work guide regarding How to Pick the Right Electrical Contractor in the 1.5 section.

Go through that point, see the image, read the tip, and follow all the instructions while picking an electrical contractor for your building.

Not all contractors/labourers do the same standard work. Keep that in mind.

Choosing the right contractor is very important to get a quality output in your house construction.

Arun

Tip for Fan Buyers if You Use Inverter Setup

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If you plan to use an inverter set up in your house, I have one tip to share today.

The tip is to buy BLDC fans when buying a fan. Especially if you are going to have an inverter set up in your house.

The reason is that BLDC fans run longer periods compared to normal fans when a power cut happens.

Your inverter battery gives you a much longer backup time.

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When 400 Volts Comes This Happens

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At around 5:30 PM, a few tenants started complaining their charges burnt out when they put for charging.

When my dad checked in the meter box, he noticed 400 to 500 volts coming. We immediately switched off the Main incoming power supply to prevent further damage.

Within a few minutes of testing, my DAD informed me it was a Neautral Fault issue. So I called our electrician to come immediately at night time. When we checked in the electrical pole, we noticed our neutral wire was cut.

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Worst Fan Company

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After fixing one of the tenant’s fan issues recently, I decided to share the incident below.

At the end of our house construction, we went to buy a ceiling fan for our rental property.

We shop for all our construction-related products in the hardware shop we went to. Me and my dad simply asked the shop owner which brand fan we would buy like…

He suggested some well-known brands, and I checked online to see that the product got a 40K+ rating on Flipkart, so I ordered around 26 fans of that brand.

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How busbar helped in solving low voltage issue

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When we were staying at the rental property, one incident happened. I explain that real incident so you can understand one useful benefit of having a Busbar in the meter box.

I have my own online business. I was not going anywhere for job. I was just working from my home with my PC and internet connection.

Everything went smoothly until one day, my computer UPS started beeping.

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