Hi all,I am a professor of Physics at Wabash College I am helping a group of undergraduate Physics majors build a drone. However, none of them has any experience with working with RC airplanes, so we would like to try to build a simple GPS autonomous car using NXT Mindstorms and maybe an RC car. I was wondering if anyone has done something like that already or have any suggestions of where to look for help.Thanks,Bojan Tunguz
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I saw RC cars with cheap cold air intakes installed. I heard in many car shop that autonomous car may be smarter than a human driver for knowing its exact location. Every car needs GPS antennas to pinpoint its own location.
Hi Bojan (ili ti pozdrav Bojane),
it's definitely possible to build simple GPS autonomous car. Most of previous answers focused on Mindstorms approach, so I'll offer suggestions on RC car approach. Most toy RC cars can be easily converted for autonomous operation. You can use ArduPilot board, or Arduino board ( or some other alternative) to control a car. Depending how simple you want to make it you can replace existing RC car's board add H-bridge, and other circuitry, etc. or simply hook-up into the existing board. I did something similar while back just to try work out electronics and communication stuff before deploying it in the airframe. I took toy RC truck (cheap) and mounted Arduino board, GPS receiver, Linux router, USB webcam, and USB memory stick on it. Arduino was connected to GPS receiver (serial), and to the Linux router via USB. I installed OpenWRT on the router allowing me to use it as a WiFi connection to a remote computer, as well as gave some onboard processing power. Web cam was connected to the router, which replayed images (video) to the offboard computer. I wrote code for Arduino to operate RC car in autonomous mode (based on GPS input, some vision input, and simple push button switches acting as bumper signals) as well as in remote mode (controlled via "base station" on the remote computer. It was good and inexpensive exercise for airframe preparation.
Replies
it's definitely possible to build simple GPS autonomous car. Most of previous answers focused on Mindstorms approach, so I'll offer suggestions on RC car approach. Most toy RC cars can be easily converted for autonomous operation. You can use ArduPilot board, or Arduino board ( or some other alternative) to control a car. Depending how simple you want to make it you can replace existing RC car's board add H-bridge, and other circuitry, etc. or simply hook-up into the existing board. I did something similar while back just to try work out electronics and communication stuff before deploying it in the airframe. I took toy RC truck (cheap) and mounted Arduino board, GPS receiver, Linux router, USB webcam, and USB memory stick on it. Arduino was connected to GPS receiver (serial), and to the Linux router via USB. I installed OpenWRT on the router allowing me to use it as a WiFi connection to a remote computer, as well as gave some onboard processing power. Web cam was connected to the router, which replayed images (video) to the offboard computer. I wrote code for Arduino to operate RC car in autonomous mode (based on GPS input, some vision input, and simple push button switches acting as bumper signals) as well as in remote mode (controlled via "base station" on the remote computer. It was good and inexpensive exercise for airframe preparation.
Hope this helps (Cao)
I'd be glad to talk to you about it. Feel free to e-mail me: Steve(at)teamhassenplug.org
I may even be able to come visit your class (I live in Lafayette)
Steve
Take a look my work
http://www.juanantonio.info/jab_cms.php?id=228
Best Regards
The best GPS-guided Mindstorms NXT car is the Green Monster.
A fun GPS-guided car (build on a children's ride-on toy) is in the April issue of Servo magazine. Here's the code.