Remote wall switch?

Richard · Jun 28, 2001

Built & wired log house for all light switches. NOW, after we have built the Great Wall of Greenback, we have added pathway lights outside that were not anticipated. The buried wires for lights enter house downstairs in garage. The logical place for switch is upstairs in back of house, and possibly downstairs near front entrance door.

Since the house is logs, my perception is that it will be a VERY difficult job to pull wires through the logs. (bro in law is electrician that wired house and is TERRIFIED that I might ask him to do this /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif)

None the less, I'm brainstorming and thought of some kind of "remote" switch, either low voltage (which I could hide in door trim) wired to main control or radio frequency to again, main control that can then be used to turn outside lights on/off.

Any thoughts on some kind of remote switch setup? I've been to Lowes and asked them. I Got a MAGNIFICANTLY blank stare by the electical pro. His blank stare was only about 1/2 the value of MINE /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Richard

Von · Jun 28, 2001

Richard,
I ran into the same problem, I hid the switch in a kitchen cabnet. Just came up from the basement into the cabnet and put the switch on the side out of the way.

Knight9 · Jun 28, 2001

You could probably figure something out with an X10 setup. I believe X10 wireless technology is relatively inexpensive. Search the web for "X10".

Kevin

RPM · Jun 28, 2001

Where are your existing light-switches and how are they mounted?

Other alternatives include motion sensor on the path and/or a photo-cell that will only turn them on at night. Would have a master switch next to your panel.

jinman · Jun 28, 2001

Hmmm...seems like you could apply a little "southern engineering" to a garage door opener and use its remote to turn on/off the lights from a reasonable distance. This might be cheaper than buying some specialty item to do the same thing, but I'm certain something like this might exist. Have you tried Radio Shack or (curses of curses) called a lighting company?

JimI

Richard · Jun 28, 2001

Been to Lowes, been on phone with local "specialty" shop, am right now doing search at Rat Shacks website..

Motion sensor type won't be accaptable to the Chairman of the House. Wall is made of 6 by 12 square cut logs that have the equivilant of carriage bolts placed inside of them to help hold them together along with existing paths for current wires to travel through. None of the existing paths are considered to be large enough to pull anything through. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif
Personally, I like the idea of switch that is RF and I can just put one where I want it. I CAN run (hide) say, some doorbell wire, up floor, behind molding. Our logs aren't chinked yet and I can just bury small wire under chink.

Richard

Gomez · Jun 28, 2001

Richard,

I have a cheap (leviton brand) RF remote outlet I use in our bedroom. Works pretty well although sometimes when I get home from work the light has mysteriously turned on. Doesn't happen overnight though, (must be the dog amusing herself). I think the unit was around $20-25.

patrickg · Jun 28, 2001

There are a couple radio type remote switches (that I know of, probably more out there). I have used one that mounts in place of a standard toggle switch and has a push button. A quick button press turns the light circuit on or off. If you press and hold the brightness ramps up and down until you release the button. When turning lights on or off the dimmer setting is preserved. BUT WAIT THERE IS MORE... With this you get a small battery operated remote control wand with a push button that duplicates the control functions previously detailed. With extensive use the battery lasts for a few years. It will work from several feet away. I bought two of these at Home Depot (on different frequencies so as not to interfere with each other)

There is another unit that looks like a regular wall switch but has a battery and is just the transmitter. The receiver is placed in the line to be controlled. You use the switch just like it was a regular light switch but it controls the remote unit. I have seen this at home improvement stores and Radio Shack (two bits says less than 10% of the customers at Radio Shack knows what a radio shack is, i.e. the origin of the name).

Patrick

Anonymous Poster · Jun 28, 2001

RF Controllers are sometimes used by woodworkers to remotely control dust collectors or air compressors, etc. They can handle up to 3 HP and may be a little pricey ($50) for your application but certainly less that an electrician. "from as far away as 75 feet, even through wood and concrete floors, walls and ceilings."

Anonymous Poster · Jun 28, 2001

...the origin of the name...

-.-. --.- Patrick,

--- -.- . -..- .--. .-.. .- .. -. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Bird · Jun 28, 2001

Love your answer, John, even if I don't know Morse code./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

Bird

patrickg · Jun 28, 2001

Of course as Morse (or international radiotelegraph code) is an aural communication, I had to struggle through it 3 times to convert it to sonds in my head so I could "read" it.

Patrick (First lisc as KN5DBP DeciBell Pat in '62, now N6AYR Gen class)

Bill_in_MI · Jun 28, 2001

Check out smarthome.com. I have used their x-10 switches to solve the same problem. Find them pretty reliable for lighting loads.

Anonymous Poster · Jun 28, 2001

Bird,

Believe me... I had to scratch my head... I'm getting rusty.

What's that saying If you don't use it... you'll lose it
{Ok Boys, no comments from the peanut gallery...} /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

GlueGuy · Jun 28, 2001

John,

That sure raised some cobebs in my brain. Learned morse code about 30 years ago, and wasn't half bad at it. But 30 years of non-use feels pretty pathetic... /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

The GlueGuy

Anonymous Poster · Jun 28, 2001

Patrick...

Exactly... I'm thinking in my head... dah dit dah dit_______dah dah dit dah, but I translated to .- and guess what ...Muhammad's "space" algorithm truncated all my extra spaces as separators...but I guess you had to be there.../w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif
________________
Patrick, Looking at your bio...1. You probably need two pages, 2. Is there anything you haven't done?.../w3tcompact/icons/blush.gif

3. What the heck does all this have to do with remote wall switches...{Gee whiz, I love this site!} {Muhammad needs another category called Off On A Tangent...}

Anonymous Poster · Jun 28, 2001

...That sure raised some cobwebs in my brain. ..

Bill...

Yes sir...exactly.

When I was 10 or 11, my Dad was studying for his amateur license and commercial first class radio-telephone... I had to read him the questions out of the books and he gave me the answers...{remember I'm only 10 or 11...}, half the words I could barely pronounce or even understand... so I guessed I learned at an early age how to wing it...

The big day came, with a 3 1/2 hour drive down to New York City for my Dad to take his tests. To make a long story short, I ended up taking the novice exam,{my Dad said as long as I had to wait for him} while my Dad took his multiple exams.

Everybody passed! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

patrickg · Jun 28, 2001

Anything I haven't done? Sure. I haven' jumped out of a flying airplane and probably won't unless it catches on fire or breaks up mid air (a sentiment shared by a number of fellow pilots). I haven't bungee jumped and probably won't. I don't mess around with other peoples wives.

I forgot to mention that the lights around my clothing-optional-after-dark spa also had a RF remote control on-off-dim switch so you don't get electrocuted messing with illumination levels while in spa. Only downside I ever noticed using thees things for several years was that sometimes if the power went off and back on the lights would come on at the preset level. This only seemed to happen when away for an extended period. Irritated me a bunch (was energy conservation officer at a submaring base for a while) so I would turn them all the way down before heading out. They would adjust so low that the fillament just barely glowed. That way mimimum waste should the power glitch in our absence.

Off topic but timely comment:

Please finish out the 4th of July holiday season with as many functioning extremities and eyes as you start it with. Everytime my wife hears a horror story on this topic she tries to get me to stop making some of my own fireworks which leads to a kind of withdrawal symptom only appreciated by fellow pyromaniacs.

Harv · Jun 28, 2001

Muhammad's "space" algorithm truncated all my extra spaces

In all fairness to Muhammad, that's not his doing. If you peek at the source for that page you will see all your spaces are right where you left them. It's the browser itself that ignores all but the first of a string of space characters. There are ways around it in HTML, but if you simply present a chunk of text for viewing, that's what you get.

I know, I know... who asked? /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif

RPM · Jun 28, 2001

What you need is a dose of the pre tag - it's a standard HTML tag but you have to use it here with square brackets ... it's under the markup options - allows you to include pre-formatted text ...

<pre>-.-. --.- Patrick,

--- -.- . -..- .--. .-.. .- .. -. </pre>



Jus' like that ...