Would it interest anyone to have a auto-raising light system using infrared sensors?

Sounds too complicated? It's really not. And I can't believe nobody has created and marketed this. Here's the the basic idea...You use a timer to turn lights on and off. You use a thermostat to keep the room the right temp. I use a timer to drip-irrigate my plants. Basically, electronics are doing ALMOST all of the work for us, right? So why not have an automatically adjusting light hood that can sense how tall the plant is, say, every 12 hrs? It could be preset for 18" for example. Twice a day the electric winch (simple gear reduction electric motor, similar to the front end of a cordless drill for example) would raise the hood using an infrared eye...like the thing that goes ding-dong when it senses you entering a 7-11. Is there a need for this product? If you are like me, and your plants are in a detached growing space, you prolly don't want the neighbors wondering why you go into that unoccupied space EVERY day. Comments? Suggestions? Ridicule? All welcome.

sound awesome!

Actually it is kind of complicated haha. The problem of hand with using a infrared is that it is line of sight. So unless the bud grows right infront of the laser it aint gonna move. You could use a ultrasonic range finder which would see growth in a much larger area but may also be the downside.

It is in general pretty easy to say something is easy to do but is in fact very hard and costly to implement. The geared motor you would need is gonna run you around 80-100 bucks. Then you will either have to build some timer to say "hey motor only turn on for say 10 seconds." Which you could do with a PLC if you know that kind of stuff, or the Arduino thing ect... ect....

Shrug I do a lot of automation of things and in particular have been developing a complete grow room controller. I can tell you from 10000000 hours of work that this shit is much harder than it sounds.

OR...

What could be done is a timer base lifting system, if you have the basic understanding(i guess that would be house i'd say it) you could have this lamp slowly ticking away every sec and slowly bring it up into the air, since the plants grow towards the light. from what i understand in the right conditions for right plants it can grow 3 inches a day, so with that base knowledge, this timer lifter thingy can raised its self 3 inches a day there would be no need for a sensor, maybe a 5 speed say 1/2 inch a day up to 3 inches a day. Correct me if i'm wrong but that would prolly be the easiest way and the cheapest

shit that your basic grand father clock(if you dont have a wined or electric one) kinda in a way lol

I'm doing a custom controller for my grow that monitors temp/humdity and controlls water,lights and fans, I would take it a step further and have a temp sensor to help as well I would use the temp sensor as well as IR to determine when to move but that's me my 2 cents

The mention of ultrasonic sensors also is a good idea they wouldn't be affected by the thermal profile of the room either, us sensors are available with varying beam widths to fine tune to your needs.

Thank you everyone for your thoughts and ideas. I'm taking silver deisel's idea and am taking apart an old paper temp./humidity plotter since it takes 1 week to make 1 full revolution. They can be picked up (cheaply) at surplus stores or ebay as that type of paper chart is no longer used by military. Should be slow enough to raise the light the appropriate distance, and can be adjusted by changing the diameter of the spool. I love a good challenge, and all i have these days is free time. i'll start at 1 inch per day. (which means 7" circumference. about the size of a 2" pvc pipe.) I'll keep it journalled and post pics as i go. Thanks again, everyone.

PS .....If It doesnt work, I'll use servos and an old r/c controller with a computer camera to manually raise it....Then i'd only need to go to the back house (about 50' behind us) once a week or so & could check on plants all the time. hmmmm...

Servos will need to be modified for continuous rotation or even better get yourself a stepper motor

can i just ask the question WHY?

Why do we have auto lights on and off? So we don't have to be home to do it or get up at 4am (when my lights turn off)
Why do we have auto watering (i don't)? because some systems need watering a lot and in general it takes time and the right timing

WHY would you have an auto lifting light? Are you really going to NOT LOOK AT THE PLANTS for that long that you need something to lift the lights for you? You don't need to lift it once a day.
Unless you have some space-age gee-wiz machine that will some how know the perfect distance to be at any given time then it would be much easier AND VERY EASY to every now and again DO IT YASELF and put it in that perfect spot where you can even put your hand or a thermometer under it over the next hours or so and see if it really is the right spot or needs adjusting again.

Why risk letting a machine fail and possibly even set your plant on fire if it decides to be too low

I went with the first idea (pics coming) I used a 7 day motor and an old monofilament spool attached to the shaft. It's mounted to the wall & it winds the rope at 1" per day. the rope goes thru a pulley attached to ceiling then down to my hi bay hood. (with ballast remote mounted to lessen the weight of the hood) Should work. We'll know by this time tomorrow.
Here's the motor-

pandan said:

can i just ask the question WHY?

Why do we have auto lights on and off? So we don't have to be home to do it or get up at 4am (when my lights turn off)
Why do we have auto watering (i don't)? because some systems need watering a lot and in general it takes time and the right timing

WHY would you have an auto lifting light? Are you really going to NOT LOOK AT THE PLANTS for that long that you need something to lift the lights for you? You don't need to lift it once a day.
Unless you have some space-age gee-wiz machine that will some how know the perfect distance to be at any given time then it would be much easier AND VERY EASY to every now and again DO IT YASELF and put it in that perfect spot where you can even put your hand or a thermometer under it over the next hours or so and see if it really is the right spot or needs adjusting again.

Why risk letting a machine fail and possibly even set your plant on fire if it decides to be too low

Click to expand...

The reason is simple.....I have neighboring houses that overlook the property that i am using for my grow. By reducing the amount of times that i'm going in and out of an unoccupied property you raise less suspicion. Thus reducing the possiblity of theft. I love spending time with my plants and they are very well cared for. So if Something were to happen to them, i would pretty much have no reason for waking up each day. Understand? I'm protecting my plants.

Not everybody has the same ideal growing situation as you. Jesus, there's people growing in computer towers, chest freezers, cardboard boxes, etc. I live in a very heavily populated urban area where people would break into that property in a second if they knew what was going on there.

The reason for drip watering is that the water is utilized A LOT better by the plant when it gets it "low and slow". Not to mention that they appreciate the consistency of the schedule. Take a closer look at my plants...They're all smiles.

oh and one more thing pandan..........I do have to raise my light EVERY DAY. about an inch or 1 1/2 inch every day.

Go "IAmFishBoy"!