My photographer friend asked me if he can control the speed of his Camera Dolly car and make it remotely controlled .

this car is used as an affordable camera slider , portable and very simple to use but it can only be operated by dragging it with your hand .

so, in this tutorial i'll try to upgrade it by adding a DC motor , some electronic components and 3D printed parts.

*there are available motorized cars that can be attached to it and do the job , but i'll design it in my way and use engineering CAD tools and the 3D printing technology which i like :D .

Step 1: How It Works

this is a video from youtube that shows how the original one works .

Step 2: What We Need

all the required component are available to buy online on ebay , aliexpress ,amazon etc.. ( except the 3d printed parts )

DSLR Dolly car
custom 3D printed parts ( the .STL files are attache at the end of this tutorial ).
DC motor 3-6v.
PWM DC motor controller.
Toggle Switch ON-ON 6 Pin 2 Way .
push button.
2x battery holder
2x 18650 batteries.

you can use any other configuration that available to as long as they match the required voltage and limits of the electronic circuit and components . for example : you can use 4x 1.5V batteries instead of 2x 3.7 batteries.

the 3D components are designed specifically to this car and motor dimensions , if u have another car/ motor model you have to design your own components .

Step 3: Assembly

take off the wheel axis and the wheel .
insert the 3D printed motor mount .
attach the gear wheel to the wheel (you can only use long bolts in case you have ) .
connect the small gear wheel to the motor and then attach to the mounting part .

Step 4: Electronic Circuit

the wiring is very simple ,

i used 2 way toggle switch to change direction of the motor forward-backward , and push button to start-stop ,

you can use components like Arduino , WiFi module or Bluetooth to control it remotely by mobile phone.

after the wiring , insert every component in its place in the 3d printed remote control.

Step 5: Testing

test it to check if every thing is working fine

Step 6: Summury

As i mentioned before , this is just a working prototype , there are a lot of improvements needed like adding one more motor to the other wheel , improving stabilization etc... (i'll add them in the next tutorials) .

if you have any questions or suggestion you are welcome to comments below