The summer months are almost here for us, many dreaming of a warm afternoon floating in a calm lake. If you don’t [Kolins] However apparently his idea of a better time was controlling a full-sized inflated canoe not from a ship with a pair of Wars, but from the coast with an RC transmitter.
As can be seen in the video after the break, the fact that the dinghy is powered by a remotely powered electric trolling motor does not mean that it still cannot carry a human bus. In fact, with the addition of a Matek F405-Wing flight controller powered by ArduPilot’s rover variant, the boat can take you on a little trip to the lake when you return and relax.
We like that this project has taken the path of least resistance wherever possible. Instead of trying to rotate its own custom propulsion unit, and inevitably tackle the challenge of waterproofing it, [Kolins] Has built its system around a commercial trolling motor. A clever servo mechanism physically rotates the motor in the same way as a human operator does, while the speed is controlled by a suitable BFI ESC from Traxxas placed between the motor and its lead-acid battery.
The motor does not appear to have undergone any permanent mechanical or electrical changes, which makes it much easier to replicate the whole thing. We’ve talked about the relative rarity of low-cost robotic watercraft in the past, so it’s interesting to have such a “bolt-on” propulsion module that could turn a cheap inflated boat into an autonomous platform for research and testing.
Thanks [Neolker] For the tip