Bumper Cars

Gocke and I once had the questionable idea to build gas powered bumper cars. We built some nice karts and hurt ourselves pretty badly. It was not a good idea.

After recovering from that adventure, I built some high-torque servos and adapted the karts to be remoted controlled.

Kate made a video about the bumper car: Bumper, the bumper car, feels lonely because he can't play on the jungle gym with all the other 20-something-year-old man children. He just doesn't know how to have fun with his wheels. Until one day he sees Turnip, the pretty white truck, having a ton of fun frolicking around a parking lot. Bumper mimics Turnip's moves and he finally realizes how much fun a little bumper car can have. Together they befriend a couple of redneck scarecrows who really show him how to drive fast!

Now I'm hellbent on building an RC system for full sized cars.

Appeared in PopSci August 2010
"It's Not Easy Being Greased" Video
Pictures

Project: Vin Marshall
Photo: Chris Wirth