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Motion Sensor Help

Lincoln

Well-known member
Joined
May 20, 2020
Member Number
408
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199
My googling skills seem to suck at the moment. I have a steam whistle I want to motion activate for Halloween. I need some kind of motion sensor that comes on quickly and the timer is 1 second or less.

I have a 110V air solenoid. For simplicity I would like to just have a sensor that I don't have to worry about another power supply or extra electronics. I thought it would be fun to mount it to an air tank and have it give a quick whistle when someone walks by. Not enough that I want to put a bunch of work into it, we don't get that many kids. Also I just have a 15 gallon tank I was was going to run a 3/8" line to from my compressor. I'm guessing I'm only going to get about 5 seconds before the tank is empty and need to refill.
 
A lot of the modern ones aren't going to have a momentary switch output...I'm thinkin you want old school, like they used to have in store doorways, where it shoots a beam across and the relay is only activated while the beam is broken.

Something like this:


(although not that exact one if you want to get it before halloween)

or:


and you mount the sensor on a stake on one side of the sidewalk, the reflector on the other side.

1697665679081.png


Just would need to check if it has the ampacity to run your solenoid directly or if you'd need an additional relay.
 
Thanks. I may have to give it a try. Im going to plumb it up tomorrow and wire in a light switch. I'll see what it sounds like on a quick blip or if I need something longer.

I was looking at occupancy sensors too, Some of those went down to 5 seconds.
 
I wonder if you could mechanically limit the time by installing the whistle after a check valve so it would operate like a ram pump. You would get a whistle just long enough for the check to slam closed.

You would have to also have a pinhole leak before the check valve to bleed off the pressure so the check valve would open once again.

Would need a check valve that didn't have a spring, and I think you could adjust the length of time it takes to slam closed by adjusting the angle it's mounted at.
 
See if this video works. The short bursts were a quick flip of a light switch.

A friend sent me this little timer. He thinks it will work. Then use some garage door sensors as a trip. I'm trying to talk him into coming over and helping.

 

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Well the fun has been ruined. :shaking: My 13 year old said it would probably scare the little kids. So he and his friends want to hide out and scare people on purpose with a switch.

Here is what I had decided on though.
Pair of these for a trip:

Connected to this little timer:

This relay to control the valve.

I can think of all sorts of fun stuff to do with that combo. Air lines pointed to the hanging ghosts. Egg thrower. Garden Hose. All sorts of good stuff.
 
I was thinking that other one just because you could power it from the same source as the contactor...guess you've got something figured out for the low voltage stuff?
 
From 1/2 mile away.

We held a sheet over it and it flaps violently. Time to add some visual.

It gets about 10 seconds on the 15 gallon tank. Maybe 30 before my 60 gallon needs to catch up a bit.

My wife said the neighbors were probably pissed. I told no one texted and said to stop with authority. It was all week shit like, "Will you stop?" And "For the love of God find something else to do."
 

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vetteboy79 said:
I was thinking that other one just because you could power it from the same source as the contactor...guess you've got something figured out for the low voltage stuff?
Click to expand...

I was thinking the same thing as you. But that timer was so cheap and did what I wanted I would have been good with that. A little 1amp 12v wall jack would work and the relay I linked to was 12v DC coil and AC rates lugs.

Not happening this year anyway. My kid and his friends are going to hide out and run it off a switch.
 
Necro thread - I'm looking to install motion/occupancy lights in a basement. The motion switch wouldn't work for this application. Everything I'm seeing you need a low voltage control box to operator the occupancy sensors which is then wired to the lighting. Is there a more direct option that I'm missing? Ideally I wire the sensor up to 120v in parallel with whatever my lighting needs are so I can place them in several locations...does anything like this exist or am I handcuffed to the LV option?
 
Bumping this.

I ran the whistle with a light switch last year. It was a big hit....with me. Highlight was a little girl was grabbing a toy out of a bucket my youngest left out. I blasted the whistle right as she grabbed something. She came to the door, looked up at my wife with evil eyes and said, "That wasn't funny".

Plus my neighbors hated it. Please, don't, stop became please don't stop in my mind. :laughing:

We decided to do a stomp pad but do it out about 10' from some animatronic thing my mom bought us. I'm hoping they step on the pad thinking it will be for it. Right now the plan is to have the whistle blow about 1.5 seconds after the pad is stepped on then blow for another 1 or 1.5 seconds.

I'm too lazy to see if I already said what I have.
1. 110V coil valve on the whistle.
2. 110V relay with a 12V coil.
3. Some little timer circuit I bought off Amazon for $8.
4. A stomp pad I bought from a Halloween store.

The timer has several built in programs. Trigger and timed on, triggered with a delay on and timed off, latching with a minimum time, and some other shit. All the times are .001 seconds to 999 minutes (pretty sure). On the next try I would figure out a way to get the 12V power supply inside the box. For right now it's just one of those wall plug adapters. I'll stuff it in an ammo box to keep it dry.

If I decide to do a motion or photo sensor all of this should still work.

SteamWhistleController.jpg
 
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