Hi,
Would have put this as a reply to a post yesterday [http://openenergymonitor.org/emon/node/10038] by David about his heating controller but the system keeps giving me errors when I try to reply, so I decided to start a new post.
Essentially David was trying to work out what commands his remote controller was sending over rf.
I've been trying to do the same thing for a couple of lighting controllers I have for some external lights.
Anyway, working from this page -> https://tickett.wordpress.com/2012/06/27/more-433mhz-rf-hacking/ and reading several posts on the jeelabs blog it appears that most heating and lighting controllers use an OOK type protocol which is much simpler than the rfm12b type of protocol. There is a hack on the jeelabs blog about making the rfm12b work but following the hack on Ticketts page would appear to be a simpler solution.
Basically you need to build the circuit, attach it to an RF receiver and with the protocol analyzer you should be able to figure out the commands. I haven't got a device to hack like Tickett did but I found a receiver/transmitter pair for 433Mhz on fleabay for about £2. So I can use the receiver to do the analysis and then will be able to connect the transmitter to the pi to use to control my lights.
Note the future tense - I'm patiently waiting for the post at the moment to get started. So in a couple of days I hope I'll be able to report back on how well this worked.
If anyone else has has any success using this method then please join in. And apologies if this is all common knowledge but I haven't seen anything gathered together in one place about the differences between these types of controllers and the rfm12b type of comms.
Simon
Re: Hacking rf communications from heating, lighting controllers etc.
I seem to recall that Martin Harizanov as had some success in decoding RF protocols, if you can catch his attention.
Paul
Re: Hacking rf communications from heating, lighting controllers etc.
[I had big problems yesterday too. If your post is more relevant there, try copying it now. If successful, then I'll delete this thread.]
Re: Hacking rf communications from heating, lighting controllers etc.
Robert, I tried again this morning but no luck and actually it might be a good idea to have a topic about this topic. Sadly the post has been this morning and no playthings :-( But I'll update the post once I've got a a bit further. Maybe even write something up for the wiki or building blocks sections. I'm sure there are more people out there who have been through the same journey.
Paul, yes I seem to remember that too, I'll have a check. Maybe that's where I found the link to Tickett's blog!
Simon
Re: Hacking rf communications from heating, lighting controllers etc.
Nearly a year later and as you can see I gave up on trying to use the methods above to hack the lighting controller etc.
However I recently found a really useful blog from Rui Santos which explains how to use the RCSwitch library to work out what codes are being used. So I'm about to restart this.
Here's the link http://randomnerdtutorials.com/esp8266-remote-controlled-sockets/
Re: Hacking rf communications from heating, lighting controllers etc.
I've just published a blog post using emonPi + OOK Tx to control LightWaveRF plugs, works very well for me: http://openenergymonitor.blogspot.com/2015/11/remote-control-of-lightwave-rf-plugs.html
Re: Hacking rf communications from heating, lighting controllers etc.
Yep saw that Glyn, great work. I think the lightwave protocol is published, so it's pretty straightforward. The blog post I pointed to has a good guide to discovering the codes for systems where there isn't a published protocol. Which is the situation I have for some lighting controllers.