Velleman kits (IR, not X10)

[Andy]

The Belgian company Velleman make a range of kit-form modules for IR control of anything at all (i.e. logic outputs you can use to drive your own relays or whatever). In the UK some of them are available from CPC and Maplin, and I'm sure they are available in the USA as well.

I did a search in these forums for the name "Velleman" before I bought any, but got no hits, so I am posting my experiences here in case it helps anyone else.

I bought the 15 channel transmitter type K8051, and the 15 channel receiver K8050. I had no intention of using the transmitter in the longer term (preferring to control everything in the room from a single JP1 remote), I just needed it to get the codes.

Now somewhere in their literature Velleman claim that their codes are "learnable" by a learning remote control, and this is true. My URC-7562 learns the codes and controls the receiver very well. Sensitivity is up there with the best (i.e. one can point the remote anywhere in the room and the receiver reads it well).

The snag (for me) came when I wanted to use a non-learning remote. The learned commands are not decoded by IR. Velleman have used PIC microcontrollers to make these devices, and have used a protocol that is (probably) entirely unique to themselves.

It could well be that this protocol is susceptible to "cracking" by the JP1 Gurus, but as I seemed to be the only person in the world interested in this, and as I found a solution infinitely more elegant for the first project I had for these (a light dimmer, about which I'll post separately), I gave up at this point.

However, if there's anyone out there thinking of using these, and who would like to avoid buying the Velleman transmitter, I'm happy to help by recording the codes for anyone to have a go at cracking the protocol (working out protocols is way beyond my present JP1 experience). Drop me a "private message" if you are interested.

[johnsfine]

Please post (to the diagnosis area) an .ir file containing a selection of those learned signals.

If they're pretty obvious structure, I'd like to include them in DecodeIr.dll and maybe in RemoteMaster (for upgrades).

[The Robman]

And just FYI, "cracking" IR signals is usually not very difficult or even that involved. Even when there's a checksum of some sort in there, one of us will usually spot it pretty quickly.

[Andy]

OK johnsfine, thanks for your interest, I've posted an IR file here.

In case it helps in understanding it, here is what the learned buttons mean, in Velleman terminology:

Code: Select all

SAT: 1    address 1, channel 1
SAT: 2    address 1, channel 2
SAT: 3    address 1, channel 3
SAT: 4    address 1, channel 4
SAT: 5    address 1, channel 5
SAT: 6    address 1, channel 6
SAT: 7    address 1, channel 7
SAT: 8    address 1, channel 8
SAT: 9    address 1, channel 9
SAT: +10  address 1, channel 10
SAT: 0    address 2, channel 1
SAT: AV   address 3, channel 1

This is billed as a 15 channel transmitter, but getting the 15 channels is quite tedious as there are only two buttons on the device. Only slightly more tedious is selecting one of three addresses (the address would be hardwired in the 15 channel receiver), so they may as well have called this a 45 channel transmitter. I hope this explains the address/channel terminology.

Of course I'll be happy to try out anything you come up with.


Rob

"Cracking" the protocols may not be that difficult, and I like to try the self-help route first if I can, but I didn't find much published here to help me. Did I miss an obvious file that would have given me some pointers ?


Thanks to you both

Andy

[johnsfine]

Do you have DecodeIr.dll installed where IR.EXE can find it?

I just opened your file in IR.EXE and clicked on each of your learned signals and got a perfectly reasonable RECS80 decode for each.

[johnsfine]

There are a bunch of different versions of RECS80 floating around. Look at the RECS80 section of the DecodeIr documentation at:
http://john.fine.home.comcast.net/ir/De ... tml#RECS80

That documents three UEI executors for RECS80 for which I have timing data. You samples don't fit any of them. But many RECS80 receivers ignore both the first timing value and the frequency, so the 0068 executor will probably work.

I also see the toggle bit is zero in all your learned signals. Most likely that means Velleman skipped that detail when connecting to a standard RECS80 component or firmware. That should mean that the Velleman receiver won't care whether the transmitter does the toggle bit or not.

The worse possibility is the Velleman receiver may require the transmitter to NOT do the toggle bit. In that case (or if the timing of 0068 isn't good enough) you would need a custom executor for this form of RECS80.

[Andy]

Ah, decode of RECS80 seems to be a relatively recent innovation ?

I was using IR v6.00, hence the .DLL that was distributed with that. The decodes showed up as Gap-722-6004-11? and so on.

Now I'm still using IR v6.00, but just put your latest .DLL in there, and now I see RECS80 decodes like you do.

Tomorrow I'll give RECS80(68) a whirl to see how it goes.

Many thanks

Andy

[Andy]

As you predicted, it works very nicely using the RECS80(68) protocol.

Tomorrow I'll get out a soldering iron to check the other two addresses, and then publish the results as an upgrade.

Now I need to think of a use for this Velleman receiver (having solved my dimmer switch problem another way).

Thanks again

Andy

[Andy]

OK, I posted the upgrade.

All 15 "channels" work, at all three "addresses".

This makes the Velleman kits (K8050 15 channel Rx, K6713 1 channel Rx) a useful way of achieving control of oddments in a room, without going the X10 route.

I see they also have a USA website, that has a "where to buy" section.