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Low cost wireless "button/switch" — Parallax Forums

Low cost wireless "button/switch"

FredBlaisFredBlais Posts: 370
edited 2013-11-12 13:35 in Accessories
I'm fairly new to wireless stuff and I wanted to know if there is an easy way (without µC) to send the state of a button or switch 200 feet away on an open field. Does anyone have advice or clue on how I might do that? I know it could be done easily with an Xbee but I think it's over-kill just for 1 bit of unidirectional data, and then I would need to program it...

Thanks!

Comments

  • Mike GreenMike Green Posts: 23,101
    edited 2013-06-10 06:13
    How about this?
  • PWonePWone Posts: 1
    edited 2013-06-10 20:14
    I purchased two of these key fob PCB receiver boards and neither one worked. I applied 5 volts per the instructions, unrolled the antenna push the A button and nothing. I tried re-linking the fob with the receiver many times. The best I could get was an occasional led blink about four feet between the two components. If they got any closer or further apart nothing would work. I am very disappointed with this product and would not recommend purchasing one of these devices.

    Steve
  • FredBlaisFredBlais Posts: 370
    edited 2013-06-11 05:45
    PWone wrote: »
    I purchased two of these key fob PCB receiver boards and neither one worked. I applied 5 volts per the instructions, unrolled the antenna push the A button and nothing. I tried re-linking the fob with the receiver many times. The best I could get was an occasional led blink about four feet between the two components. If they got any closer or further apart nothing would work. I am very disappointed with this product and would not recommend purchasing one of these devices.

    Steve

    Thanks, I will take this in consideration.
  • Tracy AllenTracy Allen Posts: 6,658
    edited 2013-06-11 20:48
    "easy... on an open field". Made me think of early experiments in biotelemetry, the classic text being Stuart MacKay's Bio-Medical Telemetry: Sensing and Transmitting Biological Information from Animals and Man. You can pick up a copy of the 1968 edition for a couple of bucks online. It has wealth of information about turning a handful of transistors and passives into a low-power transmitter and often used a commercial AM radio receiver to pick up the beep-beep-beep. There is a 1998 second edition too, but the price of that will scare you.

    That said, if you go to ebay and type "transmitter module 433MHz", you'll get lots of hits that claim 500m range (apply salt here), for a couple of bucks with free shipping from China. How can they do that?
  • phatallicaphatallica Posts: 64
    edited 2013-08-08 20:21
    PWone wrote: »
    I purchased two of these key fob PCB receiver boards and neither one worked. I applied 5 volts per the instructions, unrolled the antenna push the A button and nothing. I tried re-linking the fob with the receiver many times. The best I could get was an occasional led blink about four feet between the two components. If they got any closer or further apart nothing would work. I am very disappointed with this product and would not recommend purchasing one of these devices.

    Steve

    Steve - I have to call you out on this. Parallax has awesome tech support, customer service, and the really amazing community here on the forum. Yet, I see that you have only this one post suggesting that you bought defective product. If you ask for help from Parallax or the forum, then you are quite likely to get it.

    The product that Mike linked looks like a fantastic value, based on my experience designing/building a similar 433MHz encoder/decoder a few years ago. Once I burn through my inventory, I will probably convert to using these.
  • Chris SavageChris Savage Parallax Engineering Posts: 14,406
    edited 2013-08-09 15:00
    As far as I know we haven't had any such complaints on that product and we have used it ourselves in our own projects within Parallax Inc. In fact, it was used to start and reset our custom timer at the Official Propeller Conference and never failed to operate. I have used one in a Halloween Project and it worked perfectly.
  • NWCCTVNWCCTV Posts: 3,629
    edited 2013-08-09 23:18
    @Chris Savage, Since it was his first and only post I would venture to say that he could not figure it out and rather than ask for help he decided to "bash" the product. I also have one and it works just fine for me.
  • Chris SavageChris Savage Parallax Engineering Posts: 14,406
    edited 2013-08-10 11:50
    Whatever the reason any customer should feel free to contact us if there is an issue with a product and we will do our best to work it out. There is also a 14-day money back period if you're unsatisfied with a product.
  • Alex.StanfieldAlex.Stanfield Posts: 198
    edited 2013-11-12 13:35
    Just in case the need is still there, I'm using an XBee (series 1, known as 802.15.4 http://www.parallax.com/product/32404) as a remote control.
    It runs on two coin batteries with a voltage regulator and no uController (other than the Xbee)

    The Xbee although might be an overkill is reliable, very adaptable and straightforward to use. You could even use it's pin replication feature to avoid messing with API mode on the receiving side.

    Just my two cents

    Regards
    Alex
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