Extend motion sensor

I am in the process of converting my exterior lights to be motion activated lights and the downspout of my gutters is directly in the way of each one! So I have extended the motion sensor of each light, this post explains how.

If you do not care to read (or about) all the words and explanations, feel free to skip to the SHORT VERSION

BACKGROUND

For reasons beyond my comprehension, the downspouts from my (newly installed) gutters literally cause my exterior lights to straddle them. Maybe it looks neatly tucked away, but either way, it means that a motion sensor light is really obstructed completely by the downspout. For the record, I am using the Defiant 270 Degree lights on most of the corners of my house.

I have spent a lot of time working on my sprinkler “system” so I was aware that sprinkler risers are 1/2" PVC and already threaded. So I cut the wires that connect to the motion sensor head and extended the wires so I could shove them through a 12" irrigation riser that I inserted in where the motion sensor attached. (I needed to use a PVC coupler since both ends were threaded, but that’s only details…)

I’m not very good at soldering so I have purposely neglected including pictures of that part, but I gave it my best and soldered an extra length of each wire to accommodate the new extension. I connected everything back up and mounted it to the overhang where the previous lights were located. Overall, I’m pleased with the results and happy to report that the motion sensor is sensing about 100% more motion than it would if it were tucked behind the gutter downspout!

SOLUTION

To accomplish this, I used the following:

• Defiant 270 Degree lights
• 12" sprinkler riser
• PVC coupler
• the sprinkler PVC is grey and I wanted white to match my lights so I roughed up the PVC and spray painted it white (I let it dry a week, and by that I mean I was too lazy to finish the project in one day):
  • sandpaper: I used 60 grit, but that was too aggressive, I’d recommend getting an assorted pack and using something more like 100 grit
  • spray paint: I used Rust-oleum in flat white, it says it adheres to plastic but time will tell. It doesn’t match exactly but hopefully it is close enough

NEXT STEPS

• wait to see if the paint and the PVC hold up to the elements

SIDE NOTES

• I am not going to get into the details of how every light was previously very shittily flush mounted with just a hole with a wire poking through it…that is not how it should ever have been done and now I have to deal with the consequences and attempt to retrofit everything to a job that was done horribly to begin with…and that commentary is universal with everything I’ve attempted with this old and stupid house…but that’s not what this post is about. Still I’m angry!

WHAT I LEARNED

• sometimes it pays to think outside the box and be industrious

REFERENCE

• N/A

SHORT VERSION

To avoid tl;dr enjoy this instead:

1. remove the motion sensor part of the light
2. cut the 4x wires connecting it
3. extend the wires with spare 14AWG wire
4. paint the PVC and coupling white
5. insert extended wires through PVC extension
6. re-connect wires to the housing
7. mount that sucker to the house

[return to top of page]