How to Make a Simple Remote Control Car

The exciting hobby of building and racing RC cars continues to grow in popularity as the tech required to enjoy it becomes simpler and easier to use, but some potential hobbyist still have cold feet about building their first remote control car. Many people mistakenly think it’s too technically complex, or that it will be an expensive endeavor not worthy of finishing. As a matter of fact, however, making a simple remote control car doesn’t have to be frustrating nor expensive.

Here’s how to make a simple remote control car in just a few easy steps, how to maintain it when you’re finished, and what mistakes you should be looking out for from the get-go. Always remember to read the full instructions first, and to measure twice before cutting once!

1. Start with the essential parts

The first thing you want to do is pickup the essential parts you’ll need for an RC car that you can’t make yourself. You’ll need a simple radio control transmitter and receiver electronics, available at virtually any hobbyist, electronic, or hardware store. After you’ve purchased those parts, you can essentially create the rest out of a number of household objects that you probably already have laying around. If you’re struggling to find local retailers, some options can be purchased through online retailers.

An index card box, for instance, or another hollow plastic container or similar shape and size is an ideal body for your RC car. After you’ve located a suitable one to serve as the body, you’ll want to drill two holes into it – one on each side, where the wheels will go. Anything bigger than a 1/4-inch drill bit is likely too large.

2. Fitting your car with a motor and wires

The next part is one of the trickiest; you’ll need to thread the motor’s shaft through the holes you’ve drilled. Your motor should be sitting neatly inside of the box, with shafts poking through the holes you’ve drilled ready and waiting for you to affix the wheels. When mounting your motor, it’s highly advised you use a sticky putty, tape, or foam to ensure it’s snug and unlikely to rattle around when you hit the road.

Mounting your electronics is one of the most important elements of building a simple remote car, so be sure you read up on how to properly solder your electronics and manage the mounting process if you’re unfamiliar with the tech or tools involved. After soldering the wires from your battery pack to your remote receiver’s power inputs, you’ll also need to solder the wires from your motor to the same receiver. Remember when soldering that all wires should be positive to positive, negative to negative.

3. Finishing your battery and the wheels

Finally, carefully place your now wired-in battery pack into the body of the vehicle, firmly securing it in place with tape, putty, or foam. Make sure that your radio receiver is similarly situated, and that it’s not going to be unnecessarily roughed up in the event of an inevitable wipeout. Finally, you can move on to your wheels.

Affixing the simple rubber wheels of a motor car is usually as simple as attaching or screwing them into the protruding shafts of the motor that extend outside of the index card box. Make sure that your wheels aren’t screwed on too tight; some rookies believe the tighter the better, but in reality, too much screwing can ultimately hurt your RC car and wear out your tire and motor quicker than usual. Make sure it’s snug, but don’t force the screws in after they start resisting you.

4. Learn proper maintenance

This simple remote car is an amateur construction that will give you plenty of fun but won’t last forever. Understanding proper maintenance is the key to helping it endure for long after it first hits the road, just like any car you drive in the gig economy. Always use canned air to dry out the interior should it get wet, for instance, and don’t forget to regularly lubricate your wheels, especially if you invested in an expensive set from a store. Reviewing common RV car maintenance mistakes will help you avoid the amateur errors that others have suffered from in the past.

Eventually, you may want to consider investing in a real drive shaft that will give your simple remote car better durability and the capability of handling harsher terrain without crashing or flipping upside down. Finally, it’s worth enlisting the help of some waterproof tape at the corners of your index box to help maintain its structural integrity and water-proof the electronics within.

Remember that this simple remote car is only your first taste of the world of RC car building, however, and that greater and more complex inventions await you yet. Before long, you’ll be tearing up the local asphalt with your stellar yet simple remote control car.