As an aside, when I was a kid, people had the idea that it was unsafe to operate a garage door opener outside of visual range, since the operator had a responsibility to make sure it was safe. It's interesting how that idea vanished and now it is just about monetizing convenience.
The same way we can glue a tilt-sensor to a garage door to integrate with a random home alarm or automation system, isn't the end game here to just glue on a little networked actuator that presses the wall-mounted door button inside the garage?
Depends. Could work if you also have an emergency stop button in case there's something (your car, pet, etc) under the door while closing it, operating remotely deprives you from the ability to keep the pet away or even see the danger. Then, you'd need some IR/camera sensors and a 2nd actuator to stop the door automatically when a sensor is triggered.
With that said, you're on the right path, either automation under the full control of the user or no automation at all. I'd even say, the current plastic gearboxes used in motorized garage doors aren't worth the trouble either, just have a good spring and do it manually.
I find it absolutely absurd that they've removed the ability for dry contacts on the garage door opener itself. That feels a bit too scary to rely on the wireless completely alone to actuate a motor (especially one under heavy springs!)
> box to push the button on your own garage door opener
It's only a matter of time before the assholes make the opener remote be a fingerprint sensor that detects "liveness", to ensure it is a real human and not a robot button-pusher.
And they'll bill it as security for the end user, of course, to make sure only an authorized user has the keys in their hand...
Gotta scare it up with some stock photos of a bad guy with a balaclava on trying to push the button on your remote opener, angry that they've Been Had thanks to your clever high-tech fingerprint button!
... and then I'll go make a fake fingerprint out of gel material. Mythbusters did it.
> It's interesting how that idea vanished and now it is just about monetizing convenience.
Safety is mostly a solved problem for garage doors, they’re required to open back up if they make contact with an obstruction and are also required to have a safety beam to reverse direction if something trips the beam. I assume they use some kind of current switch to detect overcurrent in the motor and open the door, a pressure switch across the bottom of the door seems expensive and finicky vs detecting motor overcurrent. I remember when we got a garage door with both safety features as a kid in the 90s.
And yes, the easiest way to integrate this into a building automation system would be a networked actuator that presses a physical button, lol. You could probably figure out which traces are for enabling the motor on the controller board, but I’d take the easy route ;) They could easily provide a terminal block, but you can’t monetize that. Commercial overhead door openers usually provide contacts for whatever integrations you want.
If you want to monitor open/closed and door_is_moving state with more granularity than a tilt sensor, two magnetic door position sensors and a current switch plus a controller can do it. That’s how commercial overhead doors do it, anyways.
Current switch detects door operation in progress, plus a door position sensor at the top and bottom of the track. Align the top sensor when the door is fully open and the bottom sensor while the door is fully closed. Three binary inputs to monitor. If both door sensors are ‘open’ and the current switch is off, the door is stuck between open and closed. You can get by with just one door sensor if you don’t need to know if it’s fully open.
From a quick look at the company history, it seems to be named after the founder of its corporate predecessor, which pre-dates Neville Chamberlain's Prime Ministership by several decades.
As an aside, when I was a kid, people had the idea that it was unsafe to operate a garage door opener outside of visual range, since the operator had a responsibility to make sure it was safe. It's interesting how that idea vanished and now it is just about monetizing convenience.
The same way we can glue a tilt-sensor to a garage door to integrate with a random home alarm or automation system, isn't the end game here to just glue on a little networked actuator that presses the wall-mounted door button inside the garage?
Depends. Could work if you also have an emergency stop button in case there's something (your car, pet, etc) under the door while closing it, operating remotely deprives you from the ability to keep the pet away or even see the danger. Then, you'd need some IR/camera sensors and a 2nd actuator to stop the door automatically when a sensor is triggered.
With that said, you're on the right path, either automation under the full control of the user or no automation at all. I'd even say, the current plastic gearboxes used in motorized garage doors aren't worth the trouble either, just have a good spring and do it manually.
The trick is to interface with one of the wireless remote controls and click its button
That's the end result that's happened; Third Reality is now selling you a box to push the button on your own garage door opener. https://3reality.com/product/smartgarage-door-opener/
I find it absolutely absurd that they've removed the ability for dry contacts on the garage door opener itself. That feels a bit too scary to rely on the wireless completely alone to actuate a motor (especially one under heavy springs!)
> box to push the button on your own garage door opener
It's only a matter of time before the assholes make the opener remote be a fingerprint sensor that detects "liveness", to ensure it is a real human and not a robot button-pusher.
And they'll bill it as security for the end user, of course, to make sure only an authorized user has the keys in their hand...
Gotta scare it up with some stock photos of a bad guy with a balaclava on trying to push the button on your remote opener, angry that they've Been Had thanks to your clever high-tech fingerprint button!
... and then I'll go make a fake fingerprint out of gel material. Mythbusters did it.
> It's interesting how that idea vanished and now it is just about monetizing convenience.
Safety is mostly a solved problem for garage doors, they’re required to open back up if they make contact with an obstruction and are also required to have a safety beam to reverse direction if something trips the beam. I assume they use some kind of current switch to detect overcurrent in the motor and open the door, a pressure switch across the bottom of the door seems expensive and finicky vs detecting motor overcurrent. I remember when we got a garage door with both safety features as a kid in the 90s.
And yes, the easiest way to integrate this into a building automation system would be a networked actuator that presses a physical button, lol. You could probably figure out which traces are for enabling the motor on the controller board, but I’d take the easy route ;) They could easily provide a terminal block, but you can’t monetize that. Commercial overhead door openers usually provide contacts for whatever integrations you want.
If you want to monitor open/closed and door_is_moving state with more granularity than a tilt sensor, two magnetic door position sensors and a current switch plus a controller can do it. That’s how commercial overhead doors do it, anyways.
Current switch detects door operation in progress, plus a door position sensor at the top and bottom of the track. Align the top sensor when the door is fully open and the bottom sensor while the door is fully closed. Three binary inputs to monitor. If both door sensors are ‘open’ and the current switch is off, the door is stuck between open and closed. You can get by with just one door sensor if you don’t need to know if it’s fully open.
https://archive.is/20251206001631/https://www.theverge.com/t...
Funny name for such a bad company, banking it after the prime minister that collaborated with Hitler.
From a quick look at the company history, it seems to be named after the founder of its corporate predecessor, which pre-dates Neville Chamberlain's Prime Ministership by several decades.