Richardson, TX - December 18, 2003

The City of Plano Police department has created a new "Garage Door Burglar" game to teach its residents the importance of keeping garage doors closed to prevent burglaries and crime. Like many large cities, the Plano police department is acutely aware of the increasing problem of open garage burglaries. Last year, about 60% all residential burglaries in homes occurred because the garage door was left open. Thieves make off with everything from purses to golf clubs and lawn equipment. Plano is a large suburb of Dallas, Texas, with a population of about 240,000 people.

In response to this nationwide trend, Xceltronix, Inc., an electronic design and development firm from Richardson, Texas has developed a new product that will automatically close a garage door, even if the owner forgets. The Autocloser-GA, a new microprocessor-controlled product, works in conjunction with an existing garage door opener, and continuously monitors the position of a garage door. When an open door is detected, the unit will wait for a preset time period, give an audible and visible warning, and then close the door. The amount of time between detection and the closing of the garage door can be set from two to twenty minutes. The product also comes with a disable button, which allows the door to remain open when required. Autocloser works with an existing garage door opener and does not override any of the opener's safety mechanisms.