Door Bell Automation

Does anyone know if any of the wireless Insteon products can be used for connecting to a door bell. I see that some of the wireless devices, such as the door sensor, have a place to connect wires to the board. So, this has got me to wondering if there was a way to connect the doorbell wires to this wireless door sensor. When the door bell button is pressed, it would send an Insteon signal rather than utilizing the magnetic device that comes with it.

For the record, I do know about the I/O devices. However, how many people actually have an electrical outlet near their wall mounted door bell? Is there another device idea that I'm missing?

If this wouldn't work, I think it would be an excellent idea to have some of these wireless devices developed to do this.

There are a couple ways of looking at this. If your house uses a standard 24 Volt AC setup for the doorbell, connecting the TriggerLinc contact terminals to that will fry the TriggerLinc unless you completely disconnect your doorbell button from the 24 Volt system and wire it directly to the TriggerLinc. If your doorbell button is the type that lights up, doing this (directly connecting to the TriggerLinc) will cause the doorbell button light to not work because there'd be no voltage going to it. If the button never light up anyway, connecting the button wires directly to a TriggerLinc would work without any noticeable change to the doorbell button.

I currently use the Smarthome doorbell kit ("I/O Linc - INSTEON Doorbell and Telephone Ring Alert Kit") which doesn't require a plug near the doorbell or the doorbell button. But it does require an outlet within about 20 feet from the 24 Volt transformer used to power the doorbell. At first I had a hard time locating my transformer but found it mounted on a rafter in the garage as permanent electrical installation. I think this is probably a common way of installing 24 Volt systems in houses (the transformer also powers the address plate light on the front of the house).

So, in my case, installing the I/O Linc kit involved... 1) Turning off the breaker to the garage (so the 24 Volt transformer wasn't being powered). 2) Plugging the I/O Linc into the same outlet that my garage door opener was plugged into (because it was closest to the transformer). 3) Cutting the wire going from the 24 Volt transformer to the doorbell button and connecting 1 of the wire to the doorbell current sensor that came with the kit to the I/O Linc. 4) Connecting the interconnect wire from the I/O Linc "Sense" terminal to the doorbell current sensor. And 5) turing power back on.

But it does require an outlet within about 20 feet from the 24 Volt transformer

I'll assume the 20 feet is the amount of cable that comes with this device.

I'll most certainly give it a try. Although I'd love to see more "universal" wireless devices developed.

Thanks for your help.

I'll assume the 20 feet is the amount of cable that comes with this device.

LOL. You'd be right. You could always extend that though (I did with the garage door open/close control/sensor which also uses an I/O Linc).

Although I'd love to see more "universal" wireless devices developed.

Thanks for your help.

Agreed. I seem to recall reading other discussions about more universal wireless devices (not from Smarthome, but from other sources). An example might be the RFXCOM stuff, of which there is an available Indigo plugin allowing the integration of all kinds of RF devices into Indigo.

Anyway, glad I could help.