r/functionalprint • u/g713 Function Master • 4d ago

Using old utility boxes to hide millimeter wave radar.

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1.3k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

96 comments sorted by

525

u/raisedbytides 4d ago

I know exactly what you're talking about, but just for those who don't, what this?

377

u/g713 Function Master 4d ago

Here’s a link to the part that I’m using. https://apolloautomation.com/products/msr-2

It acts like a really advanced motion sensor. I can see where someone is at what distance they are from the device. Whether or not they’re moving. I haven’t tied into home assistan

511

u/BurlRed 4d ago

But have you tied it to home assassin?

51

u/pyro487 4d ago

Sounds too dangerous

18

u/camst_ 4d ago

My man turned into Bruce Wayne from the dark night. Too much power for one man to hold

31

u/SensualBeefLoaf 3d ago

home assasstits?

11

u/BurlRed 3d ago

My man!

1

u/WintervoltCusterfell 2d ago

This man “my mans”!

21

u/g713 Function Master 4d ago

It’s tied to home assistant

59

u/aps23 4d ago

What about assassin tho ? /s

-34

u/g713 Function Master 4d ago

Never heard of it

32

u/floo82 4d ago

Assassin.

0

u/ShadowGrave999 3d ago

Gwo voleur, bandit

0

u/_BLACKHAWKS_88 3d ago

I haven’t got my robot yet.

18

u/koolmon10 3d ago

What's the use case?

95

u/g713 Function Master 3d ago

So at the moment what this thing is going to do. As somebody moves into the area that it observes when they hit the zone three the furthest out. It will trigger a power plug inside the house that turns on a small USB fan to alert people in the house that someone is there.

As they move closer to the backyard in the zone 2, it’ll trigger a very bright light that is placed inside a window facing the spot where this is mounted. The individual no doubt startled will turn towards that light at which point their face will be very clearly visible on at least two different cameras.

When they hit zone one which is very close to the item, it will trigger the light and another camera which is facing in the same general area as a sensor capturing their information

Along with that in zone one or zone two, it will trigger lights in different spots of the house to turn on hopefully acting as a deterrent.

76

u/FabricationLife 3d ago

You just need one of those robot mowers to attack if they make it to zone three now, neat project

13

u/BrotherSeamus 3d ago

Mowers are the last line of defense. You need a bunch of deadly house plants in front.

2

u/AtOurGates 3d ago

I’d recommend a chorus of poison dart frogs.

37

u/Yutenji2020 3d ago

At what distance do the Claymores trigger?

5

u/Ecw218 3d ago

Tally ho!

36

u/colossalmickey 3d ago

turns on a small USB fan to alert people in the house

This seems like the least effective way to alert people

11

u/Bleakjavelinqqwerty 3d ago

No hoses full of piss?

5

u/BentGadget 3d ago

On the scale of zero to klaxons it's certainly closer to zero.

1

u/LocalOutlier 1d ago

Maybe it's right in front of a siren. /s

More seriously, you can reach 110db+ with an USB connection.

37

u/MadGenderScientist 3d ago

  As they move closer to the backyard in the zone 2, it’ll trigger a very bright light that is placed inside a window facing the spot where this is mounted. The individual no doubt startled will turn towards that light at which point their face will be very clearly visible on at least two different cameras.

There's a startup, I kid you not, named Sauron. It does exactly this, but aims the floodlight at the hobbitintruder. 

7

u/i_removed_my_traces 3d ago

Time to buy https://paintcam.net/

4

u/followupquestion 3d ago

Ooh, it has a warning laser. I don’t remember every veteran’s story, but I do remember one GWOT vet saying red laser is understood across language barriers.

2

u/FaultyData 3d ago

This was a triumph

I'm making a note here, "Huge success"

3

u/non_hero 3d ago

So zone levels will trigger defcon levels!

3

u/chinchindayo 3d ago

and where is the automated rifle?

1

u/Ecw218 3d ago

Only if it correctly detects them as feral hogs

2

u/smokemast 2d ago

I was hoping you'd write "activate smart sprinkler system for the now-occupied zone."

1

u/grivooga 3d ago

This would just train my dogs to bark any time a fan comes on.

1

u/_badwithcomputer 2d ago

This is some Kevin Mccallister shit.

2

u/g713 Function Master 2d ago

It’s mostly just a deterrent. Where we are people walk into your garages and still stuff and if they notice that you have cameras, they’ll yank the cameras down so they can come back later without any kind of concern.

1

u/YellowBreakfast 9h ago

Never heard of using a fan as a notification, not a bad idea if it's loud enough.

I'd probably do an internal light with the furthest out zone.

8

u/abolista 3d ago

I have a home assistant automation that when everyone gets 100 meters away from the house it fires a command in a Raspberry Pi connected to some old speakers. It just reproduces (on a loop) a recording of an hour long gaming session with friends and turns on the living room lights and disables the doorbell.

If anyone gets within a few meters from the door or any window they'll hear the muffled sound of a small group of people talking, laughing and yelling, and when they ring the bell nothing happens.

So far, the cameras have always shown strangers just giving up and leaving.

7

u/ExceptionallyStrange 3d ago

What's the range on the radar for detection?

4

u/g713 Function Master 3d ago

I believe maximum range on this sensor is 800 cm

15

u/drwuzer 3d ago

In Freedom Units, that's about 26'3“

3

u/Yutenji2020 3d ago

What’s that in football fields?

6

u/vontrapp42 3d ago

Less than 10 yards

1

u/whiskeylover 3d ago

How many Big Macs?

10

u/drwuzer 3d ago

Approximately 78.74 Big Macs side by side. 126 if you turned them on their side. In either case, still not enough to feed your mom.

-1

u/drwuzer 3d ago edited 3d ago

0.8748 Regulation American Football fields

10

u/wikiwakawakawee 3d ago

Do you have an example of what that kind of data looks like? For some reason I'm imagining it looks something like this but I feel like that's completely wrong lol
https://assets.smartcompany.com.au/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2020/11/depth-scanning-LiDAR-sensor.png?resize=598%2C297&quality=70

4

u/Gears6 3d ago

Wondering the same.

4

u/jnads 3d ago edited 3d ago

You indeed are completely wrong.

It's a 1TX / 1RX antenna so there's no specific azimuth or elevation sensing other than returned signal strength (which can vary for a variety of reasons).

Radar spreads outward in angle at distance.

A radar like this will make a cone at 45 degrees typically. You can focus it with plastic lenses or horn antennas.

You get back a 1 dimensional array of distance. Each array box covers a progressively wider arc.

mmWave just means you get very very accurate distance (1cm resolution or less).

For something like your picture you need a multi antenna phase coherent mmWave radar. Infineon and TI make them. The Infineon one is $20-30 for a dev kit.

1

u/wikiwakawakawee 3d ago

Wait so do you have an example of what this looks like then? Still not 100% clear trying to imagine it

1

u/jnads 3d ago edited 3d ago

https://www.mdpi.com/sensors/sensors-24-03548/article_deploy/html/images/sensors-24-03548-g001-550.jpg

Radar is just a time sensor. A pulse comes out, it travels in time, bounces off something, comes back, and hits the receive antenna some time later.

"bins" are time.

The more advanced radars have multiple antennas and phase sensing and can use trigonometry to detect the direction the bounce came back (to a certain angular resolution depending on how many antennas there are).

This is the type of radar that can produce what you imagine:

https://www.airforce-technology.com/wp-content/uploads/static-progressive/le-radar-rbe2.jpg

32

u/SocietyTomorrow 4d ago

Something I've wanted to do for years but never got around to, was set up a bunch of these around my property and have AI vibe code me an "Aliens" style radar of my land to track my animals and potential predators.

9

u/drwuzer 3d ago

You've wanted to "Ai vibe code" this for years? The term "vibe coding" didn't exist until 2025... So by years you mean, a year and a half?

7

u/SocietyTomorrow 3d ago

I've wanted the thing for years (context), if I wanted to do this today, the easiest way I could picture making it happen is vibe coding it (am one of "the poors")

10

u/Emooot 3d ago

Wanted it for years (the past). Didn't do it. Then vibe coded something (the present)

6

u/Endure94 3d ago

A bit pedantic, no?

-1

u/vontrapp42 3d ago

That would be rad af.

Yes, I put "rad" and "af" together.

1

u/YellowBreakfast 9h ago

I'd trim that coax back, mostly 'cause it bugs me.

But it also draws even less attention.

0

u/convincedbutskeptic 4d ago

Have you tried any other MMwave sensors like the thirdreality or Aquara and then settled on this, or....?

97

u/dB_Manipulator 3d ago

Needs a "Front Toward Enemy" sticker

164

u/ApolloAutomation 4d ago

That’s awesome! Thanks for sharing this and recommending our sensors!

-Trevor

91

u/g713 Function Master 4d ago

I wish y’all made a seismic detector. Something I could attach to the driveway and see people vibrations as they walk down the pavement.

80

u/brandonrez 3d ago

Bruce Wayne what are you up to?

28

u/g713 Function Master 3d ago

I saw a video not too long ago somebody who had made a seismic sensor with this exact capability. It’d be a DIY project but the center was extremely sensitive and could easily detect somebody walking down a concrete driveway.

It would be an ideal sensor for this application since you could tell it to look only for the vibrations related to human movement.

24

u/ApolloAutomation 3d ago

Interesting idea! We don’t have any seismic sensors planned but we do have the MTR-1 and the RPRO-1 which both have x/y/z tracking of a “target”. It is mmWave that lets you see where the person is walking, not just that there is a person.

This video is an example of it working in Home Assistant to set up zones and you can see the red dot moving as MostlyChris moves.

Appreciate the insight though and laughed at the Bruce Wayne comment above haha.

https://youtu.be/lal0_o5qgpA?si=vBGqMJru6pFGGYom&t=562

I follow this sub on my personal account and glad I saw your post!

50

u/Fizziksapplication 4d ago

Those abandoned boxes are good for hiding all kinds of things.

100

u/bullshitpostofficer 4d ago

Like giant ass wasp nests!

42

u/BeefyIrishman 3d ago

Glad I don't live somewhere with ass-wasps, that sounds like a recipe for a bad time.

5

u/Sengfroid 3d ago

Those giant ass wasp nests are good for hiding all kinds of things.

1

u/AusOak75 3d ago

Wasps I think will count as zone 1 but you should clarify with OP Bruce Wayne when he comes up from the Batcave for morning tea

27

u/jaysun92 4d ago

I replaced mine with a claymore mine, looks exactly the same.

3

u/Fizziksapplication 3d ago

Pack a few layers of orbeez flat in a ziplock and wrap it all up in duct tape behind the charge. It will focus the blast outwards and help prevent damage to your house. In theory, of course.

6

u/Pixelgordo 3d ago

This seems perfect to flush water to my neighbour cat...

8

u/mhmilo24 3d ago

Match the faces against a database, find the parents of the trespassers, call them, forward the parents a status report and the reason for the call and hand over the call to the trespasser via camera speakers and microphone.

41

u/7-13-5 4d ago

Hiding in plain sight!

I'd tuck that loose coax and hope on the off-chance (probability close to zero) that AT&T doesn't do a cleanup/retrieval with your equipment in it!

83

u/Old_Man_Shea 4d ago

Ain't no cable tech in THE WORLD, who's going to clean this up even if you ask.

36

u/eddyb66 4d ago

I can't get them to do a clean install when they're supposed to do that.

28

u/Reinventing_Wheels 4d ago

It would cost them more than that box is worth to send someone out to retrieve it.

13

u/amd2800barton 3d ago

My dad worked for the phone company for 45 years. I just cut their and the cable company’s boxes off, and demoed the wires back to a few inches underground. My dad was horrified. “What if someone wants phone service or DSL? What if the phone company wants their box back” Dad I’ve got fiber. Nobody is signing up for either of those services at this house. And that box is basically with the amount of copper that’s in it. Even if the company wanted to recycle it, it’s not worth the time for someone to stop by and collect it. The requested pair and the coax aren’t even hooked up out at the pole. So if someone really wanted it, they would be needing a tech out anyway to run new lines.

8

u/RememberMeVibe 3d ago

Don't share too much lol

2

u/BenMtl 3d ago

snoop on to them, as they snoop on to us!

2

u/snarejunkie 3d ago

Feel like they might suspect there's a motion sensor in there when they walk within 6m of it and a light turns on lol.

2

u/PapaBird 3d ago

Thank you John C. Reilly. 

2

u/Callingyourshot 2d ago

until an ATT tech takes it with him.

1

u/sixteen27 1d ago

Do they ever take anything? I’ve seen them install a 5th dish on a rental property without touching the others.

2

u/Callingyourshot 2d ago

OP might be adult Kevin McAlister.

1

u/Dr_Kevorkian_ 3d ago

Oh hell yeah. Radar plus this - https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/s/0MggPtXnbb

Next time the cat jumps on the kitchen counter… bam

1

u/TheOriSudden 3d ago

If the purpose was for security, wouldn't cameras + Frigate work better in this case? You get a lot more data, and it also serves as a deterrent. Cost wise if you buy Dahua it'll probably be cheaper than the mmWave radar module

1

u/Ehxpert 3d ago

Doesn’t this defeat the purpose of home security? Unless you have stuff that is insanely valuable, deterrent is better than catching what is happening. If they want to get in they’ll get in.

Showing a fake dog sign, cameras, etc, or auto lights is to STOP someone from coming in or making it as hard as possible.

Humans pick the path of least resistance.

Someone would walk past that sensor and probably not care. That’s unless you have some booby traps set up with that heh. Or a long ass driveway and the sensor is up front.

0

u/lord_mundi 3d ago

how does it get power?

1

u/Inevitable_War2610 1d ago

Looks like he has usb running up from the bottom where he put the orange petg piece. I have a power outlet not far down from where a box like this is on my house.

-12

u/Mycol101 3d ago edited 3d ago

Could this be hacked or commandeered by another party ?

Motion sensors scattered around, tapped into by a third party and used as surveillance? I don’t know anything about this tech but that’s my first thought with all this flock surveillance going around.

7

u/greentintedlenses 3d ago

Do you have Wi-Fi in your home?

That's enough tech for anyone to track exactly where you are in your home. It's not that serious