Hello,
I am trying to find a way to remotely control my drill with a momentary switch. It has roughly 300W of power being switched from a 20VDC supply.

I need a remote that at a minimum can switch that at a distance of say 200ft. It must be a form of switch whereby letting go of it opens the circuit.

I would prefer a remote where the switch can do PWM so I can alter the variable speed of the drill, but it's not a deal-breaker if one isn't available. Even less of priority is integrating the remote control with a variable-speed foot pedal switch (eg for a sewing machine) as my hands will generally be full while operating this.

I have no clue what to buy, and my attempts at searching are coming up fruitless, also i don't really know where to buy such things other than the brazilian rainforest site, and I know the stuff there is generally junk tier. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks,Dave

 

You would start with a simple remote relay card. This will give you a simple On/Off. These cards come with single or multi channel. Your motor looks to be a 20 VDC motor 300 Watts so figure your switching needs to handle 15 amps if I have this right. You could use a DC SSR driven by your relay board. This gives you simple ON/OFF of your motor. Relay cards normally Non-Latching or Latching. You use a key fob to transmit to the receiver. Example of remote relay module. When I say latching it means a simple button push turns that channel relay On and another push turns the relay off. Non latching means the relay is on for the duration you hold the button pushed.

Variable speed remote gets a lot more complicated. Yes, it can be done but the more features we want the more complex things get. The cost also grows for the project. There are plenty of WiFi and Bluetooth modules as a starter but if On/Off will work for you that is a simple route.

Ron

 

You would start with a simple remote relay card. This will give you a simple On/Off. These cards come with single or multi channel. Your motor looks to be a 20 VDC motor 300 Watts so figure your switching needs to handle 15 amps if I have this right. You could use a DC SSR driven by your relay board. This gives you simple ON/OFF of your motor. Relay cards normally Non-Latching or Latching. You use a key fob to transmit to the receiver. Example of remote relay module. When I say latching it means a simple button push turns that channel relay On and another push turns the relay off. Non latching means the relay is on for the duration you hold the button pushed.

Variable speed remote gets a lot more complicated. Yes, it can be done but the more features we want the more complex things get. The cost also grows for the project. There are plenty of WiFi and Bluetooth modules as a starter but if On/Off will work for you that is a simple route.

Ron

So basically the stuff on amazon is best then?

That looks fine, but the drill has a 20V supply battery I'll be using also for the relay, and I'm guessing the 12V requirement would fry that remote. Would a 24V like this guy work nicely off a 20V battery (does the extra 4V requirement really matter)? I checked and the drill is actually only 5A or 100W apparently I was wrong about that, cheap drill, guess it works to my advantage here.

 

The first problem you will have is simply making the connections to put a control in series with the drill control. Then, understand that the current will be about five times that of a similar mains powered drill.
So any remote control device will need to handle a whole lot of current.

 

So basically the stuff on amazon is best then?

That looks fine, but the drill has a 20V supply battery I'll be using also for the relay, and I'm guessing the 12V requirement would fry that remote. Would a 24V like this guy work nicely off a 20V battery (does the extra 4V requirement really matter)? I checked and the drill is actually only 5A or 100W apparently I was wrong about that, cheap drill, guess it works to my advantage here.

The Amazon stuff while not suited for safety of life is cheap and works fine for basic applications. No problem getting 12 volts as you can use a simple Buck Converter. That can power a remote relay board. While those boards are fine for light current loads we will need to have the light relay board to drive either a heavier relay made for DC. There are automotive relays designed to handle 20 and 30 amp DC loads.

Ron