Remote Control

Here is the kit for the remote control that I will use to control the 8 channel relay card that I build yesterday. Today I also picked up the optional RX433 receiver module what I was still missing. Luckily my local electronics shop sells these Velleman kits, so I could just drive by and didn't have to order online and wait a long time for it. Today I started building this remote control kit and I also completed it today. It also took me about an hour to build this one.

Here is an overview of all the components in the kit. Not that much actually and the PCB is also quite small. Again the manual is quite clear on everything. The are just two tricky things in the construction. One is that you have to make a 1 turn coil that has to be 5mm high. I'm not sure how critical this is actually, because that is quite difficult to do accurate on the millimeter. The other thing is that have to bend a led in a certain way. Both are described quite well, but you need to be a bit handy with pliers.

Here is a picture of the inside of the finished PCB. What you see is the backside of the PCB. There are the contacts that will be in touch with the keys later on. You can also see the battery compartment on the bottom. It runs on 3 AAA batteries. Fiddling everything in the case is not complicated, but you need some patience since everything has to be perfectly aligned. And on the PCB are also some component that you need to bend away for them to fit inside.

And here is a picture of the finished remote. It is not really good looking, but as long as it does the job right? :) The remote is transmitting radio waves by the way on 433 Mhz it is not a Infrared remote. That is very nice because then you don't have to point at the device you want to control. I have tested the remote with batteries and at least the led is showing activity. I still need to mound the receiver module now on the relay card and attach a power supply before I can test everything. I'll do that soon.