If its direct-wired to the lights, you could just unscrew the bulbs and put in one of those adapters that converts a normal incandescant bulb socket into a power outlet. that would probably be the easiest thing.<br><br>(oddly, my old roommate did a proj that involved doing this exact thing last year, and as you would expect there's some simple circuit in there that flips a relay to power the lights. For a variety of reasons, though, he said once you start taking it apart its actually much easier to just build a new circuit using the sensing element then to adapt the one in the box.)
<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Dec 21, 2007 9:47 AM, douglas repetto <<a href="mailto:douglas@music.columbia.edu">douglas@music.columbia.edu</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<br>It's probably just a relay that's switching the 110v wall current on and<br>off when it detects motion. Check it with a voltage meter to be sure! If<br>it is, then you can simply plug in a 9v DC power transformer ("wall
<br>wart", available at Radio Shack). That way when the sensor turns to<br>power on and off it'll be just like you plugging and unplugging the wall<br>wart from the wall.<br><br>What does the physical connection between the sensor and the lights look
<br>like? If it's a 2 or 3 prong jack then just plug in the 9v DC<br>transformer as you would plug it into the wall. If it's directly wired<br>to the lights then you'll need to get a bit creative -- but be careful!
<br>Wire it up with the sensor UNPLUGGED and make sure you understand what<br>you've done before you turn it on. You're dealing with 120v AC wall<br>current, and if you make a mistake you can get hurt! Maybe best to ask
<br>someone who's done it before.<br><br>best,<br>douglas<br><div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c"><br>Jascha Narveson wrote:<br>><br>> Hello, Dorkbot -<br>><br>> Quick question: i've got a 9-volt battery powered circuit which I want
<br>> to power with an off-the-shelf<br>> turn-the-lights-on-when-the-bad-guy-gets-near-your-house motion sensor.<br>> The sensor runs off normal 110 AC power, and I'm not sure what kind of<br>> power it's feeding to the light bulbs, but it's higher than 9 volts. Is
<br>> there an easy way to change the output of the sensor to safely power the<br>> circuit?<br>><br>> thanks,<br>><br>> jascha<br>> ........................................................................
<br>> .........dorkbot: people doing strange things with electricity..........<br>> ..........................http://dorkbot.org............................<br>> ........................................................................
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