The light switch for my office appears to be a SuperSwitch 2 passive infrared light switch which, according to the site, is
a motion sensing lighting control and conventional wall switch all-in-oneGreat! I don't have to turn it on, and it turns off when I leave. What could be wrong with that? Nothing, I say!
But wait. Where did it get installed you ask? Is it behind the door?
D'oh! Yes, that's where it got installed.
FAIL.
If I leave the door completely open it can't detect my presence, and the light goes off after a bit. If I close the door people won't feel comfortable coming in. If I leave it halfway open (so the sensor can "see" me) visitors will invariably open it the rest of the way.
So, the question is, how to work around this? Relocation of the switch assembly is out of the question for a number of reason.
I can think of several options, some of which are "hard" and some of which are "dumb":
- Hack the sensor by removing the actual sensor from the switch assembly and running wires to where it could actually see me.
- Rig up some kind of secondary sensor attached to a heat source that can simulate body heat and movement that can be placed within the sight lines of the room's real sensor.
- Cut a sizable hole in the door.
- Deal with it.
5 comments:
I can't think of any brilliant ideas. But can it really not be moved? That doesn't seem so hard. Either:
1) Open a new hole over to the right. Feed a new wire through(14-2 ?) and connect it in the existing box. Put a cover plate on the existing box. Put an old-work box in the new hole. Are there wood studs? I haven't worked with metal, but I assume there would be holes to feed through.
2) Use external boxes and tubing that attach on the exterior of the wall. Not pretty, but that should work.
Can you get maintenance to do that? Or at least shut off the power?
Metal studs. And both of those options would probably work. The primary factor prohibiting moving it is that the work would have to be done by the Cornell Shops, and I suspect it would cost several hundred dollars at the very least. It isn't worth that to me.
I'll hang a framed photo without contracting the union folks, but I won't do that kind of electrical work!
I guess that's what happens when they convert some animal insemination laboratories into IT offices.
Did you have any luck with this?
I was thinking of some sort of infrared flickering light to attach to my laptop to generate enough signal noise to keep the one I'm near tripped while I'm around.
Another option could be to attach a piece of reflective material to the back of the door and the wall so that the IR will bounce out.
@julian - no, no luck yet. What kind of material reflects the IR? a "regular" mirror?
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