Control garage door opener with Elk M1 with a "Smart Control Panel"

M

michelkenny

Active Member
I am trying to connect my Chamberlain garage door opener to my Elk M1 so that I can remotely open and close it. This is the model that I have: http://www.homedepot.ca/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CatalogSearchResultView?D=937038&Ntt=937038&catalogId=10051&langId=-15&storeId=10051&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&Ntx=mode+matchall&N=0&Ntk=P_PartNumber. There are only two wires going from the control panel to the opener. The control panel performs multiple functions (control the opener, turn on the lights, lock the opener, etc). When I touch the two wires together the opener opens or closes. So I connected a line in parallel to a relay on my Elk M1 (via the ELK-RB module). When I operate the relay the opener opens or closes as expected.

The problem that I am running into is that the control panel reboots when I do so. The control panel is a "Smart Control Panel", as pictured here: http://www.liftmaster.com/consumerweb/pages/accessoriesmodeldetail.aspx?modelId=842. It has a circuit board and LCD and tells me the time, temperature and status messages about the opener. Now if the control panel is simply losing power and that is why it is resetting, it is not a big deal but it is still an annoyance because the time resets. However if the reason why the control panel is resetting is because of a short or surge or something that could damage the control panel or the opener, that is what I am concerned about. Is there anything I can do to prevent it from happening? Perhaps I just have to remove the control panel and rely solely on the Elk for controlling the opener (would be undesirable as the control panel also has a motion detector for turning on the lights)? If this is the case, then I am not sure if I can get the lights and lock functions to work from the Elk too. I am not too familiar with electronics or relays, I just follow instructions of "connect this to that". Any help would be greatly appreciated!
 
You do only have the relay on for a second right? I.E. have the Elk close the relay, let one second pass, then open the relay.

If that is the case you could always go with THIS method using another remote.
 
Kazibole said:
I am trying to connect my Chamberlain garage door opener to my Elk M1 so that I can remotely open and close it. This is the model that I have: http://www.homedepot...tk=P_PartNumber. There are only two wires going from the control panel to the opener. The control panel performs multiple functions (control the opener, turn on the lights, lock the opener, etc). When I touch the two wires together the opener opens or closes. So I connected a line in parallel to a relay on my Elk M1 (via the ELK-RB module). When I operate the relay the opener opens or closes as expected.

The problem that I am running into is that the control panel reboots when I do so. The control panel is a "Smart Control Panel", as pictured here: http://www.liftmaste...spx?modelId=842. It has a circuit board and LCD and tells me the time, temperature and status messages about the opener. Now if the control panel is simply losing power and that is why it is resetting, it is not a big deal but it is still an annoyance because the time resets. However if the reason why the control panel is resetting is because of a short or surge or something that could damage the control panel or the opener, that is what I am concerned about. Is there anything I can do to prevent it from happening? Perhaps I just have to remove the control panel and rely solely on the Elk for controlling the opener (would be undesirable as the control panel also has a motion detector for turning on the lights)? If this is the case, then I am not sure if I can get the lights and lock functions to work from the Elk too. I am not too familiar with electronics or relays, I just follow instructions of "connect this to that". Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Click to expand...

I looked at the owner's manual for the "Smart Control Panel". It looks like there are only 2 wires connecting the panel to the garage door opener.

How many total wires are going to the "Smart Control Panel"?

I there are only 2 wires is there a battery in the unit?

If there are only 2 wires going to the garage door opener and there are NO other wires connected to the "Smart Control Panel" and there are NO batteries. Then the "Smart Control Panel" is getting it's power from the garage door opener. This would explain why the unit is resetting. When the relay activates the unit is loosing power.
 
You could spend a lot of time figuring out the "smart opener" or you could do the simple thing. Take one of the wireless remotes and hook it up to the Elk relay. That is how my Elk controls my garage door and it has worked flawlessly for 2 years. It is the same concept, just solder the two leads that go to the button on the remote to the Elk relay and write a rule that closes it for 1 or 2 seconds. I used a 3-button remote and it runs all 3 of my openers.
 
Thank you for your replies everyone.

BraveSirRobbin said:
You do only have the relay on for a second right? I.E. have the Elk close the relay, let one second pass, then open the relay.
Click to expand...

Yes I am only activating the relay for 1 second.


PaulB said:
It looks like there are only 2 wires connecting the panel to the garage door opener. How many total wires are going to the "Smart Control Panel"? If there are only 2 wires is there a battery in the unit? If there are only 2 wires going to the garage door opener and there are NO other wires connected to the "Smart Control Panel" and there are NO batteries. Then the "Smart Control Panel" is getting it's power from the garage door opener. This would explain why the unit is resetting. When the relay activates the unit is loosing power.
Click to expand...

Yes there are only two wires going from the control panel to the opener. There is no battery inside the control panel. If all that is happening is that the control panel is losing power because the Elk relay is closing the circuit, then that is not the end of the world. I just wasn't sure if there was something else at play here (short, surge, etc) that could damage the control panel.


Lou Apo said:
You could spend a lot of time figuring out the "smart opener" or you could do the simple thing. Take one of the wireless remotes and hook it up to the Elk relay.
Click to expand...

That's not a bad idea. I'd have to buy a wireless remote as all of our other ones are in use, but I will keep this in mind as an alternative.
 
The smart controllers use voltage from the opener.
If you are simply placing a dry contact in parallel across the terminals, closing this is the same thing electrically as pressing the button and closing the contacts at the control. That should not interrupt power.

When you open and close a relay the collapsing magnetic field from the coil can cause an induced current in the wires.
It's possible a voltage signal is being sent that is higher than the @$V the controoler is designed for, causing it to reset. There should be a protective diode across the relay coil contacts to prevent this going back to the Elk. You may neeed a diode on the output contacts.
 
Desert_AIP said:
The smart controllers use voltage from the opener.
If you are simply placing a dry contact in parallel across the terminals, closing this is the same thing electrically as pressing the button and closing the contacts at the control. That should not interrupt power.

When you open and close a relay the collapsing magnetic field from the coil can cause an induced current in the wires.
It's possible a voltage signal is being sent that is higher than the @$V the controoler is designed for, causing it to reset. There should be a protective diode across the relay coil contacts to prevent this going back to the Elk. You may neeed a diode on the output contacts.
Click to expand...

Hey Desert_AIP, can you elaborate a bit more? I don't know much about electronic circuits so I don't quite understand. I am using a relay on the Elk-RB module (output 9), not sure if that is a dry contact or not.
 
A dry contact has the same effect as touching two bare wires together. It simply completes an electrical circuit.
When you press the button on your controller, you are simply placing a thin piece of metal across two other metal contacts and completing an electrical circuit.

Since you are using an Elk product, not a raw relay, I expect it is protected.
And from the Elk-RB web page.
8 Form "C" Relays, SPDT Dry Contact.
Diode Protection Across Relay Coil.

So the Back EMF is extremely unlikely.

The power thing sounds like loose wires. Where are you hooking up the relay? At the controller or at the opener?
You are using two wires from the relay, correct?
It sounds to me like the screws on the controller where the opener hooks up are loose and when the opener operates it shakes and interrupts power to teh controller.
Does it ever happen when you manually open and close the door, or use your remote?
 
Had the same issue with a Craftsman opener. As Desert_AIP said, I had to place the wires across the terminals on the opener itself, and NOT the wires at the panel. Once I did this, everything worked fine. I know that electrically this should be the same thing, but for some reason its not, since the panel controls so many other things.
 
One other thing you may run into (at least I did with a fairly new Chamberlain opener) is with the remotes. I have three buttons on mine, with two being used. However, no matter how I rigged this thing up wiring wires up in parallel to each button, I could never get BOTH openers to work at the same time. As soon as I desoldered one set of wires, the other button's wires would work great (just touching them together). I tried every configuration known to man before finally admitting defeat and using two remotes instead of one - one for each door. Sure this cost me another relay on my Elk-RB board, but at least I have my sanity. So, instead of buying one extra remote, you might want to pick up a second :) That is unless one of the many bright sparks on here can explain what my issue was and make me feel stupid!
 
Desert_AIP said:
The power thing sounds like loose wires. Where are you hooking up the relay? At the controller or at the opener?
You are using two wires from the relay, correct?
It sounds to me like the screws on the controller where the opener hooks up are loose and when the opener operates it shakes and interrupts power to teh controller.
Does it ever happen when you manually open and close the door, or use your remote?
Click to expand...

nov0798 said:
Had the same issue with a Craftsman opener. As Desert_AIP said, I had to place the wires across the terminals on the opener itself, and NOT the wires at the panel. Once I did this, everything worked fine. I know that electrically this should be the same thing, but for some reason its not, since the panel controls so many other things.
Click to expand...

The control panel resetting does not happen when I take the Elk relay out of the mix. I have tried both splicing the relay into the wires that go from the opener to the control panel (in the middle of them both), and also connecting the Elk relay to the terminals on the control panel. Both give me the same result. I will have to try connecting the Elk relay at the opener itself to see what happens. BTW the contacts at the opener are the spring clamp where you have to insert a flat head screwdriver to open
 
You might try putting a resistor in the loop. If your opener is drawing its only power from those two wires, and you short them together with the Elk relay, that would drop the voltage to the "smart button" to essentially zero. Find a resistance that is low enough to allow the door to trigger without dropping the voltage to the smart button.
 
Well I just tried to wire in the Elk relay at the opener itself, and the same thing happens, the door opens or closes but the wall panel resets. Looks like the easiest thing might just be to hack up a wireless remote.

Lou Apo said:
You might try putting a resistor in the loop. If your opener is drawing its only power from those two wires, and you short them together with the Elk relay, that would drop the voltage to the "smart button" to essentially zero. Find a resistance that is low enough to allow the door to trigger without dropping the voltage to the smart button.
Click to expand...

Pardon my ignorance but I am not too sure how I would go about wiring the resister, or how to find one that works without trying a bunch of them.
 
Kazibole said:
Well I just tried to wire in the Elk relay at the opener itself, and the same thing happens, the door opens or closes but the wall panel resets. Looks like the easiest thing might just be to hack up a wireless remote.



Pardon my ignorance but I am not too sure how I would go about wiring the resister, or how to find one that works without trying a bunch of them.
Click to expand...

You can't hurt anything doing this so I would give it a try. Put a resistor on one of the terminals of the Elk relay, then hook your one lead from the garage door up to it and the second lead directly to the other terminal of the Elk relay. So now, when the Elk closes the relay, it will close the circuit with current flowing through the resistor. The resistor will put enough "back pressure" on the current so that some current will still flow through your smart button keeping it from rebooting.

The question is, how much resistance? If the resistance is too much, the garage door won't recognize the closing of the circuit and won't activate the door. Too little resistance and the smart button looses too much juice and resets.

I assume you have resistors sitting around that came with the Elk for use as end of line resistors. It won't harm anything to try one of those. If closing the circuit without a resistor didn't damage anything, closing the circuit with a resistor certainly won't.
 
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