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How to avoid Christmas light hanging mistakes which can prove to be a festive fire hazard in your home

How to avoid Christmas light hanging mistakes which can prove to be a festive fire hazard in your home

Nothing says Christmas like a beautifully decorated home. It’s a delight for everyone but there is always a potential risk when hanging Christmas lights. You could be overloading electrical sockets and/or extension leads.

We would recommend that you never overcrowd an electrical socket outlet and only use extension leads when absolutely necessary.

Plugging too many lights into your extension leads can cause the plug in the wall socket to overheat, melt or potentially catch fire, leading to a small domestic fire in your home.

Over the Christmas period, we often come across multiple extension leads plugged into each other in a daisy chain. This is extremely dangerous and can lead to an electrical overload.

If you are concerned about your sockets, then please do not hesitate to contact us.

If you do need to use extension leads, then please make sure you buy it from reputable retail outlet. Many of the cheaper versions online may work for a while, however, some come from various sources overseas where the electrical standards are far lower than the UK. This too could result in a small electrical fire as the Amp capacity may be different and the quality of materials used may not be as good.  

Using four-way extension leads will help to increase the number of lights and appliances you can have plugged in, however it is not always the best choice to use everything on the extension lead at once.

You should only use one socket extension lead per socket, not a multi adapter plug plugged into the socket then with many extension leads running from it this is extremely dangerous.

Some of the more common signs to keep an eye out when using the extension leads and sockets are:

• Damaged or frayed extension leads.
• Sparks or smoke coming from a plug or an appliance.
• The smell of hot plastic near the socket. (It does smell like burning, and a horrid fishy smell).
• You should be checking the coloured wires inside the extension leads which are showing at the plug or anywhere else on your extended circuit, are they all the same colour, or do they show a tint of orange/brown.
• Obviously one of the main things to look for is melted plastic on the casing of your appliances or leads, also there may be misshapen dimples, or some form of scorching on the casing of the socket outlet and also on the plug.

In the case of finding anything like this, unplug everything that is affected immediately and give us a call. We can guide you through what to do or book an appointment to come and see you.

Thankyou for reading! We hope this was of use to you. If you have any questions or suggestions, please feel free to let us know.

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For further Information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Telephone: 01892 531728

Email: karen@brightsparkelectrician.co.uk