Standby generator installation for businesses and farms
Standby generator installation, transfer switches and generator service for farms, plants and businesses in Lebanon, Lancaster and Berks counties. Sized from a real load list.
Emergency electrical service, 24 hours
Emergency work is judged on two things: whether somebody competent picks up, and whether they tell you the truth about what happens next. Our phone is answered 24 hours because a ventilation failure at two in the morning does not wait until Monday. Some of what gets called an emergency genuinely is one, and some of it can safely wait until daylight at a fraction of the cost. We will say which on the call.
- 5.0 ★
- Rating on Google
- 24/7
- Phone answered, every day
- 48
- Kinds of work under this heading
- 3
- Counties: Lebanon, Lancaster, Berks
What we do
The services behind this work
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What it is
What counts as an emergency
The test is simple. Is something unsafe right now, or is something losing money or livestock every hour it stays off? If either is true, call at whatever hour it is. If neither is, morning is usually the better answer for everybody.
- Ventilation, milk cooling or heating that has stopped in an occupied livestock building
- Burning smell, scorch marks, smoke or a hot panel cover
- Water in a panel, a flooded pit or a submerged disconnect
- A breaker that will not reset, or that trips again immediately
- Half the building dark, motors humming and equipment cutting out, which usually means a lost phase or a lost leg
- A production line or a walk in cooler down with product in it
- Storm damage, a pulled service mast, a downed overhead drop or a struck panel
When the air stops moving
On a farm the clock is not measured in hours of lost trading, it is measured in animals. A tunnel ventilated poultry house on a hot afternoon has very little thermal margin once the fans stop, and extension guidance on emergency power for poultry production is consistent on the point: losses begin in minutes, not hours. A dairy has more time, but a parlour that cannot run still has a herd waiting and milk that has to stay cold.
So a ventilation call is handled differently from a lighting call. We ask what has curtains, what can be opened, what the alarm did and whether the standby set tried to start. The useful thing to know meanwhile is that the fault is usually upstream of the fans: a controller, a contactor, a lost phase or a transfer switch that sat still. Ventilation and controller power in a poultry house covers the arrangement, and the wider farm side is on the agricultural page.
After a night like that the conversation is about standby power and alarms rather than about the fault, because a generator sized from the service instead of from the starting load will not pick the fans up. That arithmetic is in why a generator that looks big enough still stalls.
Made safe tonight, finished in daylight
A lot of night work splits into two halves. The first is making the situation safe and getting back whatever can be got back: isolating a faulted circuit, replacing a failed breaker or contactor from the van, re-terminating a burned lug, feeding the critical loads temporarily so the fans run and the cooler holds. That half we can usually do on the night.
The second half often cannot be done at three in the morning, and pretending otherwise helps nobody. Meter equipment and service conductors mean the utility has to be involved. A burned panel is a replacement rather than a repair, which is a scheduled job with a permit and an inspection, as when a panel needs replacing rather than repairing explains. Mast work in ice or wind waits for weather. Anything we leave temporary is written down as temporary, with what remains outstanding.
After hours labour costs more than daytime labour. That is true of every electrician and we would rather say it than bury it. It is also why we will tell you on the phone when something can safely wait, and what to switch off so that it can.
Lost phases, burned services and storms
Three failures make up most commercial and farm emergency calls. The first is a lost phase or a lost leg, which shows up as half a building working, single phase motors running and three phase motors humming, getting hot and stalling. Damage accumulates immediately, so isolating the motors is the first thing to do while help is on the way, and the diagnosis order is in why a three phase motor will not start.
The second is the service entrance itself: a burned lug, a corroded meter socket, a mast pulled loose by ice or a branch. That work is coordinated with the utility, sometimes on the night and sometimes at first light, as in rebuilding an overhead drop and service pole. The third is a storm. Lightning rarely destroys everything at once. It takes out a controller here, a drive there and a board in the dryer, and the failures surface over the following week. That is the argument for surge protection at the service, which is cheap next to one controller.
Most of these were visible months earlier
A loose or oxidised connection does not fail suddenly. It runs a few degrees warm, oxidises a little more, runs warmer, then lets go on the coldest night or the hottest afternoon, because that is when the load is highest. Under a thermal camera it is obvious long before it is obvious to anyone else, which is the whole point of a scanned switchboard and why a yearly survey costs less than one call out.
The same is true of standby equipment. Generators that are not exercised do not start, and transfer switches that have not moved in three years do not transfer. What that inspection involves is on the preventive maintenance page, and an account of one winter failure describes the night when none of it was done.
What this covers
48 kinds of work under one heading
If what you need is not on the list, it is still worth asking. This is what we are asked for most, not the limit of what we do.
Power loss and partial outages
The building is dark, or worse, half dark.
- Total loss of power to a building or yard
- Lost phase and lost leg diagnosis
- Main breaker and main disconnect failures
- Service entrance and meter socket faults
- Utility side confirmation before we touch anything
- Temporary supplies to critical loads
- Generator connection to keep a building running
- Restoring circuits in priority order
Burning, heat and water
Anything that is unsafe right now rather than inconvenient.
- Burning smell, scorch marks or smoke at a panel
- Hot breakers, hot covers and melted insulation
- Burned lugs, busbars and terminations
- Arcing, flashing and audible buzzing in gear
- Water in panels, pits and disconnects
- Flood damaged equipment assessment
- Making equipment safe and isolating it
- Damaged cable and conduit made safe
Livestock building failures
Where the clock is measured in animals rather than hours.
- Ventilation and tunnel fan failures
- House controller lockups and power loss
- Contactor, starter and relay failures
- Milk cooling, compressor and bulk tank faults
- Heater, brooder and waterer circuit failures
- Feed line, auger and motor faults
- Alarm and dialer systems that did not raise anybody
- Standby generator that failed to pick up the load
Plant and commercial breakdowns
Down time with a per hour number attached.
- Production line and conveyor stoppages
- Motor, starter and drive failures
- VFD faults and nuisance trips
- Walk in cooler and freezer power loss
- Kitchen equipment and hood circuit failures
- Control circuit and interlock faults
- Breaker replacement from stock where available
- Temporary rigging to finish a shift or a run
Storm and impact damage
Weather, vehicles and lightning.
- Pulled or damaged service masts
- Downed overhead drops and damaged weatherheads
- Lightning damage to controllers and boards
- Surge damage assessment across a site
- Poles, yard lights and fixtures struck or fallen
- Underground feeder damage from digging
- Coordination with the utility on their portion
- Insurance documentation of what failed and why
After the call is over
Closing out what was left temporary.
- Written record of temporary and permanent work
- Permanent repair scheduled in daylight
- Panel or service replacement where a repair is not honest
- Surge protection fitted at the service
- Alarm and monitoring added to the critical loads
- Infrared survey to find the next one early
- Generator and transfer switch testing
- Standing arrangement for the next call
Buildings we do this in
- 01
Poultry houses and livestock barns
- 02
Dairy parlours, bulk tank and milk rooms
- 03
Food processing plants and packing lines
- 04
Retail units, restaurants and offices
- 05
Warehouses and cold storage
- 06
Farm service entrances and yard distribution
- 07
Workshops and light industrial units
Who we do this for
01
Growers whose fans have stopped
The call that cannot wait for morning. We ask what has curtains, what can be opened and whether the standby set tried to start, because the first ten minutes are yours and they matter more than our drive time.
02
Dairies that cannot milk or cannot cool
A parlour down with a herd waiting, or a bulk tank that has stopped holding. Both have a deadline attached, and both are usually a contactor, a control circuit or a lost leg rather than the equipment itself.
03
Plants with a line stopped mid run
Product part way through a process and a shift standing in it. We would rather get you finishing the run tonight and do the permanent repair properly in a planned window.
04
Businesses with refrigeration and stock at risk
Restaurants, stores and cold storage where the loss is in the walk in rather than in the till. Getting refrigeration back on a temporary feed is usually the first move, and we say plainly that it is temporary.
05
Anyone who can smell something burning
This is the call we would rather have too early than too late. Switch it off at the main if you can do so safely, then call. Nothing about a hot panel improves by waiting to see.
06
Property owners after a storm
A mast pulled loose, a drop down in a field, equipment that died in a strike. Some of it is ours, some of it is the utility's, and the first useful thing we can do is tell you which is which.
How a job runs
What happens after you call
From the first visit to the labels left in the panel, this is the order it happens in.
- 01
The phone is answered by somebody who does this work, not a call centre taking a message for the morning.
- 02
A few questions: what stopped, what is still on, what it smells like, what the breaker did and what changed recently.
- 03
Immediate advice on what to isolate or open up, because the first ten minutes are yours.
- 04
An honest time of arrival, based on where the truck is and what county you are in, rather than a number that sounds good.
- 05
On site: make it safe first, then find the fault, then restore what can be restored tonight.
- 06
A clear statement of what is temporary, what is permanent and what still needs the utility, a part or daylight.
- 07
A follow up to close out the temporary work and, where it applies, a maintenance check so it does not repeat.
Why this work comes to us
A person who does this work answers
Not an answering service taking a message for the morning. The person on the phone is the person deciding what happens next, which is why the advice in the first two minutes is usually worth something.
We tell you when it can wait
Night labour costs more, here as anywhere. The honest version of that is saying which faults are safe until daylight and what to switch off so they are, rather than billing a call out for something that could have waited.
Farm failures are familiar, not unusual
A ventilation call at two in the morning is a kind of job we have done many times, not an unusual one. That shows in the questions asked on the phone and in what is already on the truck.
Temporary work is labelled as temporary
If something is rigged to get you through the night, you get it in writing along with what remains outstanding. Nothing is quietly left in place to be discovered by the next electrician.
We know when it is the utility's problem
A fast, correct answer about where the fault sits saves hours. If neighbouring properties are dark or the conductors are theirs, we will say so immediately instead of billing you to find out.
We close the loop afterwards
The follow up conversation is about why it happened: an exercise schedule nobody kept, missing surge protection, a connection that had been running warm for a year. Most emergency calls are a maintenance conversation that arrived late.
Call (717) 821-9166
5.0 ★ on Google · Open 24 hours
Jobs of this kind
Questions we get
- Yes. Our hours on Google are listed as open 24 hours because that is how the phone is really covered. Anatoly runs the crew and takes the calls, so the person you speak to is the person deciding what happens next.
Read first
Motors and controls
A three phase motor that hums, will not turn, or trips the overload: the order to check
The motor hums but will not turn, or it trips the overload on every start. Where do I begin?
Service and panels
Signs an electrical panel is finished, and the ones that only look serious
How do I know if the panel needs replacing or just repairing?
Standby power
Standby generator maintenance: the real schedule, and why a set that sits is a set that fails
What maintenance does a standby generator actually need, and how often?
Motors and controls
VFD ground fault trips when the motor tests fine: what the drive is actually measuring
The drive keeps tripping on ground fault, but the motor megs clean. What is tripping it?
Service and panels
How to read a panel schedule, and why yours does not match the building
The panel directory says kitchen and there is no kitchen. How do I fix this?
Tell us what the building has to run
Anatoly runs the crew and usually answers the phone himself. Based in Myerstown, working across Lebanon, Lancaster and Berks counties, open 24 hours.