**Modifying a TV Remote Control to Turn On/Off Any 12V DC Load Using Radio Frequencies**

The project began with the transmission of a number and receiving feedback from the receiver, indicating that the wiring was successful. It was time to build the actual transmitter by adding three tactile switches to the breadboard, which would pull pins 4, 5, and 6 to ground to simulate the 3 TV remote buttons.

**Writing Code for the Transmitter**

The code for the transmitter was not complicated; it just needed to define the RF board on pin 7 and 8, as well as the output strength of the signal, the channel used, and the address of the communication pipe. The documentation of the library provided detailed information about every command for the IF board.

**The Loop**

The loop created would send out the code number 100, 101, or 102 depending on which of the three buttons was pushed. The receiver circuit would listen whether there's an incoming message and if so save it, present it on the serial monitor, assert whether it is 100, 102, or 101, and thus either turn on/flash off the LEDs, decrease the brightness, or increase the brightness.

**Uploading Sketches and Testing**

After uploading both sketches and pushing the tactile switches, the serial monitor of the receiver outputted the code numbers. If we took a look at Pin N9, which later controls the Gate of M fats, we can see how it turns on and off, decreases or increases its duty cycle. This means everything works fine, but there might be a problem later on.

**Problem with Current Consumption**

The circuits still required around 10 milliamps of current, and thus with an average AAA battery capacity of 1 amp-hour, the remote would only last around 4 days in the best case. Therefore, three diodes were added from pin two of the Arduino to the button input pins. This way, a timer could be used which puts the Arduino into sleep mode after 3 seconds and uses an interrupt on pin two to wake the Arduino up when a button is pushed.

**Low Power Modes**

The NRF 24 L01 also supports low power modes, which are activated after sending out each code number. With those changes and the removal of the SMD LEDs and voltage regulator of the Arduino Pro Mini board, this circuit only requires around 15 microamps in sleep mode, which equals a battery run time of around 7 years.

**Modifying the TV Remote**

Before modifying the TV remote, let's gather the required components for the receiver circuits and solder them onto a small piece of perfboard according to this created schematic. Once all the parts were connected to one another, the Arduino was programmed through an FTDI breakout, hooked up the LEDs, plugged in the power, and gave it one last time test with the breadboard transmitter.

**Prying Open the TV Remote**

Using a slotted screwdriver, slowly pry open my TV remote on the inside. Remove the rubber keypads to reveal a big switch matrix which connects to an ADOM 24 P20 remote control transmitter. By scraping off the protective layer from the copper traces of the three useless buttons and connecting their breakout points to an oscilloscope, we can see that by pushing the buttons, the input of the microcontroller is pulled down to ground.

**Testing**

This basically means we can use them just like we use the tactile switches beforehand. This was confirmed after a short test on the breadboard. The only negative aspect is that a couple of other buttons, like the power button, pull the input to ground as well and thus send out the code number. Since most of those buttons are useless for me, it still was a good trade-off.

**Finalizing the Transmitter Circuit**

So, I sold a wire to each one of the three buttons, redirected them to the underside of the board, and connected them to the finalized transmitter circuits according to the schematic. The last thing to do was to remove some of the plastic of the remote's insides, glue the transmitter circuit inside two cavities, hook it all up to the battery terminals, and close it all up.

**Success**

Just like that, we successfully modified the TV remote to turn on and off pretty much any 12V DC load we want through radio frequencies.

WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enin a previous project video I showed you how to create a circuit that can adjust the brightness of an LED strip according to the sand signals of three useless buttons of the TV remotes only problem is that the communication between the transmitter and receiver is based on an optical medium infrared light to be specific which can easily be blocked modern LED strip Dias though use another more reliable communication medium known as RF or radio frequency and even though the utilized IC of this RF remote is unlabeled the exist a popular and accessible rfic the so-called nrf24 L1 plus and in this video I will show you how easy it is to use one of those with an uino and at the end insert one in the TV remote and one in a newly built receiver circuit to ultimately control my LEDs through radio frequencies let's get started to hook up the uino Nano to the RF board I simply utilized a homemade adapter module and six male jumper wires to establish the mandatory connections according to this schematic and this breakout layout of the board and while the data pins of the NRF 24 L1 are 5f compatible which means that the Arduino will not destroy them it still requires a 3.3 volt power source that connects two pin one and two it is also recommended to add a big 47 microf decoupling capacitor between VCC and ground of the board and now that the transmitter is complete I repeated the same wiring procedure for the receiver but skip the breadboard part and directly connected the uino to the RF board through female jumper wires after adding the 3.3 volt power wires as well as the decoupling capacitor it was time to program the microcontrollers since the NRF 24 L1 uses the SPI communication protocol which means it can get a bit difficult to write code for it from scratch I rather simply downloaded the rf24 library and copied it into the library folder of the uino as a first test I opened the getting started sketch uploaded unedited to the transmitter changed the radio number 2 one and then upload it to the receiver by opening the serial monitor of the transmitter and sending over the letter T we can see that it successfully sends out a number and receives a feedback number from the receiver and that basically means that the wiring was successful so it was time to build the actual trans transmitter by firstly adding three tactile switches to the breadboard that will pull the pins four five and six to ground to simulate the 3 TV remote buttons writing code for the transmitter is also not that difficult we just need to remember to define the RF board on pin 7 and 8 as well as the output strength of the signal the channel it uses and the address of the communication pipe but you can find detailed information about every command for the if board in the documentation of the library now the loop that I created will send out the code number 100 101 or 102 depending on which of the three buttons was pushed the receiver circuit on the other hand will listen whether there's an incoming message and if so save it present it on the serial monitor assert whether it is 100 102 or 101 and thus either turn on/ flash of the LEDs decrease the brightness or increase the brightness after uploading both sketches and pushing the Teti switches the serial monitor of the receiver outputs the code numbers and if we take a look at Pin N9 which later controls the Gate of M fats we can see how it turns on and off and decreases SL increases its duty cycle that means everything works fine but there might be a problem later on because after recreating the transmitter circuit with an uino Pro Mini these circuits still required around 10 milliamps of current and thus with an average AAA battery capacity of 1 amp hour the remote would only last around 4 days in the best case that is why I added three diodes from pin two of the Arduino to the button input pins this way I can run a timer which puts the alino into sleep mode after 3 seconds and use an inter erupt on pin two to wake the adreno up when a button is pushed Additionally the NRF 24 lo1 also supports low power modes which are activated after sending out each code number and with those changes and the removal of the SMD LEDs and voltage regulator of the alino pro mini board this circuit only requires around 15 microamps in sleep mode which equals a battery run time of around 7 years now before modifying the TV remote let's gather the required components for the receiver circuits and Sol them onto a small piece of perfboard according to this created schematic and of course you can find it along with other project information as always in the video description once all the parts were connected to one another I programmed the uino through an ftdi breakouts hooked up the LEDs plugged in the power and gave it one last time test with the badb transmitter since that worked without a problem I continued by using a slotted screwdriver to slowly pry openen my TV remotes on the inside I removed the rubber keypads to reveal a big switch Matrix which connects to an adom 24 P20 remote control transmitter by scraping off the protective layer from the copper traces of the three useless buttons and connecting their breakout points to an oscilloscope we can see that by pushing the buttons the input of the microcontroller is pulled down to ground that basically means we can use them just like we use the tectile switches beforehand which was confirmed after I did a short test on the breadboard the only negative aspect is that a couple of other buttons like the power button pulls the input to ground as well and thus sends out the code number but since most of those buttons are useless for me it still was a good trade-off so I sold a wire to each one of the three buttons redirected them to the underside of the board and connected them to the finalized transmitter circuits according to the schematic the last thing to do was to remove some of the plastic of the remotes insides Glu the transmitter circuit inside two cavities hook it all up to the battery terminals and close it all up and just like that we successfully modified the TV remote to turn on and off pretty much much any 12v DC load we want through radio frequencies I hope you like this video If so don't forget to like share and subscribe stay creative and I will see you next timein a previous project video I showed you how to create a circuit that can adjust the brightness of an LED strip according to the sand signals of three useless buttons of the TV remotes only problem is that the communication between the transmitter and receiver is based on an optical medium infrared light to be specific which can easily be blocked modern LED strip Dias though use another more reliable communication medium known as RF or radio frequency and even though the utilized IC of this RF remote is unlabeled the exist a popular and accessible rfic the so-called nrf24 L1 plus and in this video I will show you how easy it is to use one of those with an uino and at the end insert one in the TV remote and one in a newly built receiver circuit to ultimately control my LEDs through radio frequencies let's get started to hook up the uino Nano to the RF board I simply utilized a homemade adapter module and six male jumper wires to establish the mandatory connections according to this schematic and this breakout layout of the board and while the data pins of the NRF 24 L1 are 5f compatible which means that the Arduino will not destroy them it still requires a 3.3 volt power source that connects two pin one and two it is also recommended to add a big 47 microf decoupling capacitor between VCC and ground of the board and now that the transmitter is complete I repeated the same wiring procedure for the receiver but skip the breadboard part and directly connected the uino to the RF board through female jumper wires after adding the 3.3 volt power wires as well as the decoupling capacitor it was time to program the microcontrollers since the NRF 24 L1 uses the SPI communication protocol which means it can get a bit difficult to write code for it from scratch I rather simply downloaded the rf24 library and copied it into the library folder of the uino as a first test I opened the getting started sketch uploaded unedited to the transmitter changed the radio number 2 one and then upload it to the receiver by opening the serial monitor of the transmitter and sending over the letter T we can see that it successfully sends out a number and receives a feedback number from the receiver and that basically means that the wiring was successful so it was time to build the actual trans transmitter by firstly adding three tactile switches to the breadboard that will pull the pins four five and six to ground to simulate the 3 TV remote buttons writing code for the transmitter is also not that difficult we just need to remember to define the RF board on pin 7 and 8 as well as the output strength of the signal the channel it uses and the address of the communication pipe but you can find detailed information about every command for the if board in the documentation of the library now the loop that I created will send out the code number 100 101 or 102 depending on which of the three buttons was pushed the receiver circuit on the other hand will listen whether there's an incoming message and if so save it present it on the serial monitor assert whether it is 100 102 or 101 and thus either turn on/ flash of the LEDs decrease the brightness or increase the brightness after uploading both sketches and pushing the Teti switches the serial monitor of the receiver outputs the code numbers and if we take a look at Pin N9 which later controls the Gate of M fats we can see how it turns on and off and decreases SL increases its duty cycle that means everything works fine but there might be a problem later on because after recreating the transmitter circuit with an uino Pro Mini these circuits still required around 10 milliamps of current and thus with an average AAA battery capacity of 1 amp hour the remote would only last around 4 days in the best case that is why I added three diodes from pin two of the Arduino to the button input pins this way I can run a timer which puts the alino into sleep mode after 3 seconds and use an inter erupt on pin two to wake the adreno up when a button is pushed Additionally the NRF 24 lo1 also supports low power modes which are activated after sending out each code number and with those changes and the removal of the SMD LEDs and voltage regulator of the alino pro mini board this circuit only requires around 15 microamps in sleep mode which equals a battery run time of around 7 years now before modifying the TV remote let's gather the required components for the receiver circuits and Sol them onto a small piece of perfboard according to this created schematic and of course you can find it along with other project information as always in the video description once all the parts were connected to one another I programmed the uino through an ftdi breakouts hooked up the LEDs plugged in the power and gave it one last time test with the badb transmitter since that worked without a problem I continued by using a slotted screwdriver to slowly pry openen my TV remotes on the inside I removed the rubber keypads to reveal a big switch Matrix which connects to an adom 24 P20 remote control transmitter by scraping off the protective layer from the copper traces of the three useless buttons and connecting their breakout points to an oscilloscope we can see that by pushing the buttons the input of the microcontroller is pulled down to ground that basically means we can use them just like we use the tectile switches beforehand which was confirmed after I did a short test on the breadboard the only negative aspect is that a couple of other buttons like the power button pulls the input to ground as well and thus sends out the code number but since most of those buttons are useless for me it still was a good trade-off so I sold a wire to each one of the three buttons redirected them to the underside of the board and connected them to the finalized transmitter circuits according to the schematic the last thing to do was to remove some of the plastic of the remotes insides Glu the transmitter circuit inside two cavities hook it all up to the battery terminals and close it all up and just like that we successfully modified the TV remote to turn on and off pretty much much any 12v DC load we want through radio frequencies I hope you like this video If so don't forget to like share and subscribe stay creative and I will see you next time