Remote monitoring of garage door over wifi

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PJ48

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#201851 6-Sep-2016 22:20

Hi All.

Looking for some advice. Our garage is right on the street frontage and disconnected from the house. Occasionally we accidentally leave the garage door up and have no way of knowing. I would like to be able to easily check whether the garage door is closed or not from the house. I was thinking about some sort of Wifi IP camera that talked to my iPhone - so I could just check that it was closed, or some sort of switch that would send a signal. I have no realistic way of getting a cable to the garage, so it has to operate over Wifi.

Has anyone out there solved a similar problem?

cheers

Peter

mdf

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#1624851 6-Sep-2016 22:33

Camera would be easy with no/limited tinkering required. But @SumnerBoy kindly shared his setup with me on this thread. He did his with a reed switch.

I'm still tinkering with learning Arduino coding with a Sparkfun board, but the Wemos boards for my garage door must be due to arrive any day now so that will be another project to start and never quite finish.

PJ48

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#1624852 6-Sep-2016 22:39

Hmmm...

That Wemos stuff looks right out of my league! Does anybody know where to find cheap(ish) Wifi cameras that can stream to an iPhone over Wifi? I don't need HD video.

SumnerBoy

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#1624854 6-Sep-2016 22:49

It really isn't that difficult, but i know that is easy to say when you know how!

Good luck with whatever you decide.

Oncop53

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#1624863 6-Sep-2016 23:58

Wifi IP cams are pretty easy to get hold of, e.g. : https://www.pbtech.co.nz/category/cameras/security

They have android / ios apps.

richms

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#1624916 7-Sep-2016 09:12

If the DIY wemos route is too hard, grab a belkin wemo maker and it can do the same thing, the input will show up on the app, and you can toggle the output from the app to trigger the door.

If you are only wanting to see open/closed and only when you are home, then a cheap aliexpress wifi ip cam will be fine. Dont give it internet access, and set the framerate and quality of the video really low so it doesnt swamp your wifi.

Richard rich.ms

PJ48

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#1625004 7-Sep-2016 11:47

thanks to all - I will follow those leads

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mugs2000

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#1625282 7-Sep-2016 21:16

Some years ago, I used a Dick Smith mini-processor, much like an arduino, to control the garage door. I programmed it to close the door automatically after 10 minutes unless the timer was set for a longer period of time. If you have basic programming skills you should be able to integrate this into your door controller. I also added a basic car door remote controller when I lost the original remote. It required 2 microswitches; one to operate when open, one to operate when closed. The closed switch was also used to extend the open time in 30 minute increments by holding down for an appropriate period of time. There were 2 audio alarms; one to alert you to the fact that the door was about to close, and as an indicator for the 30 minute time extension mentioned earlier by beeping once for each 1/2 hour extension, the other was a loud alarm if something stopped the door from closing for whatever reason.

If you like mucking around with electronics/programming, this method may be what you need.