calbear Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 I've successfully installed the CA kit on two garage doors. I also have a manual human door on the side of the garage, and read in CA materials that, "The Card Access Wireless Contact Sensor monitors the states of up to two garage doors (and one human door)." But nowhere can I find any actual instructions on how to get the human door monitored. I have a wired CA contact switch that I can install on the door, but inside the CA garage sensor, it has only pins for garage 1, garage 2 and thermostat. So does anyone know how to get the third door to be monitored and added to the project without getting a second wireless sensor?Thanks!Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ryanjackson Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 Hold a magnet up to the side of the card access unit and there is your third sensor.Ryan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyknight Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 So you'd have to move the CA sensor to the man-door and find a decently strong magnet.Mount sensor along the trim of the door, magnet to the door itself. This then can act as a third contact sensor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calbear Posted November 24, 2012 Author Share Posted November 24, 2012 Thanks so much for your quick response guys! I was afraid the third switch was the sensor itself... Since I already have the sensor mounted and wired in over by the two garage doors as it is, I think I'll leave it there. What I'm thinking though is perhaps I mount the small wired door switch to the man-door and run some 18ga wire from there over to the garage sensor. And then, since one of the garage doors is actually non-powered and generally slide-bolted closed, I might wire the man door into that sensor instead of the garage door. OR, I may wire the man-door and this auxiliary garage door in serial, such that if either gets opened, it triggers a notification. Though it would certainly be ideal to know whether the trigger was a typical opening of the side door, or a concerning, non-typical opening of the second garage door. If I want to keep my signals separate, it sounds like I would just need to get a separate sensor for the side door. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyknight Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 Well if you want to go Mcguyver on this.....You could put a contact sensor on the door as per usual. But instead of wiring it to a contact, you wire it to a small electromagnet and an appropriate dc power supply (don't exceed 12v). that way when the contact is closed, the electro magnet is active - by placing this at the sensro, you now also close the internal magnetic contact....o.O Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calbear Posted November 24, 2012 Author Share Posted November 24, 2012 Funny I was starting to think the same thing! Why not, right? It would be like a little relay. I could see this running off say a 9-volt battery. Just need to find the right parts. (any suggestions from experience?). And do you know where in the CA sensor housing this switch is? I have to take a closer look... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Godzilla Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 Perhaps you can run a wire back to your controller if it has contact port on it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyknight Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 With a strong enough battery it won't matter too much. In general anywhere along the face is good. You can always tset it by having it trigger a light or something easy to notice and just try. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calbear Posted November 25, 2012 Author Share Posted November 25, 2012 Perhaps you can run a wire back to your controller if it has contact port on itWow, didn't even think about that. I may actually be able to make that run because I have some conduit in the garage that runs to where the C4 controller is. The wire on the switch itself looks to be 20ga. If I were to wire back to the controller, would it matter if I use 18ga or 20ga for a run of about 50 feet? I figure this is simply an open/close signal so this length shouldn't be much of an issue, yes?I'm still thinking the electromagnet relay MacGyver idea is fun too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyknight Posted November 25, 2012 Share Posted November 25, 2012 At 50 ft the gauge shouldn't matter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RyanE Posted November 26, 2012 Share Posted November 26, 2012 If I were going to 'McGyver' it, I'd just open it up and solder the contact in parallel with the reed switch's circuit board contacts.(it's the thing that looks like a long glass tube with metal inside).RyanE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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