Buzzing Outlets? Signs You Might Need an Electrician

While electricity offers countless benefits, it can also put homeowners and their households at risk of fire hazards. Therefore, it’s important not to try to ignore or drown out some signs of faulty connections or other electrical problems.

Buzzing or humming outlets can be a serious cause for concern, and you should call a certified electrician immediately to inspect that outlet to avoid further damage. Besides, it’s much cheaper to repair a faulty outlet or loose connection than the byproduct of your remiss.

Thus, in this article, we’ll dive into signs every homeowner should not ignore and call a Tulsa electrician to fix them as soon as possible.

Causes of Humming Electrical Outlet

Loose Connections

Whether it’s a new or old home, it’s totally normal for electric wires to get loose. However, it tends to occur more frequently in older homes than in newly built or renovated ones.

When this happens, the loose electric wires are likely to vibrate, resulting in the buzzing noise you hear from the outlet. Once you notice the noise and your home is a couple of years old without any electrical renovation during those years, you might want to call an electrician to fix that outlet and inspect your electrical connections for safety.

Weather changes

Change in temperature affects nearly every part of a home, from the roof to the floor, and electrical components are not exempted. They respond to temperature changes by contracting and expanding. The degree of the response depends on how sudden or large the temperature change is.

In Tulsa, Oklahoma, most homeowners have to deal with the consequence of temperature changes during spring and fall, when it is at its greatest. Hence, it’s only a matter of time before constant contract and expansion of your electrical wires cause a loose connection and scary humming noise from your electrical outlets.

If you are often faced with this problem, replacing those old electrical wires with temperature-resistant ones might be best to prevent contraction and expansion.

Poor Installation

Electricians can make a  mistake (no one is really above that). In some cases, the underlying cause of the humming noise from your electrical outlet is third-rate workmanship. However, most times, it can result from the electrician not adhering to installation protocols because he’s in a rush or not invested in the job.

Usually, when the outlet is poorly installed, you would notice a loud buzzing noise with more devices or appliances plugged into it. It’s likely the electrician has misconnected the polarity.

The reverse polarity is a condition where the neutral and hot wires within the electrical outlet are flipped around. This problem should not be ignored as it can lead to life-threatening electrical shock.

Broken Breakers

While it’s perfectly normal to hear some buzzing noise from the breaker sometimes, if it’s frequent and gets louder than usual, it might signal a poorly functioning breaker.

Also, you might notice an increase in the buzzing noise if you put out lesser or more amps. In most cases, it’s best to replace the broken breaker with a new one to avoid any damage to your household appliances.

When Should You Contact a Certified Electrician?

Humming noise from your electric outlet is not the only reason you need to make a call to an electrician to inspect and service your home’s electrical system. There are other common signs you should look out for that indicate your electrical connection requires the service of a certified electrician as quickly as possible.

Frequent blown fuses and trips

There’s nothing wrong with occasional trips and blown fuses, especially during an electrical storm. However, you should be concerned if you keep experiencing blown fuses and tripping regularly. This can result from a wrong connection within your home’s electric circuits.

Flickering lights

There’s nothing normal about your lights flickering. This might occur while you are trying to bring light or your household appliances on-line.

If the lights dim as you turn on a device or flicker while running any of your household appliances, it’s essential to call an electrician to inspect your home electric connection and determine what is at fault, your household appliance or your own circuit.

The socket is no longer working

Sometimes it can be hard to fit your appliance’s plug into an outlet because it’s busted or notices it sparks whenever the prongs go into it. Regardless of what happens, you don’t want to ignore a damaged electric socket. There could be a lot of reasons for this, from a bad appliance to bad grounding. Nonetheless,  it is crucial that you call a certified electrician to fix the socket to prevent a potential fire hazard.

Warm electric outlets

Typically, electric outlets are cool to the touch. So if yours is heated up, it signals a problem with your socket, and it demands immediate attention.

Although the electric circuits could be heating up because you overload them with power-sucking devices, it shouldn’t be too hot to scald the skin you touch.

If this is the case,  it is better to stop using those hot electric outlets until an electrician, as expected, determines the exact reason for a temperature build-up at that spot.

Rusty electrical panels and rusty wires

Although this is not a problem you would encounter in a newly built or renovated home,   there are chances that this would occur in older homes, especially if it has been years since an electrician last serviced your home’s electrical system.

So once you notice the critical components of your electric outlet starting to rust, it’s crucial that you call your electrician to replace them. In some cases,  a certified electrician might just take care of the rusted spot instead of replacing the faulty components, which is the cheapest way to solve this issue.

Nonetheless,  I would recommend that you listen to the electrician’s suggestion on how to approach this problem to prevent another episode.

Conclusion

It’s safer and cheaper to fix an electrical problem before it escalates and puts everyone at risk. Buzzing noise from an electric outlet is NOT normal, and you should call an electrician immediately.