I have an older Graber cord lift system for our roman shades. Inside of the headrail, there are a couple of metal spears that are used to rotate the shaft. I could use a Somfy CT32 cord lift wirefree motor with these. Given the price of these motors, especially when combined with the required battery packs, I wanted to find less expensive alternatives. But unlike the roller type of motors which appear to be ubiquitous, these motors that connect to the spears don’t appear to have any cheaper alternatives out there in the market. Has anyone come across a less expensive alternative motor/controller?
On the same topic, if anyone has had experience with the Somfy CT32 motors please share your impressions.
The CT32 is a little pricey since it has built-in Radio. Somfy just replaced that motor with the CL32 (https://www.somfypro.com/cl32) so you might see if you can get a deal on a CT32 somewhere. It could be that retailers won’t reduce the price of the old part.
You could assemble your own battery pack/brick to save money as it just uses 8 AA batteries in series to get 12V. The advantage of the Somfy battery wand is that it is long and thin to hides easily. Or you could hardwire to a 12V power supply/wall wart.
You might look at using a continuous rotation servo and something like an arduino to control/monitor it. Otherwise there aren’t a lot of other options and as you mentioned, the traditional tubular motors used for roller shades aren’t an ideal or cheap solution either.
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