Anyone intersted in home automation? [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
Anyone have some neat home automation tricks to share?
I have a few X10 items set up in my home and really like them.
For instance, my wife usually gets up before me to excersice in the basement. 5 minutes before her alarm goes off, the kitchen and living room lights come on at 30% to make a soft light to guide her way to the basement stairs. 5 minutes before I get up the bedromm lights come on full blast, then ramp down to 30% to kind of wake me up. The kids' lights come on a few minutes before they get up as well.
All of our holiday lights are set for dusk to 11:00pm, then 6:00am to dawn.
The pool pump is on it as well. It runs a schedule for me. I have a keychain remote that I carry out to the pool and can turn it off and on from anywhere near the pool area while I'm cleaning the filter and pool. I never have to touch an outlet or switch when I'm wet.
I also have some of the battery powered RF light switches that you can stick on anywhere. They look very nice and are amazingly thin. They can control 3 different devices, plus dim or brighten them. Sure beats re-wiring an older house to add switches.
It's nice to be able to turn on some of the house lights from the driveway with the keychain remotes as well.
Outside motion detectors with floodlights are next on my list. If any one of the flodlights detect motion, it can trigger all of the other floodlights to come on as well. Again, no rewiring, just swap out the existing outside lights with these units.
I also have a learning IR/RF remote control that has replaced the remotes for everything in our home entertainment unit. It learns the IR commands from all of your other remotes, and it can transmit RF for the X10 too. So, I can now control the TV, VCR, DSS, CD and the lights in the living room(or anywhere else in the house) from one remote. Makes for nice movie viewing.
I've set up a macro(string of commands) that will dim the lights to a pre-set movie viewing level with the push of one button.
I really like the X10 stuff and it is fairly inexpensive and reliable.
How did I guess this was your topic [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img]
I'm still a rank amateur with X-10 but I have all our Christmas window lights set up with dusk to dawn, same with the outside lights on the house. I'm thinking of dabbling a bit with TV/VCR control as our entertainment console in the MBR is around the corner from the bed and the remotes won't reach the VCR.
The other thing our new house brought us is a link to the security system. I need to pick up a powerline interface but with that I can use the security system to control all the X-10 stuff. I'll also be able to call the house and issue X-10 commands over the phone. Not sure what I'll do with that, but it sure sounds neat.
My current controller is a bottom of the barrel photocell, tabletop job. Pretty basic. It sounds like you've got a much more sophisticated control scheme. What do you use to program and control everything?
Slightly related... I got an "atomic clock" for Christmas. It's supposed to pick up a radio signal and keep itself accurate. Great idea but it won't pick up the signal out where we live [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
I have the old IBM home director kit that I got from X10 for $49.00. I think they still sell it under the Active Home name. It has a CM11A module. This module plugs into the wall and into the computer. You can download the Active Home software for free at X10.com. You set it up for what you want to do, then download everything to the module's memory. You can then turn off and/or disconnect the computer and it still runs. It has a battery backup that lasts about a year. For extremely complicated stuff, you can run everything from a computer, but there is an annoying delay when doing this.
So far, for everything that I mentioned, it only takes up a little of the memory in the CM11A module.
I have my father-in-law's house holiday lights on X10, as well as his front yard lights and two living room lamps. His uses the table top controller with a clock in it and has no RF capability.
One nice thing about the CM11A module is that you can set the dusk/dawn resolution. That is, it will automatically adjust for dusk dawn, based on your longitude and latitude. I have mine set for 12, so it adjusts itself 12 times a years. I made the mistake of seting it for 365 thinking it would adjust every day... It filled up the memory on the module [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]
There is also a mode that you can use with 2 way lamp and appliance modules(I only have the cheaper, one ways). You can set it to learn your habits. Lets say you walk in the door every day at 5:30 and turn on a light in the mud room. After a while, it will turn it on automatically, and keep adjusting according to your average usage. Same thing with power off. You get done using CBN or TBN every night at 11:30. You turn off the light in your computer room and go to bed, stopping for a snack in the kitchen. So the light in the computer room starts turning off by itself every night and the kitchen light comes on at 30% so you can see your cookies and milk without stubbing yor toes. [img]/forums/images/icons/cool.gif[/img] I imagine it would get kind of creepy after a while to have the house sensing your next move. I think I'll stay away from that mode for a while [img]/forums/images/icons/shocked.gif[/img]
PJ, X-10 is a Brand Name but also a standard format for home automation. It sends controlling signals across your 110v power lines in the house. Plug a controller into the wall and it can talk to any other component that is plugged in as well. My stuff is pretty simple, just lamp modules that plug into the wall then the lights plug into the module. My little controller sends a "lights on" signal through the wires and the lights come on. As MR indicates, it can get much more sophisticated than that. The real benefit is the ability to control about anything without running new wires [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
<font color="blue"> I imagine it would get kind of creepy after a while to have the house sensing your next move </font color>
That does sound a bit creepy, but I like the milk and cookies concept [img]/forums/images/icons/grin.gif[/img] I'll have to do some checking on our security system controller. I know it has the longitude/latitude settings but isn't programmable from the PC.
Fun stuff [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
X10 isnt much of home automation until you combine it with some computer controller. I installed a HCSII home automation system in my last home. Was a lot of fun to install, Many custom built items. X10 was used for lighting control but there was many non x10 devices also.
I could drive into the driveway, vehicle would be sensed and garage door would open, outside garage light turned on, Side door light came on. When side door was opened inside hall light would come on. When garage door was closed, outside lights would stay on for 5 minutes then turn off. When side door was closed lights would go off after a few minutes.
If the car comming into the driveway wasnt my or my wifes car the side lights came on and a bell rang in the house.
If you pressed the door bell the the outside light would come on. Outside light would come on a dusk and slowly dim off through the night. They would slowly dim on in the morning and then go off when the sun came up. Had some HVAC interface as well. If no motion was detected in the house during the day HVAC temp was setback. HVAC was setback at night. Hallway lights would come on dim if you get up go to the bathroom.
I found it a lot of fun to setup and build, but after all the work was done, I found it boaring to use. It took some time getting accustom to the delay X10 intruduces into a switch. X10 command on to lights on is noticable.
I doubt I would do a complete home automation again.
I don't have any noticable delays when using the CM11A module. I have tried to run some extensive macros using the PC, and those had a long 1-2 second delay. I didn't care for that.
Another item that is getting good reviews is the ocelot module. I haven't looked into it, but a friend of a friend has one and I hope to check it out in the next few months.
MR,
This stuff really sounds interesting. I built my home in 1991 and most of this stuff was not available then. Thanks for the threads, time to do some learning and updating.
PJ
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