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The Cybertek Files: Articles From Back Issues of The Cyberpunk Technical Journal complements of Thomas Icom/IIRG senior editor and founder

Garage Door Opener Hack

by The Black Manta

HTML'ed by Group42

[The opener] uses a 555 timer as a pulse generator to transmit pulses to a binary counter. Each pulse will increment the binary counter by one. You can adjust the speed of the counting by turning R1. Go ahead and experiment to find just the right speed to use. Switch one is for resetting the count back to the beginning.

As you may notice, the schematics don't show how to connect directly to the garage door opener. What I do is this: First you must desolder the DIP switches from the door opener and solder an IC socket into where the DIP switches were. (This will allow you to put the DIPswitches back, when operating in normal mode.) Second, you should connect the output to a wirewrap IC socket. If you mount the IC socket on your pc or perfboard you can use the socket to plug right in to the door opener. When connecting the output, be sure that the connectionson the wirewrap socket correspond to the ON setting of the DIP switches. 

Parts List:

Resistors:
R1 - PC mount 100k potentiometer
R2 - 1k ohm 1/4 watt

Capacitors:
C1 - 22MFD

Integrated Circuits:
IC1 - 555CP Timer
IC2 - CD4040BE 12 stage binary counter

Misc:
LED1 - 10 Light Emitting Diodes
S1 - Normally Closed Momentary Push Button Switch
Perfboard
9V Battery

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