Dealing with Non-linearities in a 1:7 Autonomous Land Vehicle

Traxxas is a well-known brand in RC-car market and known to have produced innumerable amounts of RC-cars. One of the most well-known top speed cars of the company Traxxas called the Traxxas XO-1 is capable of reaching speeds of up to 100 mph, when unleashed to its full potential. The Traxxas X0-1 is a 1:7 scaled car that has been proven to be dimensionally equivalent to a C5 Corvette (Milani et al., Veh Syst Dyn 60(7):2511–2540, 2022). The following chapter provides a step-by-step guide on how to design and model the Traxxas XO-1 for running it as an autonomous vehicle (AV). In order to perform experiments that can cater advanced vehicle dynamic measurements, the gear used to stipulate this practically includes the use of National Instrument’s software and hardware together with an onboard servo motor (2075) and the Mamba Monster Extreme electronic speed controller. Software like LabVIEW and MATLAB have been used to drive the car autonomously to prove the accuracy and reliability of the system. Together with the power of dimensional analysis, the Traxxas XO-1 has been modelled as a 1:7 scaled passenger car equivalent to a passenger car the likes of Toyota Corolla or Camry. The chapter strives to comprehensively provide the exact through and thorough account of how a 1:7 scaled Traxxas XO-1 can be successfully used to perform advanced vehicle dynamic experiments in the field of engineering.