Autonomous Race Car

Build this autonomous driving robot car based on a old RC toy car. I removed the radio control board from the car and replaced it with a brain in the form of an Arduino UNO board (plus a motor driver board) and gave it an ultrasonic distance measuring module to see the world through.

Step 1: Components

• Radio controlled toy car
• Arduino Uno
• Motor driver board (2 channel)
• Ultrasonic sensor distance measuring module
• Bread board

Step 2: Brain Transplant

Remove the radio control board from the RC car cutting all wires close to the board. Connect wires to the motor driver board - rear wheel motor in one channel - front wheel steering motor in the other channel.

"Steal" power from the cars batteries.

Step 3: Connect Arduino Board and the Ultrasonic Sensor

Connect the ultrasonic sensor and the motor driver to the Arduino board.

Step 4: The Programming

The cars intelligence is pretty simple. It's based on different modes that controles speed & direction depending on distance to objects ahead of the car:

FULL SPEED MODE - No objects ahead - full speed

CRUISE MODE - Object is X cm away - slow down

AVOID MODE - Object is too close for comfort - slow down and turn in random direction

REVERSE MODE - Object is very close - stop and reverse for 2 seconds

Step 5: The Code

Note: you need to find the "Ultrasonic.h" online. As I remember, I had to download a couple of different versions before I found one that worked.