Matchbox Solar Car

From ISURC

Project

Alex S. made this sweet Solar Matchbox car from the kit used in the BEAM workshop.

The little solar truck that could.

Pimpin' my ride

Alex describes the original circuit as moving the car pretty slowly. For the solar popper kit The capacitors only stored enough juice to pop and to pop as frequently as possible. This car application, however, needs the motor to run for a long time so that the car can build momentum. Considering the solar engine description given at Solarbotics.net it seems reasonable to add more capacitors. Let's pile them on and see what happens.

Here is the circuit diagram:

This circuit was "breadboarded" up for easy experimentation.

BEAM 1381 kit breadboarded.

Then, we added two 4700uF capacitors. This basically trebled the storage capacity of the kit.

mmm Beefy - BEAM 1381 kit breadboarded with extra capacitance.

The resulting circuit took twice as long to charge and discharged for a longer time. This means that the car should be able to get up and go for longer, win the big race, and save the community center.

Links

Solarbotics.net - The 1381-based solar engine - great, great site. Go here, learn all. Come back, rock it.