Today, I present the Formula Ev3: a racing car! Personally I like this model for its very clean profile, which aside from the cables, resembles pretty well a Formula 1 racing car from the eighties. It also features a openable front trunk, under which the steering mechanism are visible.
The building instructions of the Formula Ev3 are described in the “Lego Mindstorms Ev3 Discovery Book” by Laurens Valk. Check the video below for a demo for the Formula Ev3 performances 🙂 !
Discover the Formula Ev3
The Formula Ev3 features two Ev3 Large Motors to drive the rear wheels, and one Ev3 Medium motor to steer the front wheels. The steering accuracy is good as the motor shaft is smartly constrained to cut its natural backlash.
The vehicle is also equipped with the Ev3 IR Sensor, which can be used as a receiver for the IR Remote commands or to seek the IR Beacon when this mode is selected.
If you have had a look at the video or at the gallery below, you certainly couldn’t have missed the Ev3 Color Sensor brilliantly used as the back red light with which the real cars are equipped. That’s really cool!
The C# code I wrote for this vehicle can be downloaded from GitHub and compiled with Visual Studio 2015 with the Monobrick firmware library. The program has two functionalities:
- you can use the four main buttons to drive the vehicle, or
- you can activate the IR Beacon mode with the fifth top button so that the vehicle starts following you.
Give it a try and let me know!
how do you build this? please email me how my email: [email protected]
Hello Austin,
Thank you very much for asking.
This model has been created by Laurens Valk and it’s described in his “The Lego Mindstorms Ev3 discovery book”, where you can find the complete building instructions of the “Formula Ev3: a racing robot”.
I use this page on Smallrobots.it to share with the community how I enjoyed to program the Formula Ev3 with the C# language and the Monobrick firmware library. My C# source code is freely available on GitHub at this link.
Should you need any hint, I’m here to help!
Cheers,
Riccardo.
How do you use the remote i have to switch chanel to steer right and left then switch to go forward or backward resulting in the car stoping all the time it’s ridiculous
Hello Rob,
Thank you very much for your question.
The default IR Channel is not changed in the code:
remoteCommand = ((FormulaEv3)robot).irSensor.ReadRemoteCommand();
switch (remoteCommand)
{
case 0:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Stop;
break;
case 1:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Left_Forward;
break;
case 3:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Right_Forward;
break;
case 5:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Straight_Forward;
break;
case 2:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Left_Backward;
break;
case 4:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Right_Backward;
break;
case 8:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Straight_Backward;
break;
case 9:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Beacon_ON;
beaconActivated = true;
break;
default:
((FormulaEv3)robot).direction = Direction.Stop;
break;
}
However operating mode does indeed change if the IR Beacon is turned ON or OFF.
To use the direct commands, the IR Beacon must be turned OFF on the IR Remote. Could you please check that status of the IR Beacon when you experience this behaviour and let me know?
Best regards,
Riccardo.
By the way i’m a mac user
can you give us steps of building this car
Hello suhad,
Thank you very much for asking.
This model has been created by Laurens Valk and it’s described in his “The Lego Mindstorms Ev3 discovery book”, where you can find the complete building instructions of the “Formula Ev3: a racing robot”.
I use this page on Smallrobots.it to share with the community how I enjoyed to program the Formula Ev3 with the C# language and the Monobrick firmware library. My C# source code is freely available on GitHub at this link.
Should you need any hint, I’m here to help!
Cheers,
Riccardo.