The crew at the MIT student-run shop MITERS love their go karts, and when sitting around a pile of parts in the middle of the night on Saturday, there was only one thing to do: build a mini electric go kart in a day.
The parts for this were all taken from the jumble of parts lying around the shop: a few scooter wheels, some aluminum tubing, a 1×4″ piece of extrusion, a huge motor, and a ton of A123 cells were enough to ge tthe project started. They began by bolting the back wheel and motor to the aluminum extrusion and machining a simple steering mechanism.
The real fun began when they realized they could fill the aluminum extrusion with batteries, creating a 6S5P pack with the balance connectors and – after a few tries – the proper insulation. Combine all the parts with a Kelly motor controller and an old Brooks saddle, and the MITERS have a fairly light mini go kart that can cruise around the halls at about 15mph. Not much, but it was built in a single sleep-deprived night.
Video of the kart in action below.
15 mph? You wish…
It’ll do that fairly easily actually, I have a similar motor of lesser power than that pictured and it can just about pull my modified push-bike up to about 25-6mph.
Do this in EU and you get kicked from the school in a day.
EU as in any school in the European Union? Or, is “EU” an acronym for another university? I’ve seen some really zany stuff done by students in Europe.
In universities in the EU, you need to respect the rules and traditions. Any deviation form the norm is severely sanctioned. Even deviations of positive nature.
:O What Universities have you got in mind?
Something about cake and ale being served during exams at Oxford come to mind…
B^)
MIT is a little different to that, they want their students to think outside the mould and innovate! ;)
Indeed, I am not aware of any technical university that doesn’t allow students to do side projects using the schools resources, tough I am only aware of estonian schools.
I am a PhD student at ‘an EU University’ and I can confirm you are talking out of your ass. We dick around all the time, the professor doesn’t care as long as it doesn’t get in the way of us publishing at good conferences. I built a 3D printer with a colleague in our lab after hours, for example.
I don’t know where you go to school, but please don’t extrapolate your local culture to the rest of us, thank you.
All Tech men carry batteries…
That direct steering looks so twitchy and fun. (c:
No duct tape, arduino or hamster wheel?
the Brooks saddle makes it
What’s an A123 cell?
high quality lithium batteries from a company called A123. MIT had access to them, AFAIK they were only ever sold to industrial buyers otherwise.
Certainly have never seen them on this side of the world.
I was actually making a joke ;)
I know what A123 is. It is a _brand_, not a format. A123 makes LiPo batteries and cells in various different shapes and sizes.
The cells they used were A123 BRANDED 18650 Lithium cells. The original write up mentions this fact correctly, the write-up here does not. You cannot go about willy-nilly using a brand to describe a type of object (think sellotape, zamboni etc) when that brand has gone bankrupt.
Okay, I’m trying this again, maybe HaD doesn’t allow to “Paste and Run” a URL without some comment attached.
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=599316
Sheesh! Give us an edit button already! This was meant as a reply to danieljlouw’s comment above!