Jee Labs Talk

This forum has moved to forum.jeelabs.net - this read-only archive is for reference only!

1. hugo
   

   Hi guys,

   I'm thinking of cool things I could do with JeeNodes, and one of them would be to have movement sensors in every room, reporting to a webserver that any family member can access.

   Now, instead of using batteries, I thought perhaps there could be some lightbuld-socket mount JeeNode. Ideally it could even have a "pass-through" female socket so you can still use a lamp. Also because lamps are in the center of the room, they are well positioned for that application.

   Because I'm not a electrical enginneer, my approach would be to get one of these () and work from that.

   On the other hand, there is some chance of burning down the house when you starting messing with wall power...

   Do you think the socket mount is a good idea?

   Cheers, Hugo

   Posted 06/08/2010 14:27:18

2. jcw
   

   @hugo - I don't know why, but this post got stuck in the spam filter. Have undone that, should be visible to all now.

   Posted 13/08/2010 15:56:00

3. jcw
   

   Interesting idea, btw. As for risks: adding a fuse to the circuit can help.

   I've been looking into some directly-connected circuits as well - as long as the entire thing is not connected to anything else, i think there are some nice things to try. Risk #1 is while you're tinkering with a circuit (it can be reduced slightly by using an isolation transformer), risk #2 is once the circuit is working and sealed - that's the most important risk IMO, but I think it's manageable.

   Posted 13/08/2010 16:01:19

4. tankslappa
   

   What happens when the light is turned off though? Where would you get the power to run your Jeenode and sensor from?

   I know there is a way in the UK, as we have our lighting and power circuits delivered via a ring system. The lighting ring runs round all the ceiling mounts with a pair of wires going down to each light switch. This means that there is always mains voltage available in the ceiling mount no matter what state the light switch is in. So mounting a sensor connected to the live mains ring in the ceiling mount would be easy.

   Unfortunately I know the UK system is not used everywhere. I believe it was introduced to reduce the amount of copper required at a time of shortage. I'm pretty sure France uses a star distribution system from the fuse box, with each lamp having its own fuse and cable to the switch and back to the fuse board, so no permanent live near the lamp. Certainly the ski chalets I have stayed in are like this. It comes as quite a shock when you're used to a fusebox containing maybe 5 or 6 fuses I can tell you!

   As for Brazil, sorry, no idea!

   Posted 14/08/2010 04:09:40

5. stef007
   

   Interesting idea yes. About the fire safety: I had concerns myself regarding my kitchen light project. In fact I soldered a power supply in there together with a jeenode. And yes, don't do this at home because I did not add a fuse. Well, it has run several months now and it hasn't blown up;-) But I must admit that I turn off the whole lighting power circuit of the ground floor (where the kitchen is) when I'm not at home for several days. Don't want to invite Murphy over.

   tankslappa,

   for the light-off problem: if you use a supercap and proper power saving progamming, I think the sensor can survive the period between lights off and on.

   Posted 14/08/2010 18:23:00

6. tankslappa
   

   @Stef - Don't start me off on the whole low power thing again! lol!

   Posted 14/08/2010 19:12:10