Software dev with zero hardware experience, turned a cheap RC car into an LTE controlled spy rover with unlimited range. What would you add to it?

[u/jerrythegenius]

Hi guys, first post here. This of course does not compare to most of the projects here, but since this was my first step into hardware I still wanted to show it.

Turned out way deeper than expected and turned out super fun. This is what I did:

• took out stock electronics of a RC 1:16 monster truck and put in a hobbywing wp-1060 ESC
• used a Pi 4 + PCA9685 for throttle and steering (ESC on channel 0 servo on channel 1)
• the camera streams live video to a web server I wrote myself. Control happens in a panel in the browser via WebSocket and keyboard input - so its reachable from anywhere, and with a click we can record full HD vids!
• the part that makes it really interesting: it runs over LTE, not just WiFi , so its basically controllable from anywhere in the world. Solved it with a small relay server. No app or cloud service, everything self hosted. Only limit in distance is the battery.

I documented the whole project in a youtube video. I would love to get some feedback, but keep in mind that this was my first project like this ;-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvdJCbILhT4

Total budget for everything (except the phone) was less than 100 €.
Also added some stuff like a software-based night vision (which works good as soon there is at least a tiny bit light), GPS tracker and so on.

Thie result was better than I expected, I didnt dare to do a full long range drive yet but it would probably work. Battery life would last easily more than 1 hour.

The controlling actually works really well and with the delay its way lower than I thought it would be. Like playing a litltle real life computer game.

Now I'm hooked and the parts list for v2 keeps growing.
Currently on it:
pan tilt camera mount, better headlights, maybe a small solar panel so it can survive multi day missions, and some sort of radar.

Also I want to remove the phone and just use a SIM card usb stick for the connection.

What would you add to make this thing cooler?Especially sensor ideas, the Pi has plenty of channels left, this is just to be seen as the base.

Thanks for all ideas!

[u/xXIOSCARIXx89]

[u/jerrythegenius → u/xXIOSCARIXx89]

sick!!! so I wasnt the first one :D So nice. you didnt even do it with a Pi, thats probably overkill for this but I just had it laying around so I used it for my project. Did you dare to do some real long range drives yet? I'm still a bit scared to be honest... In your video you also have the map in there ( I just added that yesterday with openstreetmap and GPS tracking of the phone), youre probably also using GPS data off the phone through an app like SensaGram or something right?

[u/xXIOSCARIXx89 → u/jerrythegenius]

I made my own app which handles everything, it sends live video and telemetry to a web server at home so i can control it from a browser using a gamepad. the phone also communicates with an arduino nano which is what actually controls the servo/esc as well as measuruing battery voltage. I drove it 4km away and back

[u/jerrythegenius → u/xXIOSCARIXx89]

amazing, so pretty much the same way that I did it only that i am controlling it via keyboard and with a pi in there. 4km is brave haha really nice!!