RF Controlled TV bed

General Discussion
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Hi & thanks for reading. I’m looking to integrate the TV bed with smartthings. It is controled with an RF remote which has two buttons, Up on the left, down on the right. I’m not sure which mhz RF signal is being sent out. How would I find this out and how could I integrate this device.

Ideally I would love to pop another harmony hub under the bed which would send an IR signal out which would turn the TV on & lift the motor. A magical device would receive this IR signal and convert it and relay to RF for the box which controls, the motor.

20160326_161140[1].jpg1808×2419 1.34 MB

Wondering would there be any way to get something like this working with Smartthings? Assuming my device uses 433mhz

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If you can figure out the RF frequency, you may have luck using something similar to this proof of concept I created a while ago.

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just spend the last 30 minutes reading through your post my friend :smiley: Its currently not possible to get a hold of the Thingshield in the UK. I have been checking ebay for weeks to see if my luck will change.

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The frequency could be… 315 Mhz (well) too. The silver can there is likely the oscillator but I can’t read it. Check the other side of the circuit board.

If you can’t get a Thing Shield, you can hardwire solder Z-Wave relay connections to the switch posts, but that’s messy and wastes a remote.

Alternatively, use an Ethernet or WiFi Arduino (+ RF chip modules) and write it as a LAN device type instead of ZigBee ThingShield.

XBee Series 2 (and other ZigBee modules) are available, not particularly cheap and harder to program than ThingShield for a one time build.

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Thankyou for your reponse buddy, No realy clear indication on the back of the board what the frequency is.

Which option would you suggest is better:
1 solder Zwave relay
:arduino wifi?

Would it be difficult to code/program the up & down with the arduino wifi and integrate it with smart
things?

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These are mutually exclusive… I think the Z-Wave relay option is maybe easier but you lose the cleaner option of using RF Arduino module.

Third option is Particle (Spark) Core which comes with own cloud and IDE to simplify programming which @keithcroshaw has done already.

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So I think I will try this Arduino option which is complete new to me.

Arduino UNO R3 Development Board
Arduino Wireless SD Shield,
RF transmitter

Anything else hardware wise I should need to get this up and running?

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You’ll need the RF receiver as well in order to determine the codes you remote sends (during development.).

If you’re in a rush, order both 433 and 315 kits… Perhaps $10 extra (ummm… Not sure the cost of parts in UK).

And I presume you have a 5v or 9v power supply and breadboard.

Arduino clones are fine… I wonder if there is some version with WiFi included. Anyhow… As a 1 unit build the cost isn’t a huge concern.

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I was unable to see any online that include wifi as standard. Thankyou for all your help. Will post progress when I get further on.

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Yup… love to be kept posted; I like to see more projects being done on WiFi/LAN, because the Thing Shield is in such short supply.

A Particle Photon kit is $29 … not sure if available in your region:

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I’m going to upload this project soon.

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If your handy with a soldering iron this IR 2 channel remote receiver will work with a harmony remote(codes already in thier database). I’m using it for my RF motorized projection screen and it works great.

Basically it takes IR and gives you a relay output. Wire that to your remote buttons and done.

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13

I would honestly also be looking at the electrical circuit in the bed also as there may possibly be a way to integrate with ST directly from there? Maybe using a relay?

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Thanks for your response buddy, Here is a picture of inside the controller.

Any suggestions would be amazing.

20160327_082435[1].jpg1808×2419 1.24 MB

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Would there be any way to integrate something like this to the board shown below?

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So looking at that. The remote reciever is plugged into U1 and that remote triggerrs those relays. This is definately where i would work getting this working as its pretty modular by design. First i would use a multimeter locate which 2 pins power the reciever and figure out what voltage is. The fact its 10 pins with 4 relays to me makes me think that it is simply a NC or NO connection for each relay. So once that is isolated then i would examine the next two pins in line and see if you can see the circuit closing/opening or if you can follow the tracks on the other side of the board? You can figure out which pins go to each relay.
Then if it was me i would replace that controller with a particle.io photon board which is pretty easy to integrate with ST

Oh and BTW i think you are only using 2 of those relays not all 4. Just like the remote only has 2 buttons of the 4 on the board in use

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Is this what I would be connection to the circuit?

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just one last thing, any chance I could simply replace the RF receiver on U1 with a IR receiver? That way harmony can control the who system.

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possibly. But im not aware of any off the shelf IR boards that would do what you want. Which would leave you looking do do the IR bit with an arduino or Photon board etc. Which of you are going to that effort you may as well miss out the IR bit and make it more reliable. I can help write a device type as i have the code pretty much down for Particle.io integration. Can help with particle code aswell. Would make a good project to showcase

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Perfect Fuzzy, Just ordered


Will pick the multi meter up at my local electrical shop, going to need a soldering iron also :smiley:

First time adventure

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