Raspberry Pi RC Car

Question

Hi I am a high school student and I just purchased a raspberry pi and I want to make a RC car that i can control with my Iphone. So the reason I am here is because i want to know if anybody can tell me what i will need?(Any info would help, as I do not know much about this.)

Thank You in advance.

iagorubio · Answer

Hello Faizan, What you need is: A motor controller . Car motors should not be directly driven by the raspberry. A communication method . The easier is bluettoth, so a bluetooth dongle for your Pi. The software on the Pi and on the Phone. Optionally you can buy an already made chassis with motors. There are plenty of motor controller board out there to control the motor. Usually an H-Bridge IC to control the movement of the motor in both directions as you will want your car to have reverse. One of the cheapest and easiest controller I used on the Pi, is the Ryantek controller https://www.ryanteck.ltd.uk/rtk-000-001/ but it requires some easy soldering. If you don't want to solder any H-BRidge DC motor control board will work. I use to work with L298 based like this one https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9670 because they are sturdy and can use them in other projects with high voltages up to 35 V. The bluetooth dongle must be compatible with the Raspberry so take a look at here before to buy one. RPi USB Bluetooth adapters - eLinux.org The software on the Phone won't be that hard to build but it will depend on your programming. I know for Android there are already made bluetooth robot controllers you can just download and configure like this https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=pl.mobilerobots.vacuumcleanerrobot I don't know if there is something similar for iPhone but I would look for it before to start to code. The software on the Pi will depend a lot on the motor controller to use but usually is just to pulse some pins for direction and two PWM channels for speed. The chassis is optional, you can just screw everything motors and that on a thin board and it will be ok. Not long ago we had to made 10 cars for some robotic classes and we found good enough to buy cheap chinesse chassis like those Arduino Chassis: Electrical & Test Equipment | eBay but there are plenty of them there out like Magician Chassis: Amazon.com: Industrial & Scientific or a little better ones like Pololu - Dagu Rover 5 Tracked Chassis with Encoders or many others. You even have beasts like https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11056 if you fancy it but I would not spend that much on a chasis. The only thing to look on those chassis is they have motors, battery holders and some kind of screw in system so you don't need to drill holes on it. Take a look at this and if you have more doubts don't hesitate to come back and ask.