"Cusomizing" the Ador1 automatic chicken coop door

[tcstoehr]

My Ador1 chicken door is located inside a secure run, so to access its open/close button I need to go through the gate, stoop down and shuffle over to the unit, press the button and retreat before being overtaken by mad chickens. Even though it is an automatic door, I use it in different ways depending on circumstances and season. Sometimes I want it in automatic mode and sometimes I don't. Sometimes I need to shut it during the day. During the long summer days I prefer to let it automatically close at night but not automatically open in the morning. This means a daily trip in the morning to let them out. Point being I'm using the open/close button and switching the automatic/manual mode regularly. The latter actually requires removal of the front panel and the insertion/removal of a jumper across to circuit board pins. Very inconvenient.



So I decided to use the features provided by the Ador1. Removing the two front panel screws and removing the panel reveals a small green circuit board shown below. There are six pins mounted on the circuit board at the center of the picture. Pins 1 and 2 are connected by a white plastic jumper which enables automatic mode. Removing the jumper severs the connection and disables automatic mode. The remaining four pins in the picture are bare. Pins 5 and 6, in the picture's foreground, are used to open or close the door. The are wired in parallel with the front panel button and behave identically.



So I need to be able to conveniently connect/disconnect pins 1 and 2 with one mechanism, and do the same with pins 5 and 6 separately. First I prepared the cable shown below. It is two jumper pin connectors wrapped into a 1/4 inch wire loom. I used some 20 gauge bell wire to provide the length I needed to get from the door to the switch buttons I'll be using. The jumper cable with the black/white wires was a from a small kit from adorstore.com that is sold for this very purpose. The three-wire jumper cable is from a RC airplane servo connection that I happened to have laying around. I will only use two of its three wires.




The picture below shows the installed jumper cables. One across pins 1 and 2, the other across pins 5 and 6. The enclosing wire loom fits tightly through a hole out the bottom of the compartment, no dust will be getting in there.




Then the cable runs through a 7/16 inch hole drilled through the door's framing 2-by-4 and into the coop.



I then routed the cable up to a convenient place on the wall and routed out a 2x2 inch section to install my switch panel. The red and white wires shown below are attached to the two jumper cables that are attached to the circuit board pins. In this picture you are seeing the back side of two marine/boat switches that I chose because I thought they would be weather resistant and durable. One switch is connected to circuit board pins 1 and 2 and it is a standard on/off switch. This will turn automatic mode on or off. The other switch is connected to circuit board pins 5 and 6 and is a momentary-on switch, meaning that the switch is on as long as you hold it down but is off when you release pressure. This is the way the Ador1's front panel button works for opening/closing the door.



The finished project looks nice and clean from the outside. Now all I have to do is walk up to the coop and mash the buttons as I see fit. No muss, no fuss.
I hesitated to post this thread since it was such a simple deal, but I figured some folks might just be interested nonetheless.

 

[jetdog]

Neat idea but seems to defeat the purpose of an "automatic door" and for the price you paid for it it would have been cheaper to use a rope and a pulley, jmo.

 

[RJSorensen]

I am very interested in your nice mod. I too would like to have a choice in the function of my door. Your pictures and writeup are wonderful. Thank you very much.

RJ

 

[Coopish]

tcstoehr, I am very interested in your install. One of the reasons I wanted this door is for the extra stuff available like the feature you took advantage of. I'm specifically interested in the ovalight and the nightlight. Have you tinkered with either one of those functions? I'm considering building those on my own as they don't have the "plug n play" versions available for purchase yet. Oh, and a trickle charger for the battery as the coop will have electricity. Thanks so much for posting your switch solution!

 

[tcstoehr]

No, I haven't used the ovalight feature, which appears to be intended to give the chickens a 16 hour light/photo period. I do have supplemental lighting but I keep in on a timer so that I can adjust it. I give them a 12 hour photo period in the fall and winter. I'm don't know what this "nightlight" feature is. I'm guessing you mean using a nightlight on a timer to control the door?

 

[Coopish]

The night light doesn't control the door. If I remember correctly from the website, it turns on a dim light inside the coop shortly before the door is going to close at night. The light turns off a short time after the door closes. The purpose is to eliminate stragglers and provide a little light to allow them to find the roost and get settled. Seems like a great addition because it works with their nature to seek light vs having to rely on them to kinda know when the door is going to close based on what's going on outside. It is perhaps a little redundant with the second chance/last call option. This is our first coop and we can make it what we want it to be so I'm doing all I can to make it completely functional the first time. I'm in the "measure twice, cut once" camp. I just don't know if I want to brave it and try to fashion together the components needed to make these extra features work. It's fabulous that the ADOR1 controller has all kinds of other stuff built in that we can take advantage of!