Your insurance company gave you 30 days to remove the knob and tube wiring. Every other electrician you’ve called says they’ll need to cut into your walls, patch everything back up, and hope the new plaster matches. If you’ve got horsehair plaster—and in Warren, you probably do—you already know how that story ends.
We don’t cut your walls open. We use a camera system that goes through your existing outlets to locate, inspect, and remove old wiring from inside the walls. That means your original plaster stays untouched. No patching. No mismatched textures. No wondering if you’ll ever get your walls back to how they looked.
You get a fully upgraded electrical system, documentation for your insurance company, and a home that doesn’t look like it just survived a renovation. Most of our clients in Warren have homes built before 1950. Nearly half the town does. We’ve done this enough times to know what matters: getting the job done right without turning your house into a construction zone.
We’ve been working in Warren and across Rhode Island for over 30 years. We’re not a general contractor trying to figure out electrical on the side. We’re licensed Master Electricians who’ve spent decades working inside homes that were built when knob and tube wiring was the standard.
Warren has one of the highest concentrations of historic homes in the state. More than 300 buildings in the Waterfront Historic District alone. We’ve worked in enough of them to know that horsehair plaster isn’t something you mess around with. It’s why we invested in a camera-based system that no other electrician in the area uses.
You’re not going to find another company doing knob and tube removal this way. We’re not saying that to brag. We’re saying it because if you’ve been quoted by anyone else, they’ve probably told you they’ll need to open your walls. We won’t.
We start with a camera inspection. We insert a specialized camera through your outlets and feed it into the walls to locate the knob and tube wiring, check for any damage from rodents or age, and identify covered junction boxes or open joints. This tells us exactly what we’re dealing with before we touch anything.
Once we’ve mapped everything out, we remove the old wiring through the same access points—your outlets. No cutting. No notching. In rare cases, we might make a small notch somewhere if the layout requires it, but that’s the exception. Most jobs don’t need it at all.
After the old wiring is out, we install new wiring that meets current code and handles the electrical load your home actually needs. Then we test everything, document the work, and provide you with a certificate you can send directly to your insurance company. The whole process is designed to get your home safe and compliant without the mess every other method creates.
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You get a full knob and tube wiring removal and replacement done by licensed Master Electricians. That includes the camera inspection, the removal of all active knob and tube wiring, installation of updated wiring that meets National Electrical Code standards, and documentation for your insurance provider.
In Warren, where the median home was built in 1952 and nearly half the housing stock predates the 1940s, this matters more than it would in a newer neighborhood. Horsehair plaster is incredibly difficult to repair correctly. Most plasterers today don’t even work with it. If another electrician cuts into your walls, you’re looking at drywall patches that never quite match, or expensive restoration work that still might not look right.
Our process avoids that completely. Your walls stay intact. Your historic character stays intact. And because we’re working with a camera system that lets us see inside the walls, we catch things other electricians miss—like old junction boxes that were covered over, or wiring that’s been chewed through by rodents. You’re not just getting a code-compliant upgrade. You’re getting a safer home without sacrificing what makes it worth living in.
Not the way we do it. Traditional knob and tube removal requires electricians to cut access holes in your walls to reach the wiring, then patch everything back afterward. If you have horsehair plaster—which most Warren homes built before 1950 do—that’s a problem. Horsehair plaster is mixed with animal hair as a binder, and it’s applied in multiple coats over wood lath. It’s extremely difficult to match if it gets damaged.
We use a camera system that goes through your existing outlets. We inspect and remove the wiring from inside the walls without opening them up. In most cases, there’s zero damage to your plaster. In rare situations where the layout requires it, we might make a very small notch, but that’s uncommon and nothing like the wall demolition you’d see with a traditional rewire.
Your plaster stays original. You don’t need to hire a specialized plasterer or settle for drywall patches that look out of place. The whole point of our system is to preserve what you’ve got while upgrading what’s unsafe.
We insert a small, specialized camera through your electrical outlets and feed it into the wall cavities where the knob and tube wiring runs. The camera lets us see the condition of the wiring, how it’s routed, and whether there are any hidden issues like rodent damage, deteriorated insulation, or covered junction boxes.
This step is critical because knob and tube systems are often over 70 years old, and a lot can happen in that time. Wires get spliced incorrectly. Junction boxes get buried behind plaster during past renovations. Insulation gets added around wiring that was never designed to be insulated. The camera shows us all of that before we start the removal.
It also allows us to plan the most efficient path for removing the old wiring and installing the new system. You’re not paying for guesswork. We know exactly what’s in your walls before we do anything, which means fewer surprises, faster work, and a cleaner result.
Yes. We provide a certificate of completion that documents the knob and tube wiring has been fully removed and replaced with code-compliant wiring. Most insurance companies reinstate coverage within days of receiving that documentation.
Insurance companies don’t refuse coverage because they’re being difficult. They refuse it because knob and tube wiring is a legitimate fire risk, especially when it’s been modified over the years or surrounded by insulation it was never designed to handle. Once the wiring is gone and replaced with a modern system, that risk is gone too.
We’ve done this for enough homeowners in Warren to know the process. You’ll get the paperwork you need in a format your insurance company will accept. If they have questions, we’re available to answer them. The goal is to get you back to full coverage as quickly as possible so you can stop worrying about cancellation notices.
It depends on the size of your home and how much of the electrical system still runs on knob and tube, but most jobs in Warren take between two to five days. Smaller homes or partial removals can be faster. Larger homes with more complex layouts might take a bit longer.
Because we’re not cutting into walls and waiting for plaster or drywall repairs to dry, the timeline is shorter than traditional rewiring. We’re also not held up by the need to coordinate with other trades. We handle the inspection, removal, installation, and testing in one continuous process.
You’ll have a clear timeline before we start. We’re not the kind of company that shows up for a day, disappears for a week, then comes back to finish. Once we begin, we work straight through until the job is done and your electrical system is fully upgraded and safe.
We tell you exactly what we found and what it means for your home. The camera inspection often reveals issues that wouldn’t show up any other way—covered junction boxes, wiring that’s been damaged by rodents, or old splices that were done incorrectly and hidden behind plaster decades ago.
If we find something that needs to be addressed, we’ll explain what the issue is, why it matters, and what it will take to fix it. You’re not going to get a surprise bill or a vague explanation. We’ve been doing this long enough to communicate clearly about what’s a safety concern, what’s a code requirement, and what’s optional.
In most cases, we can address those issues as part of the same job. The camera gives us the information we need to handle everything at once rather than discovering problems halfway through and having to stop. You get a complete picture of your electrical system’s condition, and a plan to bring it all up to current standards in one visit.
We do both. Removing the knob and tube wiring is part of a full electrical system upgrade. That means you’re not just getting the old wiring pulled out—you’re getting new wiring installed that can handle the electrical load a modern home actually needs.
Knob and tube systems were designed for a time when homes had a few lights and maybe a radio. You’ve got computers, appliances, HVAC systems, and outlets in every room. The old system can’t support that safely, even if the wiring itself were in perfect condition. So when we remove it, we’re also installing an updated system that meets current National Electrical Code standards and gives you the capacity you need.
You’ll also get updated outlets, proper grounding, and a panel that can handle circuit breakers instead of fuses. It’s a complete upgrade, not just a patch job. And because of the way we do it, you get all of that without tearing your walls apart.
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