Wireless garage door indicator

posted Jul 5th 2010 10:00am by Mike Szczys
filed under: home hacks

[Sixerdoodle's] garage door indicator tells him if the door is open or closed. He was inspired by the hack from last September but wanted to make it wireless. The setup uses an RF transmitter/receiver pair from Sparkfun, each controlled by an ATtiny13 microcontroller. We found his battle with RF interference from other devices to be interesting. Working out those bugs made for a great learning experience.

Comments [13]

tagged: attiny13, garage door, RF, wireless

13 Responses to Wireless garage door indicator

jc says:

July 5, 2010 at 10:28 am

I’ve been contemplating a variant of this. I’d like to know when I drive off and leave the door open. I’d like a receiver in the car that squawks when I get to the end of the drive way and the door is open.

With all the other projects I have in mind, or going on, this one hasn’t gone past the “I want” stage. I have yet to put any ideas down on paper.

This is a nice little project. Bummer about the interference.

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yea, im a haxor says:

July 5, 2010 at 12:13 pm

There is this one component that looks like a hollow resistor with a ball in it. And when you turn it the ball moves to the other side and breaks the connection. Stick that on your door and when your door goes up the thing goes on it’s side and sets off a simple transmitter at walki talki frequency. Or just buy this http://tinyurl.com/2dxca4j

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Manny warren says:

July 5, 2010 at 12:31 pm

I also have a wireless garage door indicator in my car, except I call it a mirror.

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Gérard Mansoif says:

July 5, 2010 at 1:22 pm

Great for blinded car driver !

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Chris says:

July 5, 2010 at 1:52 pm

Looks exactly like what I submitted a few months ago, except it beeps and I used a magnetic switch :oP

http://www.highimpedance.net/2010/02/01/wireless-garage-door-monitor/

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aztraph says:

July 5, 2010 at 4:14 pm

Hey, where’s the http://hackaday.com/2009/09/15/using-matchbox-cars-as-a-switch/ ?

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cotton509 says:

July 5, 2010 at 6:43 pm

What. Great idea! Hopefuly he can make it into a small package for sale. People would be able to use this so no one forgets there garage open. After all I’ve seen a open garage so many times and theft because of it !!!

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pookey says:

July 5, 2010 at 8:49 pm

@Manny warren

A “Mirror”? Show some self-respect!

What you have is a 100-terahertz passive wireless indicator. I expect to see your plans on Instructables shortly.

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ben says:

July 6, 2010 at 2:08 am

@pookey
525 terahertz wideband with biological antenna?

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abruzzi says:

July 6, 2010 at 3:39 am

Crappy, you could simply wire the original switch which indicates the door is closed and stops the hydraulics/motor.

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fartface says:

July 6, 2010 at 4:55 am

Instructables….. YUCK.

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strider_mt2k says:

July 6, 2010 at 5:23 am

Beets…DOUBLE YUCK.

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Group3r says:

January 9, 2011 at 10:12 am

Have had a mercury switch w/rf transmitter for years, mounted on door verticaly tilt indicates
door up or down, still functioning, (Sears). red/green indicator mounted in bedroom reminds that door is open,keychain remote closes door with out going to garege.. Would like another
but cannot locate that type anywhere…

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