Garage Door Opener

[Synomenon]

I've Googled and haven't really found any real solutions to this other than buying a new opener.

The range of my garage door opener's remote is really short. Many times we have to get out of the car and walk right up to the garage door for the remote to work.

We've changed the battery and it does this even with a new battery.

Is there anything we can do to increase the range of this remote's signal? Would wrapping it in foil improve the range of its signal?


This is the garage opener remote:
http://www.aclickawayremotes.c...door-opener/index.html

 

[guyver01]

make sure there's nothing blocking the receiver either..

what kind of garage door? material? thickness?

if your garage door is a lead slab, nothing's gonna increase the range.

 

[Synomenon]

The garage door is metal. Aside from the beams going down the door's sections, its pretty thin. The antenna on the garage door opener is a short wire that just hangs down from the garage door opener.

 

[guyver01]

who makes the garage door opener unit? the remote?
has it always done this?
when was it installed?

 

[Synomenon]

It's an old Chamberlain / Liftmaster Garage Door Opener. Remote is the same brand (came with the opener).

As far as I can remember, it's always been like this. Just been putting up with it until now.

We've tried erasing the garage door opener's memory and re-pairing the remote, but that hasn't worked.

 

[guyver01]

hmm.. never had any problems with my liftmaster or remote.

could be yours is defective...

have you tried asking your installer?

here's a simple experiment.

keep your garage door open..
walk backwards from the garage

see how far you can get before you can't open/close the garage door.

is there a drastic distance between door opened and door closed?

 

[eldorado99]

Why not just solder an extension onto the antenna and run it outside within line of site of your driveway?

 

[Synomenon]

Well, the thing works. It's just the range which sucks. I've tried doing that walking out thing w/ the garage door open before. Sometimes I can get to the middle of the street right in front of the garage and it'll work. Sometimes I have to be right in front of the garage door.

I haven't taken notes, but I think the range is better when the door is open. Could it be the material the door is made of interfering with the signal?

 

[BoomerD]

How about running leads from the car battery directly to the opener? That'd give you 12 v instead of 9 v, and all the amperage you could ever want...hell, you should be able to open the garage from 2 states away!

I have a chamberlain opener myself and the range is pretty short. Much shorter than with the Genie we had in the last house...but not as short as yours...
Try contacting Chamberlain customer service.
http://help.chamberlain.com/help/en-us/contactUs

 

[Synomenon]

Here are pictures of the remote (took it out of the shell to take these pics.):

http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/7238/frontplt.jpg
http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/3598/backtha.jpg


Not even sure where the antenna is on it.

It uses a 3V battery. If I hard-wire it to the car, won't I need a 12v to 3v converter and some other pieces?

 

[Lean L]

Hmm, strange oppsite experience here. Our chamberlain has a short wire as an antenna and the range is phenomon. It works from two or three blocks away. Maybe the wire was cut?

 

[Synomenon]

The wire is the way it was out of the box. I don't think anyone cut it.

Is there anything I can do to the remote to increase its range?

 

[mrSHEiK124]

Originally posted by: IsLNdbOi
It uses a 3V battery. If I hard-wire it to the car, won't I need a 12v to 3v converter and some other pieces?

Save yourself the hassle, and wire your sarcasm detector to the car's battery :laugh:

 

[boomerang]

My wife manages a garage door company.

Here's her suggestions;

There's nothing that can be done with the remote itself. Put that out of your mind.

Her first suggestion is to take the antenna wire that's hanging from the opener and coil it by wrapping it around something like a pencil.

She says that electronics in the garage or vicinity can mess these things up. Is there anyone with a ham radio in the area? Although she mentioned battery operated power tools in the garage (myself, I don't get this one) I'm wondering if wireless router signals could interfere. Say, if the router was in the garage for example?

We have a lot of trees. I can usually open the door from the road (about 300') but if I don't time it right, I think that the trees interfere with the signal and it won't open. Sometimes, with the car parked at the end of the drive (getting the mail), I can't open the door until I move the car forward a few feet. I'm assuming the trees are interfering.

Although she didn't mention it, I would make sure that the antenna wire is firmly connected to the opener. I would also consider replacing the circuit board in the opener.

However, after saying all of that, I think your best advice may be to call the manufacturer and see what they have to say as BoomerD suggested.

 

[BoomerD]

Originally posted by: IsLNdbOi
Here are pictures of the remote (took it out of the shell to take these pics.):

http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/7238/frontplt.jpg
http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/3598/backtha.jpg


Not even sure where the antenna is on it.

It uses a 3V battery. If I hard-wire it to the car, won't I need a 12v to 3v converter and some other pieces?

---------------------------------------->
WHOOSH...right over his head!

No converter necessary. The purpose of using the 12 volts directly is to increase power to the remote. 4X as much power will give a massive increase in range and signal strength...

However, hooking your sarcasm meter directly to the car battery may be a better choice in this case...



Definitely make sure the antenna wire has the "coil" as it comes out of the unit.

(Not an E.E. so I can't tell you WHY it makes it work better) :roll:

 

[KK]

Have you tried another remote?

 

[spidey07]

Dumb question - have you replaced the battery?

Otherwise I'd just buy a new remote.

 

[Mardeth]

Originally posted by: spidey07
Dumb question - have you replaced the battery?

Thats IS a dumb question since he already addressed that in his OP .

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: Mardeth

Originally posted by: spidey07
Dumb question - have you replaced the battery?

Thats IS a dumb question since he already addressed that in his OP .

DOH!

Missed that.

 

[Rubycon]

Modifying the antenna or more correctly the radiator is of no use without knowing what its frequency is! There could be electrical interference causing a poor signal to noise ratio. This increased noise floor makes it difficult for the receiver to "weed out" your remote's code. A weak signal and/or combination of interference can cause similar results.

If the frequency is known it's possible to build a small directional antenna connected with low loss coxial cable with the shield bonded to the opener chassis and the center line soldered to the point on the receiver pcb where the existing wire "antenna" terminates. Pointing this at the driveway should boost the range to 100 feet or more.

The remote does not have an antenna or coil and is using foil traces for radiators.

The old school openers could be tuned with a grid dip meter to get exceptional range but the problem with these is anyone in your neighborhood with the same model would have their doors activated when you depressed the button! :laugh:

 

[BoomerD]

While a new remote MAY solve the problem, I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't.

IMO, while the Chamberlain openers are better than most, the remote seems to have a weak signal.

In the last house, we had a Genie chain-drive that was noisy as hell...and slow, but I could open the door from 2 blocks away.

My new Chamberlain opener is relatively quiet, (most of the noise is from my old garage door, not the opener) opens/closes quickly, but the remote won't open the door more than about 2 houses away.
I'm sure part of that is the stucco on the house. It's horrible for electronics..my wireless will barely work in the back yard...less than 50 feet from the router...and nearly zero cell phone signal in the house...I always wondered if the "chicken wire" they use under the stucco acts like a Faraday cage...

 

[Modelworks]

The antenna in those pictures is on the back. The area that has the thick traces that form a loop. On the top the blue component above it is a trimmer capacitor for tuning the antenna.
A lot of things like cordless phones use pcb based antennas. To extend the range you could scrape off some of the paint on the thick trace and solder a short wire. It might require adjusting the trimmer capacitor with a plastic tool to get the best range. Keep the wire you add short, longer does not mean better.


If you really wanted to increase range you could change out the transistor driving the signal with one with a larger gain. But that requires some surface mount soldering skills

 

[Synomenon]

The page I linked to in the original post says this:

390 MHZ Frequency, over 100 billion codes with code rotating technology (Security+)


We have a remote in another car that has the same problem. All of the phones in our house are 2.4GHz or higher and we do have a room above the garage that has an 802.11G router.

 

[Rubycon]

Originally posted by: Modelworks
Keep the wire you add short, longer does not mean better.

It can have slightly higher gain with more but the resonance will probably be out of range for that trimmer.

Wifi usually doesn't mess with stuff near 54 centimeters however compact FL lamps (cheap ones especially) as well as switching wall warts certainly can muck things up then the signals are weaker.

 

[Modelworks]

Originally posted by: Rubycon

Originally posted by: Modelworks
Keep the wire you add short, longer does not mean better.

It can have slightly higher gain with more but the resonance will probably be out of range for that trimmer.

Wifi usually doesn't mess with stuff near 54 centimeters however compact FL lamps (cheap ones especially) as well as switching wall warts certainly can muck things up then the signals are weaker.

True.
The other thing is where you add the wire. Placing it closer to one end or the other could effect the signal. Really need a scope for this sort of thing