Garage Door Remote Control Relocation Mod

I can't take credit for this one cuz I saw it on another forum, but I figured I would show you what I did (and lessons learned along the way). I bought an SPST Momentary On Pushbutton Switch at the Shack (Part # 275-644). Opened the remote control, removed the circuit board, and located the switch. Used test meter to identify which solder joints completed the circuit.




Desoldered all four mounting points, and resoldered in some wire to the two active points. Then I soldered the other ends of the wire to the terminals on my new switch. Mistake #1: I forgot that the switch needed to be installed in the switch blank first. I ended up having to cut the wire in the middle, slip the wire throught the front of the blank, put the nut over the wire and tighten it down on the inside of the blank, then spliced the wires back together. Doh! After this faux pas was corrected, I snapped the blank back in place, reassembled the remote (leaving out the push plate that used to activate the switch), running the wire out through the front of the remote. I just coiled the wire up and dropped the remote behind the kick panel to the left of the clutch pedal.


Here is the switch in place:

For those of you that don't know how to remove the lower dash panel to get to the switch blank, the next photo shows the piece of trim you need to pop out to get to the second screw that holds the panel in place (ThanX to someone who showed me this a while back):

I did this mod because I was tired of fumbling in the console to get my remote, and did not want to Velcro it to the dash or clip it to the visor. Eventually I will have some additional lights and will probably want to use this switch's place for the light switch. At this point, I think I will try another mod I read about: Remove the switch on the circuit board, solder in a jumper to keep the circuit always closed, solder wire to each of the battery terminals (battery removed), and splice the wires to the wires that go to the bright lights (remember: Pos to Pos & Neg to Neg). Stuff the remote in a ziplock bag and zip tie it to someplace under the hood. Flicking your brights should now activate the remote.
If I ever decide to neaten the whole thing up, I would use the Dremel to make a notch in the remote's case to exit the wire through, and replace the original push pad (after cutting off the piece that used to depress the original switch. This would keep the circuit board covered up.