TV-B-Gone sniper shirt

Here in Baton Rouge, people love TV, especially sports motivated programing. I hate this. Take a place like Plucker’s for instance (if you have never been to Plucker’s, imagine a bar/restaurant built with plasma TVs in-place of drywall). The great people at Plucker’s have assured that no matter where you sit at their round tables you are forced to watch at least 5 different TV programs at the same time, killing all chances of conversation with your friends or family. Alas, there is hope.

TV-B-Gone from Cornfield Electronics is really one of my favorite little inventions. It is an extremely simple and elegant little hack that allows you to turn off (or on) any TV by cycling through the ‘on/off’ codes of every TV manufacturer in less than 60 seconds. The best thing about it is the priority list it uses to start off with the more popular TV brands assuring that you will usually succeed within 10 seconds of pointing the device at the TV. I had a lot of fun playing with my TV-B-Gone but after my first field test, I found that holding up your keys to your head and having people laughing at your table was not going to work out. I needed a stealthier approach which would allow me to conceal my plans from everyone, including the people I was with. So I opened up the TV-B-Gone to see how it worked and found it is ready and willing to be hacked.

My idea was to extend the IR-LED to the button region on the front pocket of my shirt, place the TV-B-Gone module in the pocket, and extend the button through the inside of my shirt and down to my pocket. Essentially, the are only two parts you need to know about: the button which initiates the sequence (which looks like this) and the infra-red led (which looks like this). First, desolder the button and the IR-LED. Remember, the LED is a polarized component, so try to remember which way it was connected. The button can be a little confusing too, but it’s not polarized. Just do some test. Then, cut a few inches of some light gauge wire for the IR-LED and solder the wire to the leads. Do the same for the button and feed the wires from the button through the ’skin-side’ of the inside of your pocket. Here is a picture of the module in the pocket: Remember, the leads on the top (for the button) go into my shirt.

Take the IR-LED and poke the leads through the front of the pocket right under the shirt button and wire it up inside the pocket.

Next, open up the shirt (or flip it inside-out). Get the leads from the TV-B-Gone button and measure out a few long pieces of wire to where your pants pocket would be. I used speaker wire but that’s all I had.

Then solder up the button and tape it to prevent bounces and shorts.

This is the part that goes in your pants pocket so you can inconspicuously trigger the TV-B-Gone. There are a million ways to do this and many are probably better. If you really want to make this a full project, I would recommend a hat, with LEDs all around it (some how disguised) and powered up a little stronger. Also, some kind of auto-fire function, maybe with a 555 timer, would be cool. This technique I have could be a little stronger and have a lot wider field. However, I did manage to turn off nearly every TV at Plucker’s recently without any of my friends noticing it was me. Finished product: