Adding HomeLink to a regular Garage Door, using the RemotePro receiver

So one of the cool features of the Tesla Model 3 is HomeLink (wikipedia). HomeLink gives you the ability to Open and Close your roller door directly from the screen in the Model 3. Homelink can also activate based on location, so you can have your car automatically signal to open the roller door as soon as you approach the end of your driveway.

Unfortunately, HomeLink doesn’t natively work with many Garage doors in Australia. However, a company in Queensland sell a small device that you can fit to your Garage Door to give it HomeLink capability: Tesla HomeLink Compatible Garage/Gate Receiver from RemotePro.

• V (+12V to +24V supply)
• Ground (0V)
• Relay 1
• Relay 1
• Relay 2
• Relay 2

RemotePro Homelink Receiver (Outside)	RemotePro Homelink Receiver (Inside)

The RemotePro interfaces to the existing Garage Door with up to six wires:

To get it working, you need to supply power between 12V and 24V on the V/GND terminals, and then utilise one of the relay contact to trigger the garage door controller.

My garage door is a “Automatic Technology Securalift GDO-9V2”, pictured below:

I found a manual for the roller door here: http://www.ata-aust.com.au/AtaAust/media/Manuals/GDO-9v2-Enduro-GDO-9v3-Manual-v1-01.pdf (However, as I found out, you shouldn’t blindly trust the manual.)

Opening up the rear of the controller exposes the control circuitry:

The bit I was really interested in was the terminal block in the top left:

The pins didn’t exactly match the pins described in the manual, so it took a little experimenting to confirm what each one did:

1. PWR: Supply Voltage
2. PE: PhotoElectric beam (to stop the door closing if obstructed)
3. PE-: PhotoElectric beam (to stop the door closing if obstructed)
4. GND: 0V
5. OSC: Open/Stop/Close (this pin will trigger the door to Open/Stop/Close when momentarily connected to ground.
6. AUX: Auxiliary out (for things like external lights)

The first task was to confirm the supply voltage for the RemotePro. Putting my multimeter across the PWR and GND shows it’s a bit too high for the RemotePro, at 32V:

This 32V is a problem – the RemotePro only has an input range of 12V-24V.

So the next step probably won’t be required for everyone, but if you have 32V, here’s a simple way to turn it into 24V. I grabbed a simple 3-pin regulator (LM7824) and a couple of capacitors, a diode, and wired them onto a tiny PCB.

3-pin Voltage Regulator (zoomed)	3-pin Voltage Regulator in-line

Connecting the wires as follows:

Colour	From	To
Blue	Controller PWR	Voltage regulator +ve input
White/Blue	Controller GND	Voltage regulator -ve input
Brown	Controller OSC	Orange/White & Green/White

Colour	From	To
Orange	Voltage regulator +ve output	RemotePro V (+24V)
White/Orange	Voltage regulator -ve output	RemotePro Ground (0V)
Green	Mini-PCB (OSC for Relay)	RemotePro Relay 1
White/Green	Mini-PCB (OSC for Relay)	RemotePro Relay 1

And the results speak for themselves:

So, now I had a cable with two pins with the voltage, and two pins for the relay. All I needed to do was connect these 4 pins into the RemotePro:

With all the wires connected, it was time to configure the Car. Just use the remote from RemotePro, and follow the on-screen prompts.

With everything working, it was time to close it up and do a final test from out on the street:

And that’s it. I’ve now configured the HomeLink in the car to automatically open the RollerDoor when I get home (set to 21m distance), so the door starts rolling up as I turn into the driveway. Very futuristic!

Anyway, I would definitely recommend this to anyone with HomeLink in their Tesla. I’m not sure if I would pay the $450 install cost to put HomeLink into the carif I didn’t get it for free, but if you have HomeLink then the $60 for the RemotePro is definitely worth it!