My old Sears garage door opener has bit the dust and I'll be replacing it soon. I've been lurking here reading the posts to determine which HA technology I want to implement someday. As I replace stuff like this around the house I do check to see if there are models offered that make them easier to interface to HA systems. I suppose GDO's aren't all that high tech, but outside of HomeLink capabilities are there any on the market that are preferred for this?
Garage door openers
- Thread starter daveg
- Start date
hi daveg, welcome to CocoonTech!
Back when Z-wave was announced, they mentioned they would support garage door openers someday, but as far as I know, there is no unit on the market yet which does. I personally would just get a regular GDO, and look for more important features (such as being quiet or fast), and use a hardware controller to monitor the door status and controlling the garage door. This is what most people do, and it is reliable, plus it will work in any HA environment.
Back when Z-wave was announced, they mentioned they would support garage door openers someday, but as far as I know, there is no unit on the market yet which does. I personally would just get a regular GDO, and look for more important features (such as being quiet or fast), and use a hardware controller to monitor the door status and controlling the garage door. This is what most people do, and it is reliable, plus it will work in any HA environment.
I agree with Electron. I just finished mine. Since most of my stuff is based on X-10 I simply tossed a cheap door/window sensor on the door itself so I can check the status (open/closed). I then tossed a universal module connected to the contacts on the opener itself. I did set up my universal module on a "closed" housecode where my W800 will not accept RF for that particular housecode. This keeps me from worrying about someone with a x-10 remote figuring out one of the 256 different codes I could be using 
Of course that won't stop them from connecing their controllinc controller to one of my oudoor AC outlets.
Of course that won't stop them from connecing their controllinc controller to one of my oudoor AC outlets.ChrisWalker
Active Member
Wayne Dalton has a Z-Wave enabled garage door opener. It reports the status of the garage door being opened and closed, and may be able to send out a real-time status of it being opened and closed, control other devices, etc.
I've seen it. Wayne Dalton is committed to releasing it. I'm not sure what date it's going to be out.
Chris
I've seen it. Wayne Dalton is committed to releasing it. I'm not sure what date it's going to be out.
Chris
Polycron
Quoting
"I then tossed a universal module connected to the contacts on the opener itself. I did set up my universal module on a "closed" housecode where my W800 will not accept RF for that particular housecode."
What does this do ?
I suspect it lets you close the door from a Homeseer program but not from a remote ?
Right ?
Neil
Newmarket Ontario
Quoting
"I then tossed a universal module connected to the contacts on the opener itself. I did set up my universal module on a "closed" housecode where my W800 will not accept RF for that particular housecode."
What does this do ?
I suspect it lets you close the door from a Homeseer program but not from a remote ?
Right ?
Neil
Newmarket Ontario
BraveSirRobbin
Moderator
Correct. My primary use for this method is to have my system check if the garage door is open at night and if it is, close it. I also wanted to be able to connect up to my system from work and be able to open/close the door from my computer. I have had two instances where this has worked very well for me. The first was a recent thunderstorm that somehow triggered my garage door to open. I've never had that happen before but wouldn't you know it, I was on vacation and out of town. I checked from the hotel room and saw that it was open and was able to close it from there. I have also had people call me up when I'm at work to drop off stuff at my place and I've been able to open and close the door from my computer at work.nsisman said:
I had thought about using an x-10 keychain remote to control this but as a number of people pointed out, there really is no secuirty doing it this way. I have seen other recommendations for doing this: Using multiple universal modules, setting up scripts to check for multiple unit code's coming from the remote, etc.
kwilcox
Active Member
Your most reliable setup would be to use two sensors, one triggered when the door is closed and one triggered when the door is open. That way, your door close program can toggle the opener button and terminate when door closed occurs. You can fire error routines based on open trigger event and timeout. In my house, an open trigger event and timeout event during door close restarts the program once then fires an error if it occurs again. Since my door moves about 6" before it stops and reverses if the lightbeam is obstructed, my open trigger error sets an "obstruction encountered" flag and my timeout error sets a "system failure" error. I've had a few obstruction errors that made me get out of bed and remove a kids bike from the door area, but I've never had a system failure.
<insert wood knocking sounds here>
<insert wood knocking sounds here>
AutomatedOutlet
Senior Member
Sounds like a good idea about the 2 sensors. That way you will also know if the door is in the process of opening or closing too.
markthomas
Active Member
That's great news. I hope it's based on the Wayne Dalton iDrive opener, which I have, and it's the best garage door opener I've ever had. My master bedroom is above the garage, and it used to be very loud (even with a quiet screw-drive). With the iDrive mounted on the wall above the garage door (nothing on the ceiling!), you can barely hear the door open!ChrisWalker said:
Even the current model has automation potential, because there are pins you can use to get status, toggle the door open/closed (no need to hack a remote). Not any of this stuff in their literature, but I contacted them and talked to an engineer. Pretty cool company.
markthomas
Active Member
There's a few models; mine is
http://www.wayne-dalton.com/idrive_TorqueMaster.asp
Mouse over the feature list in the lower left to see all the cool stuff.
http://www.wayne-dalton.com/idrive_TorqueMaster.asp
Mouse over the feature list in the lower left to see all the cool stuff.
Steve
Senior Member
Mark,
How long have you had the iDrive? They looked pretty cool so I poked around a bit and read through this . It didn't sound like people had much luck with them, including the dealer that claims he was 0 for 70. I know most of these places people just complain, it would be nice to hear a long term success story with one.
