Don't go too far back
Discussion
I've been looking at the problem of stopping my S-Class and Viano in exactly the same positions in the garage for a while now. My objective was to have the vehicle just inside the roller door and no more, thus allowing me space to move around at the rear of the vehicles. I had looked into curtain beams but the price for the beams alone was expensive and by the time I bought all the other bits and pieces that I would have required to make it work for my application made the cost almost £900, rather more than I wanted to pay....
After trawling the net I found that Maplin do a safety beam that with a slight adaptation was exactly what I was looking for. These beams cost £19.99 and parts to adapt around a fiver, grand total under £25.00 for a very accurate way to stop at the exact same spot time after time.
The problem with the original Maplin beam set up was that it would buzz when the beam was broken, rather annoying for neighbours in the middle of the night and more annoying for me every time I walked through the beam, so I fitted a jack socket & plug and connected it to an LED which I have placed in line of sight to both vehicles so that I can accurately park.
My original plan was to have the beam inside the front roller door, but the sunlight interrupted the beam and kept setting it off so I mounted the transmitter to one of the ramp posts at the rear of the garage and the receiver onto some shelving, the height was determined by the rear of the S-Class bumper and the distance was set by parking just inside the roller doors.
Receiver fitted to shelving
Transmitter fitted to ramp post
LED sited on shelf where I can easily view it when reversing in
Now all I do is reverse in until the LED illuminates then draw forward a few mm until it goes out
After trawling the net I found that Maplin do a safety beam that with a slight adaptation was exactly what I was looking for. These beams cost £19.99 and parts to adapt around a fiver, grand total under £25.00 for a very accurate way to stop at the exact same spot time after time.
The problem with the original Maplin beam set up was that it would buzz when the beam was broken, rather annoying for neighbours in the middle of the night and more annoying for me every time I walked through the beam, so I fitted a jack socket & plug and connected it to an LED which I have placed in line of sight to both vehicles so that I can accurately park.
My original plan was to have the beam inside the front roller door, but the sunlight interrupted the beam and kept setting it off so I mounted the transmitter to one of the ramp posts at the rear of the garage and the receiver onto some shelving, the height was determined by the rear of the S-Class bumper and the distance was set by parking just inside the roller doors.
Receiver fitted to shelving
Transmitter fitted to ramp post
LED sited on shelf where I can easily view it when reversing in
Now all I do is reverse in until the LED illuminates then draw forward a few mm until it goes out
trickywoo said:
Complicated way of doing something a ping pong ball suspended from the ceiling would do more reliably.
did the same with a tennis ball. Much cheapness!when it touches the bottom of the back screen, you stop. Simples.
For a van though, as mentioned, a marker on the wall in line with the wing mirror should suffice.
£25. what a waste of money!
t. As usual. 
We need an iPhone app for that...Surely an easier solution would have been to demolish the garage and rebuild it on rails? Then you could drive your car up your drive, park, and use a remote control to move the garage over the vehicle. You could even install cameras inside the garage and move it from the comfort of your armchair.
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