Building the FASTEST Self Driving RC Car

I built a self-driving RC Car that can follow racing lines and then tried to race it as fast as possible without crashing it. This time, it is WAY faster than anything you've seen in the previous video.

Also, I'm looking for a Fall 2023 software internship, so if you're hiring, would love to get in touch. I built this entire self-driving car myself, imagine what I can do for your company 👀

My notes:

Credits

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MY SOCIALS

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Subscribers at the time of uploading: 5,371
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ABOUT ME
I'm Steven, a university student currently studying Software Engineering at the University of Waterloo. I like to build cool things with code. I started this YouTube channel to share my love for learning and engineering with the world. I do everything ranging from electronics, CAD, control theory, programming, 3D printing, physics, and design.

My ultimate goal is to be able to make anything that I want. I'm working towards this by building increasingly difficult engineering projects that push the limits of my knowledge. Consider subscribing if you would like to follow my journey and learn alongside me as a student of the universe!

#stevengong #selfdrivingcar #fpvracing #rccar

[stevengongg]

Thank you all for the support this past month, I really appreciate it! I got loads of exciting projects planned, so make sure to subscribe and turn on the notification bell so you don't miss out on my new videos :))

[johng]

i’d love to see this self driving car race against some hobbyists on an actual track

[Pythnn]

If you really want to hate fine tuning, you could even start introducing slip angle, as on lower grip surfaces like polished concrete it can be faster to be putting power down earlier into corners and letting the tail of the car kick out a little bit. It would require gyros (which could also help with the oscillations at high speeds) but could also increase corner entry and exit speeds a fair bit

[IngmarSolissa]

In the last few clips, the gear mesh sounds awfully tight. Also you can get better tires for it, so it does not slide as much. Final advice, the stock Traxxas servo sucks in keeping position imo, it's the first thing I advice people to change.

I'm new to programming, so no idea how that part works (yet). But been racing and working on rc cars for the last 15 years. Love these video's, gets me excited

[npsit]

To be fair to you, people have other senses to rely on when driving. You just have the LIDAR. People can feel when a car is losing grip or how hard they're accelerating or braking or how close they are to something. You've done a really great job with limited sensors on your vehicle.

[CrueMusic]

Absolutely epic! This motivates me to start a similar project

[Habberplabb]

Dope project! I'll be on the lookout for follow ups.

An unwarranted thought: You can probably squeeze out more performance from your controller with something like a model predictive controller with constraints for following the racing line, vehicle dynamics and local obstacle avoidance in your lidar map

[Videolinquency]

If the government had been able to understand how fascinating this is, they would no doubt have taxed it. Thanks a lot for the ride!

[wanderingcameraguy]

As an engineer. I absolutely love this and I am inspired to make my own.

[billybagins]

Bro u basically copied this entire thing from the MIT 6.141 class on robotics (now titled 6.4200). Please mention that.

[frfrongong]

You should totally make a drone that follows it around like a third person view racing game

[fynnjackson]

For those floors I’d recommend slicks they have a higher contact patch than gridded tyres although slicks aren’t great for anything other than smooth surfaces. Also reducing the sensitivity or speed of steering to reduce instability

[gkelly]

UWaterloo! Those new buildings have a lot more windows than the previous uh... 'aesthetic'. This is such a cool project. I remember trying to write the firmware for a fully autonomous drag racer one year in-between exams. It didn't go well! Your results are awesome!

[Alien_Jenkins]

Maybe it's worth making a "safety square" around the car so that it avoids obstacles in priority over the trajectory of the track

[TaiViinikka]

Steven, I'm wondering if the LIDAR is doing anything during your speed runs, or if it's just used to help build the map? It seems to me you are doing autonomous driving via a sort of multi-stage process where the vehicle doesn't have any capacity to respond to obstacles, changing track conditions, changing internal mechanical (like gears eroding or tire wear.) Don't get me wrong, it *STILL* looks damned hard and we're enjoying the details you're sharing! I think it might be helpful to spell out for the viewers that this is (self)-mapped autonomous rather than real-time autonomous driving.

Also, if that LIDAR is a snap-on module and isn't doing anything during racing, maybe pull it off and save your $1500. :)

Please let me know if I've misinterpreted your process. It looks super fun either way. Glad you had some friends to help out with the 2am laps.

[blacklangster]

Also! A great addition would be slick tires for more grip on this smooth floor

[gracehopper]

I'm making a racing game, your notes are a LIFESAVER my man. Love the videos, I'll be following and not just to scoop more insight.

[renatobfa]

Congrats!!! First thing, in my opinion, would have been to change the stock tires. There are some that are so much grippier then those, and would make the car feel much more precise.

[OniKidou]

As someone who works in the field of autonomous vehicles, I have to say you did a banger of a job with the localization/mapping, and programming the annotations for the RC car to be able to race around the hallways like a pro. I can't wait to see it do more though, like detecting and avoiding obstacles.

[ironman]

i noticed in your optimization parameters you didn't include the car mass/inertia, that can help reduce the unplanned overshoots (if your PID is optimal anyways)