Blog

Student Model Car Engineering

2009-04-04T11:23:35Z

The last week I found out about two school projects engineering model cars.

First, through Twitter, I found out about a high school who are building a gas engine powered 1:4 scale car from scratch as an educational project. They are just in the concept stages and getting information together. For the virtual design they will use Autodesk Inventor. They are looking for help on several issues, so have a look at their site and see if you can give them some tips!

Just a couple of days later I read a magazine article about a project in the UK to get high school students interested in engineering. CAD software company PTC and slot racing brand Scalextric put together a competition where students can design a slot car in Pro Engineer CAD software, build it, and then race it against other schools for a prize. Called Scalextric for Schools it is supported and promoted by Top Gear presenter James May.

Schools can get a free software license for the project and parts are available at a discount from Scalextric. 3D-Models of the standard parts (motor, wheels) are available for download to cut down on construction time. The lay-out of the track is known, so you can rebuild it to test your car and compare times with other competitors.

This initiative is a great and inexpensive way for students to get into the complete construction of a racing car. The cars are fairly simple in lay-out, but you have to come up with some good solutions to get the best performance from the chassis. Maybe some other companies can up this a bit and start an rc car construction competition for schools as a follow up series?

While writing about student engineering, I can't leave out the world wide racing series for students, Formula Student. It's also not rc, but a great way to get into racing and get some job experience. The winner is not just the team who finishes first. A whole range of subjects are rated, from the cars performance to how the team is managed to aquiring sponsors and engineering solutions. If you're studying engineering in some way and are interested in car racing, definately have a look at this series!

It looks like there is still a lot of interest from students to get into engineering, and companies who are willing to promote this even further. Who knows what great creations will come out of this in the future!

Nurnberg Toy Fair 2009

2009-02-09T14:25:28Z

This week the worlds largest Toy Fair is held Nurnberg, Germany. A lot of companies introduce new products at the show. Since I had to go there for some non rc related business and it is only 1,5 hours drive from Munich, I decided to take the oppertunity to check out the rc stands as well.

Definitely the biggest new trends were the CORR-style trucks like the Traxxas Slash and 1:8th scale cars with lipo/brushless electric power.

Just about every brand has at least one of the CORR-trucks now, and they come in all shapes and sizes. Gas and electric, 1:8th scale down to 1:16th with the new Traxxas Slash XLS, which looked really trick with cantilever shocks. I think a group of these cars would make some great indoor winter racing!

1:8th electric versions were all around; Associated, Losi, LRP. From now on also not limited to off-road anymore. French company DXF Competition showed an electric 1:8th on-road car. Looks like electric is the wave of the future, although there will always be a group of people who love the smell of nitro of course!

Also new from a couple of manufacturers are the 1:10th scale pan chassis touring cars of which a lot of people have high hopes. I'm not sure this class will help the racing community. A couple of people at the show already mentioned the racing scene is dying. There seems to be a big shift towards the hobby type trucks etc. which you can also see by the number of RTR kits on offer. A new racing class will only split up the already deminishing racing community. 1:12th scale pan cars are very similar and already established. Why kill off two existing catagories to start a new one where everybody has to invest in first? The future will tell.

For a full gallery of all the pictures I took at the show, follow this link.

Russian Touring Car Follow Up

2009-01-28T21:54:02Z

Finally there is an official word on the Russian touring car I reported on a while ago.

Pictures appeared on the internet for the last 2 years or so, and showed a really redical looking car. From the pictures it was hard to figure out any details though and information was scarce. Now the first official CAD images of the car designed by Oleg Babich have been unveiled on the website from the company that will be producing the car, Awesomatix.

The motor drives the longitudal drive shaft directly through a bevel gear assembly which hasn't been seen before on a production touring car. The biggest innovation however is the suspension. The upper suspension has a lot of resembance to a 1:12th scale front set-up. The lower arms are milled out of carbon sheet and pivots on balls instead of hinge pins. This car doesn't have the usual coil-over shocks, but some rotary shock system with torsional springs wrapped around them. The whole shock assembly is really small and can be fitted right on the chassis for a very low center of gravity. According to the site they offer a full range of adjustments. This setup looks very exotic, but from the released images you can't really tell how it all works. We'll have to wait till the first cars hit the market I guess!

I totally love the looks and innovative features of this car and can't wait to have a closer look! With the current trend towards brushless motors and lipo batteries I think this could spark a whole new wave of touring car evolution. I'm looking forward to what's coming!

EuroMold 2008

2009-01-12T00:00:00Z

I recently visited the EuroMold trade show in Frankfurt, Germany. This show features products an services for product development, from capturing the first idea, construction and simulation software tools, rapid prototyping, tool construction through to injection molding machines for actual production.

The things I was most impressive by on the show were the 5-axis mills and the 3D-printers. The mills create very complex shapes from metal blocks at an amazing speed, just fascinating to watch. The technology of 3D-printers has come a long way the last couple of years. Just like colour printers have seperate resevoirs, 3D-printers can now create parts from different materials. You can now put a lot of different functions in one part without any assembly, very cool stuff!

Some other products that I came across and found very interesting:

A company called Protomold can machine one-off parts from plastics. They also make injection molded parts for small series at relatively low cost. At €1700 and up, it's too expensive for hobbyists, but if you think you can find about a 100 people who would also need such a part, it can become a very viable option. Therefore also very interesting for open source hardware projects in my opinion.

Moldware showed off an iPhone application for viewing your Catia 3D-data. I was given a short demonstration of the viewer. It loaded quite big models pretty fast and was really snappy once the parts were on screen. You can rotate the parts any way you like and zoom in and out just like you would with images on the iPhone. They told me they are looking at developing versions for other operating systems like Windows Mobile or Blackberry. The next version will also be able to measure didtances between parts. Looks like a very cool product for people on the go. The product is mentioned on their website, but I couldn't find a download link or buy option. It's also not in the iTunes app-store at the moment of writing, so I presume it will come out soon.

Converting real life parts into virtual data is not always easy. There are now cheap 3D scanning possibilities, but the product that showed an interesting development was RhinoPhoto. It is a plug-in for a 3D software tool called Rhino. You put special stickers (targets) on strategic locations on the object you want to digitize. You then take several pictures of the object from different directions. Upload the pictures into the RhinoPhoto tool, and it calculates the 3D coordinates of the points and creates surfaces through the points! It was a pretty amazing demo to watch.

Just the plug-in costs €900, so it is still aimed at professionals, but expect to see this kind of technology available for a lot less in a couple of years.

All in all there is a lot happening in the rapid prototyping arena. Technology improves at an amazing speed and prices drop, so it might not be all that long beforeyou have a 3D printer sitting on your desk for a couple of hundred bucks.

If you're interested in visiting the show, have a look on their website. This year it will be held from the 2nd till the 5th of December.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-01T12:01:15Z

Open Source RC wishes everyone a happy, healthy, inspired and creative 2009!!!

Matsukura and Rheinard New Worlds Champs

2008-11-17T18:52:02Z

Last week the 2008 IFMAR on-road worlds were held in Bangkok, Thailand. Because of the many top racers and brands attending, some intense racing was expected and the event certainly didn't dissapoint!

Xray and Masami with Yokomo both wanted to finally win the touring car title, but in the end neither of them managed to fulfill their dream. The biggest surpises were two 15-year olds who impressed the paddock. Some big name manufacturers (Schumacher, Serpent) seemed to be completely absent. An other curiosity was the absence of American racers in the A-finals of both classes.

In 1:12th the races were dominated from the get-go bij the good old Associated team with their RC12R5, and they never looked back. 15-year old Naoto Matsukura impressed everyone by taking the TQ and winning the title at his first worlds. Thanks to a accident involving Matsukura in the first final, the decision who would be the new title holder was made in the final race which kept the tension high till the last minute.

The final 1:12 result:

1.	Naoto Matsukura	Japan	Associated
2.	Juho Levanen	Finland	Associated
3.	Hupo Honigl	Austria	CRC
4.	Marc Rheinard	Germany	Hot Bodies
5.	Hideo Kitizawa	Japan	Hot Bodies
6.	Jilles Groskamp	Netherlands	CRC
7.	Simo Ahoniemi	Finland	Corally
8.	Andy Moore	UK	Hot Bodies
9.	Teemu Leino	Finland	Xray
10.	Dasiuke Yoshioka	Japan	Hot Bodies

In the touring car class it looked like Hara was going to dominate the event after he TQ'd with some impressive runs in qualifying. In the end he only managed to finish 4th after some unfortunate events in the finals and very strong racing by Marc Rheinhard. Another 15-year old impressed the pits; Elliot Harper ended up in 5th place as the best Xray driver at his first worlds.

The final touring car result:

1.	Marc Rheinard	Germany	Tamiya
2.	Ronald Volker	Germany	Hot Bodies
3.	Masami Hirosaka	Japan	Yokomo
4.	Atsushi Hara	Japan	Hot Bodies
5.	Elliot Harper	UK	Xray
6.	Viktor Wilck	Sweden	Tamiya
7.	Andy Moore	UK	Hot Bodies
8.	Hayato Matsuzaki	Japan	Hot Bodies
9.	Meen Vejrak	Thailand	Xray
10.	Jilles Groskamp	Netherlands	Tamiya

If you would like to see video of the finals in full lenghth, get yourself over to this YouTube feed.

Some interesting behind the scenes footage and interviews can be found on the HPI website.

1/12th & 1/10th Worlds 2008

2008-11-09T20:17:36Z

Today the IFMAR 1/12th and 1/10th World Championships 2008 started in Bangkok, Thailand.

It looks like it will be a very close title fight this time. There are a lot of manufacturers and a mix of some really good experienced and some young and upcoming drivers racing. Teams from Tamiya, X-Ray, Hot Bodies, Yokomo, Associated, Schumacher and Serpent will be fighting for the title.

The race is run on an outdoor tarmac track which could also provide some surprises. Most races are run on carpet these days, so it will take some adjusting for the drivers, although most of them already clocked up quite a few practice laps on the track in the last couple of months. Furthermore, the weather could have a hand in the end result as the day before first practice some heavy showers already hit the track.

Some companies have already stated that they will be bringing new or updated cars which have been kept under wraps so far, so it will be interesting to see what improvements they have made. The biggest news so far being X-Ray who brought a brand new 12th scale car to the event and were setting some of the fastest lap times in practice with it so far.

You can follow all the action at the official worlds website, or you can go over to RedRC who have some great live coverage of the event.

3D Scanning

2008-10-29T19:39:34Z

One thing that could come in handy when you are constructing something in CAD is 3D-scanning. This is especially handy if you want to bring complex existing shapes into your CAD models. You might for instance want to scan a lexan body for your car, so you can check its fit on the chassis you designed. Or you carved a shape from clay, foam or wood and would like to modify it in CAD. You can also use it to overlay scans of machined parts with CAD data and check them against each other to see if you got what you designed. Trying to recreate surfaces in CAD will take a lot of work, and because it is very hard to measure curved 3D surfaces, the result probably won't be very accurate.

Up till now machines that could do 3D-scanning cost thousands of dollars and were therefore out of reach for the occasional hobby user. However, on a recent episode of the Revision3 show Systm they showed a software package that can scan 3D objects with the help of a simple web- or other digital camera and a laser line. You can be up and running with a very basic set-up for less then $100!

The basic version of the DAVID scanning software used is free. If you want more functionality you can buy a more advanced version. A webcam can be had for as little as $30, and a simple laser will cost you about the same. The system also needs two back walls with calibration points behind the object so the sofware can figure out where the object is in space. This shouldn't cost much and be easy to build yourself from some wood panels and printed calibration sheets.

If you are looking for the best results and have some more money to spend, you can get more accurate scans by upgrading to a higher resolution camera and a better quality laser. For such a setup you can easily spend around $500.

The way the scanning works is as follows:

Set up the back ground walls with the calibration points.
Put the camera in a stable fixed position.
Calibrate the software.
Put the item you want to scan in front of the walls.
Switch on the software.
Run the laser line over the object top to bottom.
The software captures the laser beam bouncing of the object with the camera and converts it to a 3D points cloud.
You're done!

You repeat this procedure on the object from several directions until you have captured all the surfaces of it. With the software package you can then put those scans together to recreate your virtual part.

Check out the episode of Systm where they demonstrate how to scan an object and convert and transfer it to CAD-software. They explain all the steps involved and show you how to scan an object and stitch the scans together to get a closed volume 3D model.

To download the scanning software, more extensive information about 3D scanning and setting up your system, a forum with lots of tips and tricks and more, go to the DAVID 3D Scanner website.

2008 IFMAR 1/8th Off-Road World Championships

2008-09-15T20:03:33Z

This week the 2008 IFMAR 1/8th Off-Road Fuel Buggy World Championships are held at "The Farm" in Charlotte, NC, USA.

This should be one of the biggest races seen in several years. There are a lot of manufacturers who have introduced 1/8th scale buggies since the last worlds. The field is therefore very diverse and with 180 racers at the start everybody wants a piece of the cake. The track looks very technical and the weather hasn't been too good so far so we might be in for some surprises.

If you would like to follow up on all the action, you have a number of options:

Radio Control Car Action magazine has regular updates here.
LiveRC will have TV style live coverage with video, pictures and reports on their site.
The race has its own website of course with schedules, reports and results.

XRAY Column 21 - Preparing for the Euro's

2008-08-28T20:29:10Z

Another insight into the work of an rc car developer. Juraj Hudy from XRay just published a new column in his series of articles on their site. Read all about how the XRay team prepares for this summers racing season and how much preparation and testing goes into building a race winning car. I always find it quite interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes!

Hop on over to the XRay-site for the full article.