April 2001
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Click on the thumbnails to get a better view.
This is what it looks like on the outside. What
it
does is work in conjunction with my remote start that I installed on my 1992
Buick Regal. Using a visual basic program, the user can start the car by either
clicking a button or by entering a time of day for the car to start. The car
will then automatically start at that time of day. The user can also
activate or de-activate the alarm, and even cause the panic alarm to sound as a
test. The box is connected to the PC using a parallel cable to the
parallel port. The box that was built also has a "MANUAL TEST" button
on it that can be used to test if the box is within an acceptable range.
Here's a sample of what the program looked like.
This project was my idea for our group's EET 359 Final Project. We were
actually a group of 4, but really only two of us actually did any significant
work (Sorry Rocky and Jon). I did the hardware wiring, soldering and
design work while David Lemaux did nearly all of the software in Visual
Basic. David and I got together for final testing on a laptop computer.
Jon did some touch-ups on the appearance of the final interface and Rocky
started some soldering of the relays to the board.
The RF signal to control the alarm and starting features
were used from an existing remote controller. As you can see from the
picture, each button has some solder traces next to it. I found that by shorting
these traces together, it was as if a button was pressed. So, the relays
shown below were connected to act as the "PUSH" to enable that
feature.
On the inside, I have the actual remote for the alarm
wired to the circuit board. On the circuit board, I have 6 Reed Relays.
Basically, the relays just "PUSH" the buttons to enable the remote to
send the signal to the vehicle. One relay for "ARM", one for
"DISARM", one for "PANIC" and two were needed for
"START" because it was the combination of pressing "ARM" and
"DISARM" that started the car. The last relay is explained
below.
One problem that I encountered while constructing this was
that the parallel port of the computer does not supply enough current to trip 2
reed relays. While bench testing with my home built power supply,
everything worked perfect! But, once connected to the PC, the "START"
command would only trip 1 relay, causing only the alarm to arm. So, the
6th relay was added and connected to a power supply of 4 AA batteries.
This supplied the needed 5 volts (6V actually) and plenty of current to trip
both relays to start the car. If this were an actual marketed product, a simple
DC power supply could have been made to plug into the box.
Pretty Nifty eh? We got an "A" on the project, and we displayed it working by using a laptop computer and bringing the whole EET 359 class outside where the car was located.
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