January 2004
Intermediate to advanced
348 pages
13h 33m
English
Content preview from Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks
Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
256
Part II: Advanced Hacks, Tools, and Techniques
Project Demo
Now it’s time to plug everything in and have some fun!
1. Plug the controller board into the RC vehicle power supply.
2. Connect the IR cannon and the IR sensor to the control board.
3. Switch on the board.
4. Drive towards your other, similarly equipped vehicle and let the duel-
ing begin!
Extensions
There are many additional ways to hack a radio-controlled car. Among the
more fun hacks are modifying the microprocessor software, or adding a
small wireless camera, a sound effects chip, another power supply to power
your own hardware from the car’s battery, or additional sensors.
Software
The version of the software included with this chapter has a few limitations.
For example, when you fire your IR LED at the other car, the software does
not scan the sensors at the same time, which keeps your car from being hit
when firing. This can, of course, be changed. I will leave it to you to dis-
cover this and other optimizations and make your own enhancements.
As mentioned previously, you can change how the cars behave when they’re
hit by modifying this hack’s hardware and software yourself. For example,
you could make one car less susceptible to damage than the other, which
is ideal for rivalries between an older and younger sibling, or between child
and parent.
Figure 13-19: Program the chip
Project Demo
ch13_rc.indd ...
Become an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
and much more.
Read now
Unlock full access
More than 5,000 organizations count on O’Reilly
O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.Julian F.
I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.Addison B.
I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.Amir M.
I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.