Hello, I'm in need of some assistance with a project I'm working on. My goal is to be able to use my high beam flash lever to open my garage door and I'm half way there.

I've taken my 12 volt garage door remote apart, soldered a jumper to the door open button so that as soon as the device gets power it sends the signal to the door to open or close. Then I soldered wires to the positive and negative terminals that the garage door remote battery would normally connect to.

Then ... I tested the modified remote directly on the battery negative / positive. it works flawlessly.

Then, .. I tapped the hot wire of the remote into the high beam wire of the drivers side headlight and grounded the negative wire. (with the jeep off) pulling the high beam lever towards me it works flawlessly!

Here's the fly in the ointment ... when the Jeep is running (2008 JK) it does not work ? And if I turn the Jeep off it takes a bit less than a minute for the modification to work again with the Jeep not running.

I'm confused and need your valuable assistance.

(to clear any potential confusion, once I get this mod running flawlessly in all ways, I am going to wrap the remote in a zip lock for weather protection and zip tie it to the inside of my front bumper hidden from view)

Thanks in advance for any help with this.

Ron

 

first. what wire did you tap into? I'm curious how you did this without sending power to the opener 100% of the time you have your high beams on.

second. not sure it will work, but try powering a relay and having that power the opener, instead of powering the opener directly. the pulse system of the jeep might not send constant enough power to operate the opener.

third. I freakin love this idea! how slick would it be coming home, flashing your garage and it opens. sweet idea!

 

x2 on the relay . and to thinking outside the box .
A plain old relay will buzz but for the 2 seconds you need it might work.

 

When the Jeep is running, the headlights get pulse width modulated power.
When the Jeep is off, the headlights get pure 12v DC.
This difference may be related to your issue.

 

Can you cite a source for this information or expound on the pulse width modulated power? Cheers!

 

exactly what it states......constant DC power is continuous - no breaks. PWM is blips of DC power every second

 

Doesn't the high beam double as the DRL? Its only gets 50% duty cycle on that mode.
Even after you get it to be fully on it still doesn't receive a pure DC power source. Hence you see TruckLite headlights flicker... Mine flickers regardless of engine power.

So yah a relay might help!

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Most of us would just cite ronjenx as the source and be satisfied with that. He has torn apart the JK, analyzed how it works, and put it all back together again (unless his teardown was destructive, which sometimes I think it was). No one outside of Chrysler knows more about the ins of outs of the JK than him. Here's an example of his work ...

http://www.jeepforum.com/forum/f96/oem-tipm-study-1200238/

 

I went out to the Jeep and measured it myself.
Pulse width modulation means the power is not always on. It is briefly on, briefly off, etc.
It is a way to extend filament life with no perceivable reduction in brightness.

Measured with two different instruments....

Headlights on with engine running:
78% duty cycle; 90Hz

Headlights on with engine off:
0% duty cycle; 0Hz
(I would have thought always on would be 100% duty cycle. But, I guess it means there is no cycle to measure.)

 

Thanks for the feedback! Is there a workaround for this? I want to be able to pull the highbeam lever to operate the garage door opener. Maybe a relay or something?
Equally I am (like others) concerned that driving with my highbeams on may cause an the remote to get constant power and shorten it's lifespan.
Your assistance is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!