Inevitably batteries in the door push fail in the cold weather. Inevitably the plastic has become brittle due to the sun in the summer and the cold of the winter. Inevitably there is nothing as simple as a screw so you need to start prising the cover off. Inevitably little plastic ears snap off.
Damn things!
En el artículo , DerbyBorn escribió:
Mains powered ones are a few quid from the bay of fleas. I got one with two sounders, they just plug into a 13A socket. Choice of ring tones, most of which are truly awful but there's an acceptable ding-dong one.
I put the wireless pushbutton on the *inside* of the door, drilled small hole through, put standard bell push on outside. Passed wires through, soldered to wireless sender pushbutton.
Wireless pushbutton protected from weather, battery terminals won't corrode, battery easy to change without snapping bits of UV-embrittled plastic, exterior pushbutton falls to bits, simple and cheap to change.
Inevitably batteries in the door push fail in the cold weather. Inevitably the plastic has become brittle due to the sun in the summer and the cold of the winter. Inevitably there is nothing as simple as a screw so you need to start prising the cover off. Inevitably little plastic ears snap off.
Damn things!
------------- FYI - Some models allow you to use a normal push-button outside, wired to a transmitter inside. So you can have a "gold plated fish-head monstrosity" outside with wireless function and avoid having one of those, frankly nasty looking, wireless transmitters on your door frame.
That would solve the look and UV degradation - not sure about the quality of construction though.
Paul DS
I want one to detect when my front gate opens - a heavy iron affair - any suggestions for a detector switch?
Hang a bell on it?
Yes, there is a lot to be said for wires. Seems strange as bell pushes have been made of plastic for many years, so why can they not use the same type for the wireless bells? I suspect the answer is cost and china. I'm not sure about temperature affecting batteries to that extent unless there is a leakage due to damp or something. The same issue seems to dog weather stations with remote sensors from the reports I hear, so it needs to be solved.
Brian
We had an alarm once that worked from the sensor on an outside light. The alarm could be plugged into any 13 amp socket. Trouble was wild life set it off so swmbo threw it out.
Wires to a reed switch potted in epoxy and a magnet on the gate?
But would that only work if the gate is opened fully?
Besides that, people tend to leave garden gates open, which might mean the home owner is driven mad by the buzzer sounding continuously, and it won't then detect the next person. If the owners then fit a really strong return spring to close the gate, people can get hurt.
No, it would work as soon as the switch state is changed by the magnet which is normally at a couple of centimetres from the magnet at most. If the switch is on the latch side, then opening the gate even a fraction will work it. Attach it to a stop which the gate hits when it's fuly open, it will activate when the gate hits the stop. How this works, depends on how it's fitted to the gate. You can even fit one so that it works momentarily as the gate passes a certain angle.
The buzzer can be on a short monostable drive circuit to give a beep as the gate opens, with just a warning light to show when the gate is open. The spring only needs to be strong enough to close the gate against hinge friction and wind resistance, and if it's a wrought iron gate, there's not a lot of wind resistance to overcome.
Failing that, point a webcam at it and use a motion sensor on a computer, which only needs to be an old, obsolete one running Linux. Even the 500 MHz Pentium laptop I've got sitting in a cupboard is adequate for this application.
I was beginning to think along those lines.
The front gate is too far from the back of the house to hear such a bell.
Some bells can be heard many miles away...
Can I ask what the purpose is, please?
For example, will it be so that you know if someone enters? In that case, you will need to ensure that the gate is closed beforehand. Is that easily done?
How serious is it if someone get in unannounced?
How much annoyance are you prepared for from the bell ringing when it shouldn't?
The spring needs to close the gate even in autumn when there's a big pile of leaves in the way, and even if someone hasn't oiled the hinges for a while. Plus it would be damned annoying if the gate doesn't quite swing completely shut, so the buzzer sounds the whole time or doesn't sound next time someone comes in.
But Quasimodo ended up deaf anyway & still overslept his alarm.
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