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  • Author Author: scrpn17w
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Knight Rider

scrpn17w

This is my build thread of turning my 1999 Honda Prelude into an emulation of KITT (Knight Industries Two Thousand) from the TV series "Knight Rider". There is going to be a lot of buttons, switches and various indicator lights. I'll add a small screen in the car for both interfacing with the Pi and displaying various data/Images/Videos. Then of course there are the 3 most recognizable traits of the car: The LED "scanner" on the front of the car, the unmistakable voice from the "AI" of the car, and the LED "visualizer" of the cars AI system. Being that I won't be able to make this quite as awe inspiring as the actual KITT and the car I'm using was made in 1999 I'm going to call it the K.I.N.N. (Knight Industries Nineteen Ninety-nine).

  • e14 Contributor
    e14 Contributor in reply to scrpn17w

    if you need any help relating to linux or programming, feel free to ask, myself and im sure others would only be happy enough to help.

     

    personally I would use python to program and use its "os" module to run standard linux bash commands that use aplay to play mp3 sound files. this kind of approach using python as glue logic to interact with existing tools can take much of the headache out of programming. - Sorry, i get carried away sometimes lol!

  • in reply to e14 Contributor

    That may be something I look into further down the road. I have a sensor board with a gyroscope and accelerometer and other sensors like that in it that would work perfectly for that kind of project. Combine that with the sensors already on board of most cars, add a small touch screen and maybe a heads up display for basic info and the KITT project could become a very futuristic machine. For now though, I'm going to stick with my list. It's a lot to do in a short amount of time considering I've never coded with Linux or the Pi.

  • e14 Contributor
    e14 Contributor in reply to scrpn17w

    Im glad to see that your still going with this! a personal in car computer is something everybody should have lol!!

     

    It would be great to see a project like this utilising real world functions, distance sensors on the front and back of the car would let the computer warn you about getting too close to obstacles when parking and that kind of thing!

     

    Also a quick thought about other sensors like accelerometers etc.. could provide info on what direction the car is facing aswell as things like how fast the car is accelerating or decelerating, the highest acceleration reached to date! instead of just the speed the car is moving there is plenty of other motion and vector data that can be gathered and displayed for cool factor!!

  • It's been awhile since I've updated and I haven't made any progress until today. I decided that with just under a month left it was time that I made time to get work done on the project. After reading through KITT's features on the Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KITT) I came up with 9 functions that I would include in my design. Those functions (and the controls/what they do) are listed below

     

     

     

    1. Turbo Boost
    • Red Arcade button and covered toggle switch
    • Plays “turbo boost” noises

     

    1. Anamorphic Equalizer
    • Blue LED Rocker switch
    • Turns on red LED “Scanner” at front of car
    • Plays “scanner” noise

     

    1. Oil Jets/Smoke Screen
    • Blue Arcade Button
    • Sprays “oil” from tank

     

    1. Emergency Braking System
    • Red LED Rocker switch
    • Plays “brake” sounds

     

    1. All Systems
    • Blue LED Rocker Switch
    • Plays “all systems go” sound clip

     

    1. Homing Device
    • Momentary Push Button
    • Plays “I’m on my way” sound clip

     

    1. Power
    • Covered toggle switch
    • Turns on Pi and associated systems

     

    1. Voice Modulator
    • Red LED rocker switch
    • Turns on LED screen for Visualizer
      • Base rows of green LEDs turn on

     

    1. Pursuit Modes
    • Red LED Rocker switch
    • Plays “Super Pursuit mode” sounds.
    • May use multiple switches/buttons to switch between normal/auto/pursuit/super pursuit modes

  • I did some digging around yesterday and came upon a project I started a few years ago. image

    It started life as an old joystick for a windows 95 PC. I bought it as a yard sale for a couple dollars and immediately went to work on disassembling it. I got rid of the base that it mounted to, removed the old wiring and machined an adapter to fit it on to the shifter of my car. I always wanted to use a flight stick as some sort of control in my car and even though it's not necessarily an item from the real KITT I thought it fit the scope of this project pretty well. Wiring and programming the controls should be fairly easy as all of the buttons (and even the thumb stick) are micro switches pre-mounted on a very basic circuit board.