Power Wheels Jeep Makes An Awesome R/C Car

powerwheels-remote-control

[Will] from RevoltLab wrote in to share part one of a cool project he is working on right now, a remote-controlled mobile rocket launcher. Before you run off and call the Department of Homeland Security, he says that the launcher will be used for personal hobby rockets, which are typically considered mostly harmless.

The first part of the build is mostly concerned with obtaining a Power Wheels car and tweaking it to be driven remotely. After stripping out most of the odds and ends out of a Barbie Jeep he found via Craigslist, he added a small hobby servo under the dashboard to actuate the pedal. A larger (and much more expensive) servo was attached to the Jeep’s steering bar, allowing [Will] to easily turn the wheels with the flick of a switch.

With the mechanical bits out of the way, he installed an R/C receiver and took to the streets lawn with his creation.

The car seems to handle pretty well, and although the price of the components quickly start to add up, we’d be more than happy to spend that kind of cash for an R/C car that size!

Continue reading to watch a short video of the Jeep in action, and be sure to check Revolt Labs’ site often to follow [Will’s] progress.

Continue reading “Power Wheels Jeep Makes An Awesome R/C Car”

Improving A Motorized Toy

[Dan Fruzzetti’s] daughter was delighted to get a motorized vehicle from her Grandparents, but [Dan] was unimpressed with the stock features. The lead-acid battery supplied remarkable life between charges, but the vehicle only had one feature: a go button that routed juice to the bipolar motor. After the break we’ll look at his improvements to the drive train, steering, and cosmetics.

Continue reading “Improving A Motorized Toy”

Remotely Control Your Crappy Car (dangerously)

Here’s one that brings back that giddy feeling we got when the original episodes of thebroken were posted all those years ago. The lunatics over at Waterloo Labs have altered a beat-up Oldsmobile for remote control via laptop, iPhone, and…. wait for it… Power Wheels.

Brake and gas pedals are actuated using a wrench connected to a motor bolted to the floorboards of the car. The steering wheel has been replaced with a gear and connected to a motor using a motorcycle chain. Much like the van we saw last month, an iPhone app has been written to wirelessly control the car of doom. This leads to some car surfing and ghost riding the whip in the video after the break.

To our delight, they’ve also implement the most unorthodox automotive interface yet, Power Wheels. A chain has been added to measure the orientation of the toy steering wheel, and an optical encoder is used to measure the speed of the tiny electric vehicle. It looks like it doesn’t do the best job of translating to a full size vehicle, but it maxes out their style points.

Continue reading “Remotely Control Your Crappy Car (dangerously)”