I have a Large Detached garage (2500 sf. 4 bay doors, several rooms and 2 windows) on a vacation house that is currently not part of my GE NX-8 Alarm on the main house. Because of monitoring dual systems I’m trying not to run 2 alarms which is how it was setup. I wanted to just setup another partition. Problem I’m having is wiring running between the house and back garage doesn’t exist and doesn’t look so easy to do either with pool and concrete.
I know Honeywell has wireless keypads and such. But I’m not sure the actual distance they will reach. Shortest gap maybe 60-75ft between the house then you have house and garage walls to go threw. Other end of garage is probley 150ft or more away from house.
My NX-8 doesn’t have any wireless (input) keypads and I would need siren and at least 10 wireless or wired zones. Only thing I can come up with is running 3-4 wires for a wireless keypad, plus another 2 for siren. So that’s like (6) 18 guage wires and all wireless sensors in that area. Or running another 3 wires for on top of that for an expansion modual out there then can have 16 wired zones there too.
I just really don’t want to try and pull wires.
There is a CAT5e, phone, and Cable wire out there. But wire size seems to small on phone wire to use that.
Anyone have experience on Vista Wireless keypads and such to reach out there?
Any ideas to keep my GE panel and get wireless out there?
I’ve not done it on a GE, but on my panel you can buy “bus extenders/isolators” that sit at the end of longer runs of the normal 4-wire cable.
These provide localized power (and sometimes tamper, siren and/or other outputs) in addition to a “new/isolated” Bus to provide power to all the stuff that’s on the other side of the Bus Extender module.
I’ve also had an alarm guy “wire” in a module using Cat5 cabling, but bundling the pairs (stripping/twisting the twisted pairs together). In my case, there was only a short distance being traversed, and a single module at the end (so, not much load on the wires).
If you have a spare Cat5 wire running to the Garage that you’re not using, and there’s some sort of Bus Extender for GE then it might be worth investigating with a local GE Alarm installer… to save you a few cycles for install.
I’d also imagine the folks on the DIY Security Forums would also have a better idea, since they’ve seen more security system deployments.
[quote=“guessed, post:2, topic:180616”]I’ve not done it on a GE, but on my panel you can buy “bus extenders/isolators” that sit at the end of longer runs of the normal 4-wire cable.
These provide localized power (and sometimes tamper, siren and/or other outputs) in addition to a “new/isolated” Bus to provide power to all the stuff that’s on the other side of the Bus Extender module.
I’ve also had an alarm guy “wire” in a module using Cat5 cabling, but bundling the pairs (stripping/twisting the twisted pairs together). In my case, there was only a short distance being traversed, and a single module at the end (so, not much load on the wires).
If you have a spare Cat5 wire running to the Garage that you’re not using, and there’s some sort of Bus Extender for GE then it might be worth investigating with a local GE Alarm installer… to save you a few cycles for install.
I’d also imagine the folks on the DIY Security Forums would also have a better idea, since they’ve seen more security system deployments.[/quote]
Good Idea on twisting the pairs together. I could get a keypad that supports 40 wireless channels back there with 3 wires. Then use all wireless sensors. I have a crapload of phone lines going back there and one cat5e (which is in use). But I’m a cell phone person only these days. So I can careless at this point with having 4 phone lines back there.
Thanks,