Outdoor lighting has been steadily increasing in popularity. People love to have the ability to showcase their home while also getting the benefit of additional home security.

If you want to maximize the security benefit you get out of your outdoor lighting, the first thing you have to do is survey your immediate premises. Take a good look at the house, the landscaping, perimeter, interior, and surrounding areas. Then make a note of any security concerns you have.

From there, you’ll be able to come up with a list of improvements. It could be something like adding a motion light over your garage door. If people walk outside by your garage area during the nighttime, a light will show you exactly what’s going on. Maybe you need a light in the backyard, or maybe you want to keep varmints out of your garden. The system could detect the motion from rabbits or deer and turn on the light to scare them away.

There are a lot of considerations that you can make to improve your home’s security. You might want to make sure there was adequate lighting at the front door so it would be intimidating for intruders. A spotlight right on someone nefarious would make them think twice before doing anything they’re not supposed to.

We know that most burglars and thieves don’t want to be in the spotlight. They’ll seek out a dark, isolated area of the home where they feel more comfortable. A motion detector in those areas might be a handy way to alert yourself and the neighbors that someone’s there. You might also want to use a photocell that detects when it gets dark. If not, you could set the lights to a timer to accomplish something similar.

All of these considerations may be tough for you to figure out for yourself. That’s why you should contact Boulden Brothers online or by phone. We’ll make a recommendation based on your home’s unique needs. Remember, the Boulden Brothers electricians have years of experience, whether it’s installing security lights or outdoor landscaping lights.

We look at each home on an individual basis and decide the best way to get both power and lighting installed. There’s no doubt that the best place to look when you have a project like this in mind is with Boulden Brothers. We’ll give you the information that you need to make a good decision. That way, you’ll end up feeling more secure with an excellent security lighting system for your home.

Water softeners do a great job of removing hardness from water. They’ll even remove iron if it’s present in a low enough concentration. All salt-based water softeners operate under a very simple principle called ion exchange. A resin in the softener removes calcium and magnesium from the water. It then uses salt to periodically flush the accumulated hardness from the resin. It’s a tried and true technology that’s stood the test of time.

There are non-salt options, but I believe that they’re better classified as a descaler. There’s no doubt that descalers work differently from a salt water softener. They do not remove calcium and magnesium from the water. Instead, there’s a change to the chemical makeup of the calcium and magnesium so they don’t adhere to each other and result in scale buildup. Since those two chemicals are still present in the water, a dropper test to determine hardness will show no difference. There are, however, many manufacturers of tankless water heaters that require the use of descalers in hard water areas.

When it comes to standard salt water softeners, I don’t think you can say that one system works better than another if it’s using the same resin. (Remember, resin is the media that removes the hardness from the water.) There are, however, decisions that need to be made that can influence how well the system will work. The size of the system is one factor that makes a difference in this regard.

You don’t want to base the size of the unit on the number of people in the household. Let’s say you’re an empty nester and you have a very large four-bathroom house but only two people living in it. If you were to sell the home to a new owner who has three or four kids, they’re going to run into trouble. You really have to size for the home, not for the number of occupants.

The next decision you’ll have to make is how often the system will regenerate. It can regenerate based off of a timer or you can have it metered, which means that it will only regenerate itself when a certain number of gallons have passed through the system. In some rare cases, homes might have a manually regenerated system. (We don’t see them being used anymore.) Metered systems will probably end up saving salt because a timer based system will regenerate at a set time regardless of how much water you’ve used. Even if you’re on vacation and haven’t used any water at all, the timer will still go off.

It doesn’t make any sense to install a water softener only in the kitchen sink. Calcium and magnesium aren’t harmful to you. You’re removing them because they add scaling or hardness to your piping, water heater, and fixtures. Hard water is an aesthetic issue and it also reduces the life of your plumbing components. Additionally, soft water uses half as much soap as hard water to get the same job done. You would stand to benefit the most if your entire house had soft water. Think about how much money you would save each year if you cut your laundry detergent use in half.

Once you get a water softener installed in your home, maintenance is fairly straightforward. The salt needs to be replaced periodically. The system will also need to be cleaned occasionally depending on the quality of the incoming water. If properly maintained, hardness or iron won’t build up excessively in the unit.

If you want to find out if your home will benefit from a water softener, contact us online or give us a call today. We’ll send a Boulden Brothers technician to your home to test the water for hardness, iron, pH (acidity), and chlorine levels. If you have a concern that bacteria may be in the water, a test must be run in a state approved lab. We can help you get through that process as well.

When it comes to repiping a home, the quality and experience of the plumber are critical. Repiping a home isn’t something that most homeowners will ever have to deal with. It means that there’s been a critical failure in the home’s pipe materials. For example, it could have been a plastic pipe that deteriorated over time or a metal pipe that has corroded due to the water quality.

You’re basically starting from scratch when a plumber is replacing your home’s pipes. The difference is, when the pipes were installed during the home’s construction, there wasn’t any insulation or drywall hindering the process. Now, the plumber has to use their knowledge and experience to determine the best way to go about getting the job done. They have to consider the least intrusive way to replace the pipes so that the cost and inconvenience are minimized.

The entire repiping process will likely take about two to three days, depending on the size of the house. Some parts of the home are easier to repipe as well. For example, the first floor may be relatively easy if the home has a full basement or crawlspace. It would be fairly straightforward to get water up to the kitchen sink or hall bathroom/toilet. There also might not be much drywall that would need to be replaced.

When water needs to be transported to a second story, that’s when it’s a bit more challenging. Drywall might have to be cut so the pipes can be put in place. Otherwise, there might be a way to get water to the attic and then bring it down to the second floor. It really requires a plumber with extensive experience and expertise to make sure the job is done in an ideal manner. A good plumber will adhere to code, make sure that the same problem will not occur again in the future, and minimize the amount of work it takes to repair the home after the repipe is complete.

It should go without saying that the job needs to be done by a qualified professional. If an amateur or inexperienced plumber attempted to repipe a home, you could end up with disastrous consequences. The greatest threat to doing a job like this by yourself is doing something incorrectly. All of a sudden, a leak that springs up while you’re away will end up dumping up to 50 gallons a minute of water right into your home.

Unfortunately, most homeowner insurance claims are for water damage. Doing the job on your own means that you’re relying on your homeowner’s insurance as your only option. When a licensed insured plumber does the job, you’ll have their insurance to fall back on if there’s a problem. That’s why it just makes more sense to hire a qualified professional to get the job done right.

The repiping process might even be an opportunity to make some improvements. If the home is very old, it probably won’t have all the safeties required by current code. Once the house is repiped to today’s standards, you’ll know that an experienced plumber is meeting today’s safety codes. An amateur likely won’t be aware of proper code, so they won’t put valves, expansion tanks, or other components that could be crucial when it comes to protecting the home.

If a home needs to be repiped, Boulden Brothers will look at each case individually and decide what’s in the best interest of the homeowner. Is it best to do an isolated repipe for just one bathroom that’s having a problem, or should the whole home be redone? Which pipe material (metal or plastic, for example) would be best? We’ll answer all those questions for you, explain exactly what needs to be done, and keep you informed every step of the way. The most crucial step is being adequately prepared in advance.

To get started with repiping, contact us online or give us a call today.

If you’re thinking about purchasing a new HVAC system, it’s important to pay attention to the SEER. Seasonal Energy Efficiency Rating (SEER) is a mathematical equation to determine the efficiency of the system. The EPA has mandated that the southern half of the country, including Delaware, adhere to a minimum of 14 SEER. (There are fewer total cooling hours further north so they have different requirements.)

If you compare a 14 SEER unit to a 28 SEER unit which is at the very high end of efficiency, the 28 SEER unit requires half the operating cost. In other words, the efficiency rating scales linearly. Even though the 28 SEER unit is incredibly efficient, you probably won’t see a savings over the lifespan of the equipment. Of course, this really depends on your unique use case. You’ll have to spend a bit of time figuring out whether the higher efficiency rating will end up saving you money in the long run.

There are some cases where it does make sense to use higher efficiency equipment. It’s a good idea to install a unit with a higher SEER if your house uses air conditioning very often. If it’s a summer home or a situation where the air conditioner isn’t used as often, you’ll have to weigh the cost/benefit. Is the cost of the more efficient equipment going to be offset by the long-term benefit in electricity savings? Don’t worry about figuring it out all by yourself. That’s what we’re here for.

Boulden Brothers will be able to explain what the SEER means for your particular use case. We’ll tell you how much the equipment will cost and how the price factors into the energy savings over the life of the system. We’ll help you make an educated financial decision about which efficiency would be best for your home and living patterns. Remember, a second home that’s used four weekends a year needs a different kind of unit than a primary residence that’s being cooled all summer long.

Here’s how we figure out the numbers: A three ton 36,000 BTU system divided by 14 SEER would equal to 2571 watts/hour. A three ton system divided by 16 SEER would equal to 2250 watts/hour. That’s a difference of 220 watts/hour. We can multiply that number by the cost per kilowatt in your area to figure out the annual operating savings based on how you use your system.

When it comes to gas furnaces, the math is similar but we use a different kind of calculation for efficiency. Gas furnaces don’t use SEER. We instead look at the efficiency by calculating how many BTUs are actually going into the ductwork to heat your home and how many BTUs are going out your chimney as waste. When a system is 90% efficient, for every 90 BTUs that are heating your home, 10 BTUs are going out the chimney.

If you’re weighing your options about the ideal HVAC system for your home, give Boulden Brothers a call or contact us online. We’ll walk you through the process and give you all the information you need to make an informed choice.