Hello,
I am relatively new to Arduino and am working on a project to slave some LED IR Floodlights to a trailcam. The aim is to save power on the Floodlights by only having them switch on when the trailcam IR lights come on.
So I am looking for a reliable IR sensor like a photoresistor to be able to sense the trailcam IR LED's firing and then use the Arduino via a relay to switch on our floods. At a later stage we may slave in a DSLR with Flash too.
Where I am struggling is in finding a suitable IR sensor. there is a flame sensor in my kit but not sure that will be suitable. I can see many 38khz IR receivers for decoding IR comms signals but cant seem to see just an IR photosensor like the visible spectrum one in the kit.
would the visible spectrum sensor do the job? could I use the 38khz sensor, is there something I have not seen yet?
Many thanks for reading this.
Peter.
1 Like
CdS photoresistors have a peak sensitivity in the middle of the visible range. You are not likely to get much response at IR. Probably better find a phototransistor and if necessary put an IR filter in front of it.
Russell.
You need something like QSE773
If you have a 38khz IR transmitter tied to the main lights, you could use something like the TSSP4038 IR receiver. The second "S" in the part number indicates it is designed for use as a sensor and the spec sheet indicates "it can receive continuous 38khz signals or 38khz bursts". It also has a built in filter so "visible light is suppressed by IR filter". The little 3 terminal gadget is only $1.27 ea or $0.80 ea if you buy 10 at Mouser so it is quite reasonable. Looks like the typical 5v supply current is about 1ma. Someone else mentioned this part in another post and I have printed the information for my future reference - seems like a handy thing to have 
Hello all,
Thanks for responding I will be checking these out to see if I can get them to do what I need. Got bits on order.
Cheers, Peter.