ALUMINUM WIRING NEED NOT BE WORRISOME

Many insurance providers no longer cover homes with aluminum wiring and most insurance premiums require aluminum wiring upgrade. This puts customers, who own houses built from around the 1960s to 1970s, in a pickle. For a brief period in the 1960s to the 1970s, aluminum wiring was used in residential properties. Due to the high prices of copper wires at that time, aluminum wires were mass-produced in sizes small enough to wire homes.

These days, however, you will be hard pressed to find a company that will agree to cover properties with aluminum wiring and even if you opt for premium, insurance premiums require aluminum wiring upgrade, in general. Even if the house was previously covered by an insurance policy, the insurer might refuse to renew the insurance coverage unless the wiring is checked, repaired, or replaced with copper wiring.

Although insurance premiums require aluminum wiring upgrade, aluminum wire in itself is not dangerous, nor is it an inherently inferior product to copper wire. The reasons why insurance premiums require aluminum wiring upgrade is because majority of electrical devices are not compatible with aluminum wire. The problems that frequently surround aluminum wiring are almost wholly associated with the terminals – the connections from the electrical wire to the electrical devices. During the time when aluminum wiring was used, most wiring devices were built to work with copper wires and were not designed to be fully compatible with aluminum wire; many of the terminals started failing as a result of improper wiring practices and overheating.

Not all houses are the same, and each house must be checked out on its own. Because insurance premiums require aluminum wiring upgrade, a house must be inspected first by a qualified electrical contractor who is experienced and knowledgeable in working with aluminum wiring. You need not be overly worried just because insurance premiums require aluminum wiring upgrade. Depending on the technician’s assessment, you may or may not have to rewire the entire

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