Flying RC Drift Car

Description

This is a drone disguised as an RC drift car. You even drive it with an RC car transmitter, making it extremely easy and fun to fly around. The airframe is fully 3D printed, and the electronics are standard off-the-shelf 5" miniquad parts. If you've successfully built one of my projects or a custom racing drone before, you should have no problem building this project.

Details

This project was heavily inspired by the EjoWerks Speeder project: https://sites.google.com/view/ejowerks-speeder/

Thanks to Erik for all of his awesome design work and laying the foundation down for this incredible configuration! I would not have been able to build my version without his help and feedback.

PARTS LIST:

Radio: https://amzn.to/3q4CVlv

Microcontroller: https://amzn.to/45scBlz

IMU: https://amzn.to/3q4ACyN

Wire (24AWG): https://amzn.to/3oyodmn

Wire (18AWG): https://amzn.to/3ow8KmS

Lidar: https://amzn.to/45uVa3J

Motors (lift): https://amzn.to/426Lppq

ESC (lift): https://amzn.to/3ouBCMh

Motor (pusher): https://amzn.to/3Wu1IM1

ESC (pusher): https://amzn.to/433fY0t

Props: https://amzn.to/3IGLCZD

Battery: https://amzn.to/3MVB4IQ

Camera: https://amzn.to/3MA0nOX

Video Transmitter: https://amzn.to/3MBR3tU

Video Goggles: https://amzn.to/436wugv

Antennas: https://amzn.to/3IC9BZS

M3 Heat Set inserts: https://amzn.to/3MC5kXE

Magnets: https://amzn.to/3WxePff

Foam Tape: https://amzn.to/3OG8LiU

3D Print Filament: https://amzn.to/3oxPyVG

All of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. I receive a small commission for every product purchased at absolutely no cost to you.

ASSEMBLY INSTRUCTIONS:

Please see the INSTRUCTIONS.pdf in the 'Files' section of this page.

FLIGHT CONTROLLER:

Any drone flight controller will work for this project since it is just a quadcopter with a pusher prop, but I can not offer any help in getting that, any altitude hold capability, or control via RC car transmitter set up. You'll be on your own! But I am providing the exact same code that I fly on my version that includes all of the functionality mentioned above, which is a slightly modified version of my generic flight control code, dRehmFlight. You can access the modified version for this project here: https://github.com/nickrehm/dRehmFlight-LandSpeeder

Please read the INSTRUCTIONS.pdf in the 'Files' section of this page to fully understand how to set this up and get flying.

This project is released under the CERN open hardware license (strongly reciprocal): Home | CERN Open Hardware Licence

By using this project or files contained within, you agree to adhere to the terms within the CERN-OHL-S license.

Files

INSTRUCTIONS.pdf

Full instructions to get you from 3D printer filament to first flight

Adobe Portable Document Format - 624.78 kB - 05/26/2023 at 14:11

Preview

speeder_bottom.STL

100% infill

Standard Tesselated Geometry - 1.53 MB - 05/29/2023 at 21:37

Download

speeder_top.STL

100% infill

Standard Tesselated Geometry - 1.08 MB - 05/29/2023 at 21:37

Download

speeder_cover.STL

100% infill

Standard Tesselated Geometry - 257.60 kB - 05/29/2023 at 21:37

Download

speeder_side_panel_X2.STL

100% infill, print 2

Standard Tesselated Geometry - 12.58 kB - 05/26/2023 at 03:20

Download

Discussions

albert1922 wrote 12/04/2023 at 18:57

Hello Nick,

I am using the same TF mini plus laser rangefinder on project of my own in order to get accurate altitude sensing, and I was wondering, is the UART checksum expected to fail so frequently (like one in 5 data packets)? Did you see the same behavior when first playing around with the sensor? I'm using the same arduino library you are using.

For example, running the example script in the arduino library:

10:54:43.246 -> Status: CHECKSUM

10:54:43.246 -> Data: 59 59 02 00 BA 10 C0 09 E7

10:54:43.246 -> Status: CHECKSUM

10:54:43.246 -> Data: 59 59 02 00 BB 10 60 09 D8

10:54:43.246 -> Dist:0002cm Flux:04281 Temp:44C

10:54:43.278 -> Dist:0002cm Flux:04282 Temp:44C

10:54:43.278 -> Dist:0002cm Flux:04271 Temp:44C

10:54:43.278 -> Status: CHECKSUM

10:54:43.278 -> Data: 59 59 02 00 70 10 60 09 E5

10:54:43.317 -> Status: CHECKSUM

10:54:43.317 -> Data: 59 59 02 00 B7 10 C0 09 E4

10:54:43.317 -> Status: CHECKSUM

10:54:43.317 -> Data: 59 59 02 00 BC 10 60 09 D9

10:54:43.317 -> Dist:0002cm Flux:04279 Temp:44C

10:54:43.354 -> Dist:0002cm Flux:04281 Temp:44C

Are you sure? yes | no

Tim Good wrote 10/12/2023 at 20:42

I've got the parts printed I have a question about how you mount the rear thruster motor. Seems like that rear bulkhead should just be part of the bottom half. As it is now, you can mount the lower screws but then getting to the upper screws for the top half seems like a bit of a challenge.

Can you post a STEP file for the top and bottom so I could mod them?

Are you sure? yes | no

Nick Rehm wrote 10/17/2023 at 20:13

Printing will be a challenge with part of the motor mount protruding out of the flat face as it is currently sliced. Try mounting the motor to the lower piece first, then slide screws through the top piece's mounting holes and lower it down. A long screwdriver can get in there to tighten at least one of the upper motor mount screws. It's a little tricky, but you only need to do it once

Are you sure? yes | no

Tim Good wrote 10/18/2023 at 02:23

True but my thought was to make that rear bulkhead a single piece that you would glue in to the bottom half.

Thanks for the tip though. I'll try that with the first one.

Are you sure? yes | no

superdave42 wrote 06/23/2023 at 23:51

Hi @Nick Rehm This is super cool . How much work would be involved in adding an Optical-Flow sensor for Lateral position hold ? I'm a mechanical designer and not Savvy in creating code, but I can work with code and cut/paste it in and tweak it.
Since this flies close to the ground I think a optical Flow sensor makes sense to hold it's position until you give throttle. I know it is something that needs tuning etc and I'm willing to put the work in.

I'm almost finished designing a custom frame for this and was thinking about leaving space for an Optical flow sensor near the Lidar.

Thank you so much for making this avail. I was always able to make the frames but never code the fun stuff.
Have an Awesome weekend ,

SuperDave42

Are you sure? yes | no

Nick Rehm wrote 06/29/2023 at 17:45

Check out my phonedrone bicopter project--I used an optical flow sensor for position keeping on that with moderate success. It would be fairly easy to take that concept and map the position (or rather: zero-velocity) controller to the throttle position such that it only engages when throttle is at idle

Are you sure? yes | no

Cris V wrote 06/12/2023 at 19:13

Are you interested in selling built ready to fly kits? If so I am interested in buying.

Are you sure? yes | no

Tim Good wrote 06/11/2023 at 11:48

Very, very cool!

What about a 5th Element Korbin Dallas Taxi and Police Car body to fit over this? There's a couple nice models over on Cults3D, come up with a lightweight shell somehow?

Are you sure? yes | no

Chris wrote 06/09/2023 at 20:25

Afternoon - any chance you happen to have a version that could be printed on a 250x250 bed? I am willing to try and chop out a few mm in Tinkercad to make it fit, but pretty sure it would lose its lovely looks. Thanks!

Are you sure? yes | no

Nick Rehm wrote 06/10/2023 at 20:51

Scale the whole thing down 75% which will give you 12x12mm motor mounting holes, close to 20x20mm flight controller stack. Could easily run a 3" 3s setup with some slight modifications to fit the lidar

Are you sure? yes | no

Chris wrote 06/10/2023 at 23:27

Thanks! I'll give it a go. It's a great project!

Are you sure? yes | no

adam.trzaskowski87 wrote 06/15/2023 at 18:28

You can also chop it into smaller pieces in the 3D printer slicer software and glue them together afterwards - this is what I am doing. No need to modify the original project.

Are you sure? yes | no

Darcsyde wrote 05/31/2023 at 09:40

while I LOVE this project do you know where I can get the more ‘geometric/futuristic’ body files that are on the EjoWerks quad? They aren’t on his site anywhere that I could find

thx

Are you sure? yes | no

Nick Rehm wrote 06/02/2023 at 20:03

Maybe try contacting Erik through his website to see if he'd be willing to share files: The EjoWerks Speeder - Contact (google.com)

Are you sure? yes | no

Dan Maloney wrote 05/26/2023 at 16:47

Hi Nick --

Another great project, thanks for sharing. I wrote this one up for the blog, should post soon. Thanks!

Are you sure? yes | no

Flying RC Drift Car

Description

Details