Single Doorbell Push to Two Battery Chimes

[davewizz]

And with the addition of a relay it works! Wired as shown in John's diagram with the relay.

I found some relays in a box of spares but I bought one from Maplins today for the sake of it.

Now to add some led's and attempt to get a strobe/flash unit for them or add a small strobe.

It's very useful having a visible sign when the doorbel goes.

So far the strobe works but when activated it went on for way too long.

Again thanks for the help.

 

[martinxxxxxx]

Don't ya just love a happy ending?

 

[JohnW2]

And with the addition of a relay it works! Wired as shown in John's diagram with the relay.

Great. Glad it worked.

Kind Regards, John

 

[davewizz]

Hello all.

Right the two door chimes are still not working correctly. After I thought they were working more or less the next day the garage chime didnt work, aome sort of intermittant fault so I took it back for replacement and bought an 8v transformer too. The reason for the transformer was that I checked the brand new duracel batteries in the garage chime and they were significantly lower in power thereby I thought they were being drained more. Hence wouldn't last very long.

Today wired up front door chime (batteries) and back door chime (transformer) with a relay. When the transformer is plugged in, its silent.
Press the doorbell and it buzzes loudly which is really annoying. Turn it off/on - no buzz, doorbell pressed gives buzzing sound, making it useless to me.

I'm nearly at the end of my tether with these chimes. Can anyone think of any wired electronic doorbells? One for the front door ideally using batteries and one in the garage plugged in to the mains so they both use the one bell push. Almost forgot garage one would ideally have a visible led or mini strobe too.

As said before wireless is not an option due to distance and thickness of walls/doors etc.

Cheers

 

[wingcoax]

Do you have to use batteries? Use a 12v transformer, that will work both no trouble. You just need a bit more "Grunt"

 

[davewizz]

There's no handy mains socket at the front door.

 

[OwainDIYer]

transformer does not have to be located at front door, it can be located anywhere and the 8V wired to the bell circuit.

 

[JohnW2]

Right the two door chimes are still not working correctly. After I thought they were working more or less the next day the garage chime didnt work, aome sort of intermittant fault so I took it back for replacement and bought an 8v transformer too. The reason for the transformer was that I checked the brand new duracel batteries in the garage chime and they were significantly lower in power thereby I thought they were being drained more. Hence wouldn't last very long.
Today wired up front door chime (batteries) and back door chime (transformer) with a relay. When the transformer is plugged in, its silent.
Press the doorbell and it buzzes loudly which is really annoying. Turn it off/on - no buzz, doorbell pressed gives buzzing sound, making it useless to me.

I can't help thinking that you must be doing something wrong. With the relay arrangement I suggested, unless the front door unit batteries are duff, I would expect them to be able to operate the relay in the garage - and if that relay does operate, that's no different from having a local press switch for the garage one (whether it'spowered by batteries or a transformer).

Given all this talk about 'loud buzzing', are you sure that the 'transformer' you've bought has a DC output, rather than AC?

Kind Regards, John

 

[big-all]

i wonder if the voltage is pulsing as in the relay drops out and in as the bell coil is energized and de energized

in other words it may be better to convert to a 2 relay system to avoid the pulsing

 

[davewizz]

Again thanks for the quick replies to this conundrum.

Presently, its one chime only connected from front doorbell directly to garage with the chime plugged into the 8v ac transformer with no buzzing and no relays.

So due to the lack of buzzing that would rule out the cable picking up anything under the house and it must be off the batteries in the first chime.

Later, I'll try the other chime again at the front with batteries and the relay.

Where would a secondary relay go?

The front chime batteries still work well and sound the chime loudly. As said I thought something was draining the secondary chime batteries as they are way down in power and sound the chime very quietly hence the transformer.

This is a diagram with both connected using the transformer that caused the buzzing.

[/img][code:1]

Untitled

• davewizz
• 26 Sep 2012
• 1

[/code:1]

Thanks again

 

[mattylad]

How thick are your walls?

mine are 22" and a cheap £19 wireless twinset from argos works OK upto the 3rd floor attics.

 

[davewizz]

I had a wireless setup, friedland brand, one plugged into the wall in the house then one of their 200m wireless extenders with strobe in the garage.

Then as soon as the batteries drop a little power it doesnt work. If it's put outside the garage on the doormat then its in range.

They are absolutely useless and unreliable and then they both decided to become faulty and the speakers in both the units packed in.

So I only want to use wired and do not want the expense of Grothe Mistral series.

 

[JohnW2]

Presently, its one chime only connected from front doorbell directly to garage with the chime plugged into the 8v ac transformer with no buzzing and no relays. So due to the lack of buzzing that would rule out the cable picking up anything under the house and it must be off the batteries in the first chime.
Later, I'll try the other chime again at the front with batteries and the relay.

I think using this transformer at the garage is probably confusing the issue. When you use the relay, the batteries at the garage supply only the garage chime and the relay switches it locally - so if that chime works with the batteries and local activation, it also will work with the batteries when activated via the relay. What you need is to get the relay activating properly.

Whatever you do, I would suggest that you don't try using that 8V AC transformer to power the front door chime whilst you're using the relay at the garage end. If you got the one I suggested, it's a DC relay and has a maximum rated voltage of 6.6V. Fed from an 8V AC supply, it will probably make a hell of lot of buzzing noise, probably won't work and might get damaged.

What part of the world are you in?

Kind Regards, John

 

[davewizz]

Well everything is all sorted and working great now!

I returned the doorbells and transformer that I bought, that were chime ones that just didn't do what they should have, probably due to the distance but the time and hassle, they had to go back or I would have destroyed them.

I bought a cheap eletronic ding-dong doorbell from ebay, and of course it was lost in post and never showed but saw the same in a shop (discountuk) so bought it. Worked perfectly so bought another connected it and everything works as it should and the new doorbell has the addition of a led that flashes which I need. So one press of the button gives three ding dongs and three flashes of led on both independant units. So a result!

Untitled

• davewizz
• 17 Oct 2012
• 1

Thanks again for the quick replies to all who helped.

Cheers

dave

 

[big-all]

thanks for taking the time to let us know how you got on it makes it all worth it