The Autonomous Drifter: Data

Data & Observations
           Now that the autonomous drifter is completed and ready to go, let's give it a shot. The test video shows the connections necessary to transmit correctly as well as manual & auto drift modes that the car has. Take a look:


           I only had the chance to make one video this time, but I feel it demonstrates the basic idea that the project stands for. Control over the car is sketchy at best, but again its only a cheap $20 toy car, so expectations shouldn't be very high, however this project shows how far you can go with even cheap technology like this. Work for another hour or two and you could easily be controlling the car over the internet or via sms.

Issues & Problems
           A main problem with the auto drift mode was that the serial communication would fall into the error region and the data wouldn't be transmitted correctly. This was fixed by having the script send "aaaa" instead of a which ensured the receive buffer on the PIC had the 8-bit ascii code for 'a' for sure.
           Another issue was that the learning curve for controlling the vehicle was a tad steeper than conventional controls, for manual mode. Since left and right were actually forward left and right. A few minutes playing with it and you're having just as fun. You may have noticed I crashed the car in manual mode...=D its fun though.



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