Suggestions wanted for Motion Detector delay/time-out

Hello & thanks in advance for your suggestions...

Briefly, I've got a CCTV on my front door. I also have a motion detector that 'dings' when someone is in my yard & approaching my front door.

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The problem is that there's no chime delay (?) setting w/ the motion detector -- meaning, the receivers 'ding' everytime the motion detector is triggered. You can imagine how annoying this can be when someone stands on my walkway, mows the lawn, etc. It goes off and off and off...

I'd like to find a way to turn off the receivers for a period of time (i.e. 1-3 minutes) before they'll chime again. Does anyone know of a product that I can use to solve my problem? The receivers simply plug into an outlet. Other visitor announcement systems have too short of a range to work, so I'm stuck w/ my existing system.

Thanks again...I'm grateful.

Richard (oc snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com)

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RichardinOC
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I have a similar application but use an ADI Ocelot as my Home Automation controller. If two of the three X10 wireless Motion Detectors in the driveway get a detect with 5 seconds of each other, the Ocelot tells the ADI SpeakEasy to announce "Someone's in the Driveway".

The Ocelot then ignores subsequent detects for 2 minutes to avoid the problem you are experiencing.

Before I added the SpeakEasy, the Ocelot just beeped an X10 Universal module.

Doing this without a programmable controller like the Ocelot would be difficult and the Ocelot is much less expensive than your current solution...

John W

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John W

"John W"

Reply to
Robert Green

----- Original Message ----- From: "Robert Green" Newsgroups: comp.home.automation Sent: Wednesday, January 11, 2006 9:49 PM Subject: Re: Suggestions wanted for Motion Detector delay/time-out

Reply to
John W

Home Domination

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has an option with its macros to trigger on activity or lack of activity. This is really nice for this kind of problem. You set it up to monitor one or more sensors and tell it if you want to monitor for activity or inactivity. When triggering on activity, if there was previously no activity then it will trigger as soon as the motion sensor is tripped. Then it won't trigger again unless there has been inactivity for an amount of time you specify. Triggering on inactivity is similar except it triggers as soon as there has been no motion for the amount of time specified. This can be handy for turning out the lights after there has been no inside motion for a period of time.

Home Domination also has a very reliable remote client, can monitor and take snapshots from an unlimited number of video sources, monitor email for commands, and lots of other stuff. It's very inexpensive and supports the CM11A, CM19A and cm15A as well as USBmicro devices so you can add 1-Wire temperature sensors or control things directly. It's very inexpensive too.

Harry Strand StrandControl, LLC

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snipped-for-privacy@homedomination.com

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Harry

"John W"

Reply to
Robert Green

I use the black weather-proofed versions (Eagleyes) mounted high just under the eaves. We have a double garage and they are mounted on either side of the doors pointing more-or-less towards each other but more out and down. The RR501 receiver is in the garage. Between them is a PR511 (X10 Dual Floodlight MD) which casts the deciding vote. Since it is not RF, it is a little more reliable than the Eagleyes. It is also modified to seperate the floods from the MD so I can have it detect even in daylight but only turn the floods on at night.

John W

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John W

"John W"

Reply to
Robert Green

"John W" Just to give you and idea of how useful that is, here's the list of

Is that the online text-to-speech software?

Are you intergrated with an alarm panel? Do these messages play forever until an alarm system deactivation?

Is this a message that allows enough time to countermand ALL OFF? It's a problem with the MUTE button on the 8-in-1 remote where someone means to press MUTE but the remote is in X-10 mode and it turns off all the lights!

What operations are controlled by a guest flag?

Do you rotate through the above messages? Nice touch.

What are these messages for? Do you take actions predicated on room occupancy or are these just status queries?

Good stuff. I'll have to do the same.

This opens up another issue - compliance. I would like to automatically determine whether Dad's taken his regimen of pills at the right time.

Now if I could only get the Ocelot to clean it out, too!

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

The Speakeasy is configurable for two different length messages. I use 50 X

5 seconds each. I have 6 PC-style amplified speakers located throughout the house. Since the SpeakEasy is mono, I can split a pair as two mono outputs.

Yes, the AT&T online text-to-speech (freeby).

I use an X10 Palmpad (actually I have lots of them). When we go to bed, I press OFF (top position) and that initiates the bedtime sequence. ON in the same position, initiates an "All Lights ON" which I can use if I hear an wierd noise.

The guest flag turns off some automatic functions like "Please Close the Laundry Room Door" and several lights that turn on or off based on motion.

This message is issued based on a random number generator to select one of the 6.

At midnight, my house automatically goes into "light alarm" mode. We can override it manually or it gives us 5 minutes if we approach from the bedroom end of the house. Anyone entering from a door or from the other end of the house would be audibly tracked. It goes OFF automatically at 6 AM.

Full alarm mode is set with a keypad.

This message is issued 1 minute after the ALL OFF (bedtime) so if I haven't already taken it (Cholesterol pill), I say "OH SH_T and get up to take it. The goodnight message comes 4 minutes later.

Reply to
John W

"John W" > have to revisit the specs. Do you pipe the output through a home intercom

Nice idea! I just bought a $25 3 piece Creative speaker set that sounds remarkable given its small size and low cost. They've made a lot of progress in small speaker design. For well under $100 I could cover the whole house if I split the pairs, $200 if I chose to deliver stereo to each room. Great!

Great!

Thanks for all the information. It's certainly going to be useful in designing a new HA system. If I am going to install several sets of PC amplified speakers in the house, I've got to figure out how to integrate them into a household audio system where I can listen to netcasts, TV audio and whatnot and have that muted when it's time for the SpeakEasy to deliver it's message. I imagine I need a SECU module to handle the speaker input switching via relays. When it's time to deliver a message switch input from [whatever] to [Speakeasy] and then switch back. Not sure if I can fade out the normal program material and then fade it in after SpeakEasy speaks - that would be nice, too!

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

Yes, that would work and in fact, it's one of my "to do" projects. You could use SECU16 relays to switch the audio inputs. All of my SECU16 relays are connected to a home-made relay board that has 10amp SPDT relays. By routing my audio input through 2 of these relays I could pick them before issuing a SpeakEasy message and then drop them for normal PC audio to play my MP3's through the same speakers.

Have a look here for some pics of my installation (see John W's HA installation):

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John W

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John W

"John W" installation):

There's something about their site that just doesn't agree with my conservative browser settings. The above URL puts me in a messageless forum. I did manage to find a saloon recreation here:

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But I'm still looking for your thread . . .

Here we go:

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But I can't seem to find *all* the pictures and UBB has more damn icons then the Temple at Karnak!!!!! It doesn't just make me *long* for a straightforward group messaging medium like Usenet, it makes me LUST for it. I was born the gleam of a green phosphor screen and good old ASCII characters!

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

Hmmm...

Can you even get to the ADI forum at

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??

or from their Web Site at:

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(select Customer Support) ??

If yes, select "The Showcase Archive"

John W

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John W

Roberty --

Baffled me for a minute, too. Top right corner of the screen, select "all posts" instead of "last 45 days"

:Lee

E. Lee Dickinson Entertainment Design and Technology

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E. Lee Dickinson

I have no idea how I concatenated a "y" yo the end of your name. Wasn't trying to be cute. :)

Reply to
E. Lee Dickinson

"E. Lee Dickinson" wrote in

Well, at least I am not the only one!

Figured that out for myself after a while of scanning seemingly empty fora. Seems to default to that setting, too. I suppose I'll get the hang of it eventually. In this case, the information's valuable enough to me to make it worth the search. Right now I am trying to understand Guy L's voltage divider scheme to read multiple inputs for SECU modules. Lots of interesting code snippets but ladder logic seems like the antithesis of structured programming. It's hard for me, a very casual programmer, to assimilate.

But like it or not, I've determined that whatever I do, it's got to be in C-MAX. I may hate it, but it's clearly the language of choice in Ocelot programming AND it requires no PC running 24X7 to keep it alive. HomeSeer was very attractive for a while, but it requires a PC running MS SW. C-MAX will allow the HA system to run on battery power long after any PC running from the same AH-rated battery has died. With several, recent sustained power outages, extreme energy efficiency has become a real factor in my planning.

If you separate HA functions into human brain categories, the Ocelot is like the lizard brain, working automatically to maintain a certain internal environment. Now to learn enough C-MAX to become the Lizard King!

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

"E. Lee Dickinson" wrote in

"Y yo?" Your keyboard is playing tricks on you!

-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

"John W"

Reply to
Robert Green

It's faily bizzarre how they've split the discussion of one person's installation into multiple threads. Not SOP.

I do like newsgroups, though. The ability to embed binary's would aid in discussion sometimes -- and the bit about linewrapping URLs is frustrating. But there are ways around both of those.

I've got an Ocelot and a SECU-16 sitting in their boxes for about 6 months now. Haven't had time to install them yet. But some of these installation examples are making my mouth water.

:Lee, who is currently building his projector lift.

Reply to
E. Lee Dickinson

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