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| EMagazine Volume 5 Issue 3 June / July 2000 |
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The ability to remotely control your home is no longer a futuristic dream. The technology is available today. As more and more integrators become trained on the design and implementation of home control systems similar to those provided by Echelon, you will find home control installation becoming a service profession similar to the security system installation business that exists today. |
Imagine…it’s a cold winter’s day and you've had a rough week at work. You start looking forward to the end of the day when you can drive over to your family’s beachside retreat, enter a warm, well-lit cottage and relax in the hot tub overlooking the Pacific Ocean. You realize, however, that the cottage and hot tub have not been heated since the last time you were there over a month ago and that it can take hours to heat the cottage and the hot tub to a comfortable temperature. No problem. You finish your memo, launch your web browser and pull down your favorite site entitled, “Remote Control of Our Beach House Cottage” and this is what you see:
You set the cottage’s thermostat to 78 degrees (you like it warm), turn on the hot tub and the interior lights, and lean back in your office chair knowing that your coastal retreat will be warm and ready for your family’s weekend visit!
The scene described above is not from a futuristic science fiction novel but a true story of how remote home control, enabled by broadband Internet access, can be a great way to enhance the comfort and enjoyment of owning a second home (in addition to saving energy). Echelon ( www.echelon.com ), together with it’s smart-home integration partner cyberManor ( www.cybermanor.com ), implemented this secure remote home control package for a beach house in Northern California earlier this year. What follows is a description of the components used, the installation effort required, and an estimate of the project’s cost.
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To implement the remote home control solution detailed above, the following Echelon LonWorks® enabled devices were installed in the cottage:
- A Leviton light switch and dual switching light controller to control the interior lights
- A Smart Controls SmartStat 21 thermostat to monitor and control the interior furnace
- An Echelon DIO-10 LonPoint module connected to a relay switch to turn on and off the hot tub
- An Echelon i.LON 1000 Internet Server
Additionally, 2 cameras from Axis Technology were used to provide video feedback of the interior and exterior of the cottage.
The Implementation
The beach house cottage benefited from having a broadband DSL connection and a structured wiring home network already installed. The DSL connection allowed the i.LON 1000 Internet server to connect to an “always on” Internet connection and the structured network wiring made it easier to wire the LonWorks devices together.
After the LonWorks light switch control, thermostat, and hot tub relay were installed they were connected with twisted pair wiring back to the iLON 1000 Internet Server in the garage. Fortunately there were Category 5 structured wire jacks near the LonWorks device locations that had been used as data ports. Since computer ports require only two of their four pairs of wire to transmit data, the unused pairs of wire (twisted pair LonWorks devices only need one pair) were available to interconnect the LonWorks light switch, thermostat, hot tub relay and the i.LON 1000 server in the garage.
Once the devices were all physically connected, LonMaker for Windows integration tool was used to commission the home device network and logically connect each device. This was accomplished by dragging and dropping each of the LonWorks devices onto a Visio network diagram (through the LonMaker for Windows installation tool) and linking their monitor and control points to one another. The “binding” between the LonWorks devices allows the devices to interact with each other (e.g. the switch turning off the light) while at the same time permitting remote monitoring and control of those devices via the Internet. The network diagram for the LonWorks network is shown below. The logical network diagram is used by the LonMaker for Windows tool to configure all the LonWorks devices, including the i.LON 1000 Internet Server.
LonMaker for
Windows Control Diagram of Beach Cottage Devices
Next, a set of user-friendly HTML web pages was created to represent the beach cottage LonWorks devices (e.g. light controller, thermostat, etc.) and their respective monitor and control points (e.g. temperature, spa state, etc.). These web pages were then were transferred to the i.LON 1000 (which also functions as a web server) over the Internet via the FTP file transfer protocol. Access to these HTML pages on the i.LON 1000 over the Internet allowed for easy modification of the web pages from any remote location without having to visit the beach cottage.
Last, but not least, a password was assigned to the i.LON 1000 Internet Server that allowed only those individuals that have login and password rights to enter the web site and control the home’s devices, preventing unauthorized tampering of the home’s controls.
Material Costs and Labor Hours
The approximate cost to implement the remote control system described in this article breaks down as follows (note that these are estimates):
Leviton L-720T Light Switch |
$120 |
Leviton Dual Switching Light Controller |
$215 |
Smart Controls SmartStat 21 Thermostat |
$190 |
Hot Tub Relay |
$100 |
I.LON 1000 Starter Kit (includes 3 LonPoint modules & LonMaker for Windows) |
$2495 |
Axis 2401 Video Server and Cameras |
$1,000 (optional) |
LonWorks Twisted Pair Wiring |
$50 |
Installation of Hardware and Wiring |
8 hours |
Programming LonMaker for Windows |
2 hours |
Developing HTML Remote Control Page |
3 hours |
The Leviton and Smart Control products were purchase from Engenuity systems, a distributor of LonWorks products (www.engenuity.com; 800-375-3363).
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It should be noted that remote home control installations are best accomplished by using an Echelon LonWorks reseller integrator. These integrators can be found by visiting http://www.echelon.com/partners/lid/hclid.htm. |
Summary
The ability to remotely control your home is no longer a futuristic dream. The technology is available today. As more and more integrators become trained on the design and implementation of home control systems similar to those provided by Echelon, you will find home control installation becoming a service profession similar to the security system installation business that exists today. You can be sure that remote home control integration expertise will quickly follow the rapid advance of residential broadband Internet access. Having an “always on” high speed data conduit to the home provides the necessary link to make remote home control easy to use and reliable to implement.
For more information about Remote Home Control, please contact the authors or visit their company’s websites:
Reza Raji, |
Gordon van Zuiden |
Director of Business Development |
President |
Echelon Corporation |
cyberManor |
