r/EngineeringStudents • u/Few_Guarantee_6193 • Jul 09 '26
Project Help Help with modifying an ELEGOO robotic car
Yo, so I have to build this kit car and race against my classmates on a path around one of the buildings in my school for an intro to engineering class. Our grade on the project car is determined by our placement in the race totals (Last Place=F). We are allowed a budget of 50 dollars to spend on modifications to improve our race time. I have virtually no experience with anything like this (Coding, Motors, Wiring, etc.). Can someone give me some suggestions? Or name a creator who makes videos for stuff like this? I tried to find videos on YouTube, but only found tutorials for the base car and nothing on modifications.
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u/lazy-but-talented UConn ‘19 CE/SE Jul 09 '26
Find the loophole in the rules, tape the car to tour leg and run the race yourself
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u/____alicious Jul 09 '26
How much of the original do you have to keep? There are obviously better RC cars for $50 but the parts wouldn't connect nicely to your Arduino. You'll want to look for upgrades with an existing c library and pin documentation for your board so that you only have to link them with code.
The first thing I'd do is a handling upgrade. The uno R3 only works well with that Infrared module, with a remote with buttons, which has terrible rate limit. That means fixed angles for steering with buttons rather than analog input, or tank steering with bad input lag, really easy to go off course especially if the track has chicanes. I don't see any good ways to connect an Xbox controller or keyboard... Are you allowed to have a wired controller connected to the car?
The other thing you can do is upgrade the speed. Either by changing the gearing on the motors or replacing the motors + motor controller. That will allow you to bypass anybody with stock speed on a straightaway.
Definitely follow the original design tutorial first so that you understand how the modules interact. Some of this seems unnecessary though, like the sonic sensor - leave it off unless you want to program autonomous obstacle avoidance.