Most ceiling fan jobs are quick. The ones that are not are the ones where the existing ceiling box was never rated to carry a fan — which, in houses of the age we mostly work in, is the majority of them. The Electric Guys install and replace ceiling fans across Pittsburgh and about thirty-three miles around it, braced properly.
The distinction matters more than it sounds. A standard ceiling box is rated for the dead weight of a light fitting. A fan adds several kilograms of moving, vibrating load that works at its fixings continuously for years. Fans that come down do not usually come down on the day they are fitted.
Why choose The Electric Guys
- Fan-rated box, every time. Tied into the framing, not screwed to the same plaster the light was hanging on.
- We say when it needs opening up. Where there is no access from above, bracing means a small opening in the ceiling. Being told that in the quote is better than being told it halfway through.
- Switching sorted properly. Separate control of fan and light usually needs a third conductor that older two-wire switch loops do not have, and there are several ways to solve it.
- Balanced before we leave. A fan that wobbles is a fan that will loosen its own fixings.
Our ceiling fan process
- Check the existing box. Type, rating, and what it is actually fixed to — which on a plaster ceiling is sometimes very little.
- Check the framing above. Joist position relative to the fan location, and whether there is access from an attic or the room above.
- Agree the approach. Brace bar between joists where there is access, or a small ceiling opening where there is not.
- Fit the fan. Fan-rated box, correct downrod for the ceiling height, wired for the switching you want.
- Test and balance. Through every speed, with the light and any remote or wall control working as intended.
The local complications
Ceiling height is the first. A lot of the pre-war housing in the city and the older South Hills streets has ceilings well over the modern standard — nine feet and occasionally more in Highland Park, Squirrel Hill and the larger Mt. Lebanon houses. A fan on a stock downrod in a ten-foot room is too far from the people in it to move any air. The downrod length is part of doing the job properly, not an upsell.
Plaster is the second, for the same reason it complicates everything else here. There is no drywall to screw a brace into and no forgiving material to patch; the fixing has to reach real framing.
Switching is the third and the one that surprises people most. Many older rooms were wired with a switch loop carrying only two conductors, which is enough to switch a light on and off and not enough to control a fan and a light independently. The options are a wireless control at the fan, a compatible smart switch, or running a new conductor — and which makes sense depends on the wall, not on preference.
Finally, the attic conversions and third-floor rooms that are so common in this housing stock are exactly where fans do the most good and where the framing is least predictable. Those get looked at before they get quoted.
Serving Pittsburgh, PA and nearby
Across the city and out through Mt. Lebanon, Bethel Park, Monroeville, Penn Hills, Murrysville, Robinson, Moon Township, McCandless and Cranberry.
A service call on a repair is $99; a fan installation is quoted free after we see the room. Call or text (412) 501-7391 with a photo of the ceiling and the existing fitting.