Driveway Sensor

[phenigma]

I am looking to use a driveway sensor to sense vehicles coming into a long driveway and hope to use it to switch on driveway lighting and entrance lighting.  This is for my parents house and so it may not be tied to lmce directly, but I may make use of the same thing at my house.  I am looking for something with a relay contact or such.  Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

Thanks,
J.

[Marie.O]

Only vehicles, or any kind of traffic, i.e. pedestrian or cyclists, as well?

[phenigma]

Ah, good question!  Only vehicle traffic at this point.

J.

[tschak909]

Look for windshield RFID tags and an ethernet connected transceiver. A driver can be written, and we have Presence Detected and Presence Lost events that can be latched onto.

-Thom

[Marie.O]

I am sure you'Ve already googled for driveway sensor, haven't you? The following is what I found to be helpful:

http://cartell.com/driveway-alarms/

http://www.drivewayalarmfacts.com/various-types-of-driveway-alarms/

Helpful? I dunno...

[phenigma]

  Yes I have been googling.  I was wondering if others had had any experience with any driveway sensor devices.

posde: ty, I have seen one of those links, but not the cartell one.

tschak: My parents would like the detection to work for any vehicle, not just theirs, otherwise I really like your suggestion!

Thanks a bunch guys!  I am definitely looking into buried induction sensors as IR break-beam gets mucked up by snow banks covering the sensor/receiver and PIR can trip on too many different things.

J.

[Marie.O]

I was surprised at the price of these things. I expected a higher price tag.

[phenigma]

I have been pleasantly surprised by the prices as well.  I am definitely going with the buried induction sensor.  It seems to be the only device that will not be interfered with by snow and other weather events. 

Thanks guys.

J.

[Armor Gnome]

It may seem low tech but sometimes those can be the most reliable, IMO.  How about using a light beam?  Commercially available models with their own built in relays can be had for under $200 depending on the height you want.  Even less expensive would be a garage door IR beam connected to either a GC-100 or other type of closure sensor that would detect a state change in that circuit.  Buried signal wire and a nice little rain cover for the sensors and short of being hit by lawn-mowers it could last forever.  Just my thoughts since you were asking for ideas.

[Marie.O]

ArmorGnome,

did you see the prices for the other modules? They can be had for less than 200USD

[totallymaxed]

I have been pleasantly surprised by the prices as well.  I am definitely going with the buried induction sensor.  It seems to be the only device that will not be interfered with by snow and other weather events. 

Thanks guys.

J.

Induction sensors are definitely the way to go on this as any other method can be accidentally triggered and cause false positives.

All the best

Andrew