22nd October 2026By Neil Skoglund
LDS03A Use Case
The shed at the bottom of the field, the barn across the yard, the boathouse by the water, the pavilion nobody visits midweek. Outbuildings like these often hold valuable equipment, sit well away from the main house, and have no mains power or Wi-Fi. If someone forces the door or it's left open after use, nobody may notice until the next visit - which could be days later.
This guide is for rural property owners and estates, holiday-let owners, sports and boat clubs, allotment and community groups, and churches. It shows how a Dragino LDS03A on the door, reporting into Trackpac, tells you within seconds when a remote store is opened (coverage permitting), warns you when a door has been left open, and keeps a record of when each building was used - with no wiring, no broadband and no SIM card. For a broader introduction to door sensors, see our overview of door and window monitoring.
The LDS03A is an outdoor open/close sensor. A weatherproof enclosure holds the battery, radio and antenna, and an armoured, steel-sheathed cable runs to a heavy-duty magnetic contact. A separate magnet goes on the door itself. Because it carries its own long-life battery and talks over LoRaWAN, it doesn't need anything from the building - which is exactly what a shed, barn or boathouse can't offer. And with an operating range of -40°C to +85°C, an unheated building in midwinter is well within its rating.
Magnetic contact
Heavy-duty contact on an armoured cable. Works across a 10-30mm gap on wooden doors and 30-45mm on steel.
Reports every opening
Sends each open and close as it happens, plus a status check every 2 hours.
Open-too-long alarm
Raises an alarm if a door stays open past a time you set.
Counts & durations
Keeps a running total of openings and how long the last one lasted.
Built for outdoors
Weatherproof enclosure, rated from -40 to +85°C.
Up to 10-year battery
8500mAh battery. Life depends on how often the door is used.
Specifications from Dragino's LDS03A documentation.
Many sensors report on a timer every few hours. The LDS03A is different: by default it sends a report the moment the door opens and again when it closes, so with good coverage an opening reaches Trackpac in seconds. An alert rule then passes it on by email, SMS or push notification to the Trackpac mobile app.
Time windows keep this useful rather than noisy. A rule that only alerts on openings overnight, or outside the hours a club store is normally in use, means you aren't pinged every time a groundsman fetches the mower - but you are told if the barn door opens at 2am. Be clear about what it does: the LDS03A alerts you, quickly, so you or a neighbour can go and look. It doesn't sound a siren, lock the door or record video.
Not every problem is a break-in. A volunteer locks up the pavilion but leaves the equipment store ajar; a guest at a holiday let props the garage door open and forgets it; the boathouse door is left wide in a storm. Rain, wind and animals get in, and the store sits unsecured until someone notices. The LDS03A's open-too-long alarm handles this: set a time on the device, and if the door stays open longer than that, it sends an alarm that Trackpac can alert on. When the door is closed again, a "resolved" message tells you it's been dealt with - so you don't have to drive over to check.
One sensor on one shed is simple. Where Trackpac earns its keep is when there are several buildings, several sites or several people who need to know.
Barns, garages, workshops and stores all appear on the same Trackpac dashboard, named by building and tagged by site, farm or property - so you can see at a glance which doors are open and which are shut.
Keep an owner-only store, plant room or garage under watch while guests are staying, and use the history to see whether a shared bike shed or boot room was used during a stay.
Sports clubs, boat clubs, allotment societies and churches can see when the equipment store, boathouse or tool shed was opened and for how long - handy for matching use against bookings and match days. It records when, not who.
A shareable, read-only dashboard link lets committee members, keyholders or a housekeeper check the status of the stores they look after, without being able to change sensors or alert rules.
Every report from the LDS03A includes the door's status, a running total of openings and how long the last opening lasted. Over time, Trackpac builds that into a history of each building: which days the club store was opened, how long the boathouse stood open on a regatta weekend, whether anyone has been into the barn since harvest. Reports and exports turn the history into figures for a committee meeting or your own records. The opening count is cumulative rather than reset each day, so weekly or monthly usage comes from the history and exports rather than from the raw total.
Installation needs no wiring or mains power, and the contact copes with both timber doors and metal up-and-over garage doors.
Order "Trackpac Ready", scan and name it
Buy the LDS03A from Hexaspot with the Trackpac Ready option, scan its QR code in the Trackpac app and name it something like "Top barn - main door", which reads far better in an alert than a serial number. Tag it by site or property.
Mount the enclosure and the contact
Fix the enclosure to a wall near the door and the magnetic contact to the door frame, with the armoured cable running between them. One sensor monitors one door, so a building with a personnel door and a garage door needs two.
Line up the magnet within range
Fix the magnet to the door so it sits opposite the contact when the door is shut: about 10-30mm away on a wooden door, or 30-45mm on an iron or steel door such as an up-and-over garage door.
Test before you leave
Open and close the door a few times and check each change appears on the Trackpac dashboard. If it does, the building has coverage and the alignment is right. Set the open-too-long time and reporting interval remotely over LoRaWAN afterwards if the defaults don't suit.
Trackpac can alert on the door opening or closing, the open-too-long alarm and battery level, by email, SMS or push notification. Rules can target tags, so every sensor tagged "North farm" or "Club stores" shares the same rules, and a new sensor added to the tag picks them up automatically. A few rules cover most needs:
An opening alert limited to a time window - overnight, or outside the hours the store is normally used - to the people who can respond.
An alert on the open-too-long alarm, around the clock, with a "resolved" message when someone shuts the door.
For a building that should stay shut - a winter boathouse or a store between seasons - alert on every opening, with a trigger-lock interval so a busy visit sends one alert, not a stream.
With a battery rated for years, a low-battery rule makes sure a sensor in a building you rarely visit doesn't quietly stop reporting.
Send alerts to more than one person, so a neighbour, groundsman or committee keyholder hears at the same time as you. And because the LDS03A also sends a status report every 2 hours, the dashboard shows each sensor is still checking in even when nobody has been near the door.
The LDS03A sends its reports over LoRaWAN, so there's no Wi-Fi or SIM card per building and no reliance on broadband reaching the far end of the property. If coverage drops for a while, the sensor stores its events and sends them once the network is back, so you don't lose the history. Events can also be forwarded by webhook to another system, such as a security or maintenance platform, if you already run one.
Remote rural buildings are exactly where coverage is worth checking first - read what to check about LoRaWAN coverage before you plan, and see Trackpac pricing for the subscription. On a farm or estate, the same sensor works on gates too - see farm and yard gate monitoring. If your stores are shipping containers rather than buildings, read about container and site storage door alerts.
Get Started
One LDS03A per door, running on its own battery with no wiring, Wi-Fi or SIM - sending every opening to a Trackpac dashboard, with out-of-hours and left-open alerts to your phone.
No. The LDS03A runs on its own 8500mAh battery, rated for up to 10 years depending on how often the door is used, and sends its reports over LoRaWAN rather than Wi-Fi or a mobile SIM. That means it can go on a shed, barn, boathouse or pavilion with no power and no broadband, as long as the building has LoRaWAN coverage. Check coverage at the building itself, and confirm the first open and close appear on the Trackpac dashboard before you leave.
By default the LDS03A sends a report the moment the door opens and again when it closes, plus a status report every 2 hours. With good LoRaWAN coverage an opening reaches Trackpac within seconds, and an alert rule can then send it to you by email, SMS or push notification. If coverage drops for a while, the sensor stores events and sends them once the network is back, so the history stays complete.
Yes. Dragino quotes a working gap between the contact and the magnet of about 30-45mm on iron and steel doors, and about 10-30mm on wooden doors. Fix the contact to the frame and the magnet to the door so the two line up when it is shut, then open and close it a few times and check each change appears on the dashboard. One sensor monitors one door, so a building with a front door and a garage door needs two.
No. The LDS03A detects when the door opens and closes, and Trackpac records when it happened and how long the door was open. It does not identify the person. For a club or community store that is usually enough to match openings against bookings, match days or a key-holder rota, but it is a record of use, not of identity, and it is not a camera or a lock.
The Dragino LDS03A is sold by Hexaspot, Trackpac's sister company in the Connect IoT group, for €59.92 ex VAT, with VAT added at checkout based on your country. Choose the 'Trackpac Ready' option and the sensor is pre-registered on Trackpac, so you only need to scan its QR code. A Trackpac subscription from £15 / €18 per sensor per year covers connectivity, the dashboard, alerts and data storage.
Looking after sheds, barns or club stores across several sites? Get in touch and we'll help you plan sensors and coverage.
Get a personalized walkthrough of our platform. We'll show you how Trackpac can solve your specific monitoring challenges.
30 minutesNo commitmentPick any time
