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Go X10 Speed Racer! 176

Posted by michael from the airbags-not-an-option dept.
BoomZilla writes ""Speedy" Shayne Barr races Nitro RS4 remote controlled Racecars competitively. These cars are nitro fueled, 1/10 scale, and they can go as fast as fifty miles per hour. To make his racing more interesting, he has hooked up an XCam2 to his racecar so that not only can he race the car, he can also view the race from the car's viewpoint after the race is over. Speedy's posted a number of videos on his website where he describes the construction process. The vid where his car winds up on its roof is most entertaining. Go Speed(y) Racer!"
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Go X10 Speed Racer! More

Go X10 Speed Racer!

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  • I've always wanted to do that... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Jim Ethanol ( 613572 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:13PM (#4493042) Homepage
    Now it's time to rig on to a kite at the beach ;)
    • Now it's time to rig on to a kite at the beach ;)

      That wouldn't exactly be a new idea, but I think the quality of the X10 cameras and shaking of the kite wouldn't give you much of a return on your investment. Maybe fly a model rocket in an arc, taking pictures?

    • Re:I've always wanted to do that... (Score:5, Funny)

      by pyr0 ( 120990 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @12:57AM (#4493393)
      That reminds me of something that happened to me once. Myself and a friend used to go to a Best Buy parking lot around midnight and race our R/C cars until around 4am. Anyway, once a cop saw us up there, and he drove up behind my R/C car with his lights and siren on. I thought I was in trouble for loitering in a parking lot late at night, but instead when he finally got to where I was, he opened his window and said "I've always wanted to do that! Pull over an R/C car." He even was nice enough to clock our cars at full speed with his radar gun.

      Aside from that, I would really like to try and mount a camera to my car. I tried it with a small camcorder once, but it flipped the car every time I tried to turn.

    • Some friends of mine were planning on making a battlebot with some X10's sending a live feed to a set of VR goggles.

      We could have done it, but it's hard enough to get my friends to focus long enough to watch a movie, let alone long enough to build a bot...

  • The real question is (Score:4, Funny)

    by madsenj37 ( 612413 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:14PM (#4493046)
    are the racing groupies 1/10 the size?

  • Added weight (Score:5, Interesting)

    by LeapingGnomeArs ( 561240 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:14PM (#4493048)
    I'm assuming that he is only using the camera for fun, not during an actual race? In RC car races the weight is kept the minimum possible, I don't think adding the 5.8 ounces for this camera is going to help him get on the podium.

    • Re:Added weight (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Loligo ( 12021 )
      >In RC car races the weight is kept the minimum
      >possible

      Might they have a weight minimum, kinda like full-scale racing?

      I know that in NASCAR and F1 and CART and the like, you have to weigh at least a certain minimum. To the point of ADDING weight to the cars if needed. Basically this translates into every car basically weighing EXACTLY this amount, but...

      I dunno anything about RC, do they have something like this?

      -l
      (...you must be at least this heavy to race this race...)

      • Re:Added weight (Score:3, Informative)

        by Bios_Hakr ( 68586 )
        >To the point of ADDING weight to the cars if needed.

        Keep in mind that NASCAR/CART remove as much weight as possible. Then they go back and add weight to specific places on the car to make it handel properly. By doing this, they can get the weight lower on the car to decrease the effect of centripital force twisting the body out of a turn.

      • Re:Added weight (Score:4, Informative)

        by bm_luethke ( 253362 ) <`luethkeb' `at' `comcast.net'> on Monday October 21, 2002 @04:37AM (#4493979)
        yes there is a minimum weight. ROAR sanctions US races (not sure about outside of US). Roar rules can be found here [roarracing.com], I don't know the minimum weight right offhand though (and it would matter what class you are running also)

    • Re:Added weight (Score:3, Insightful)

      by dirvish ( 574948 )
      If you read the site it says that his lap time with the cam was ~5 seconds slower than cars in races.

      Total weight of body with camera and batteries is 11.8 ounces. Total weight of body before camera was just under 4 ounces.

      Obviously it will be slower with a camera on top but I am sure the cam car is just for exhibition. He has lots of other cars [racenut.com] for races.
    • I'm wondering if weight can be trimmed off the camera. I don't have an X10 to disassemble, but I'm thinking there's extraneous weight in the base that could be removed, plus some of the casing (like around the lens) I think could be removed. Additionally, I don't know how much room is inside the car, but if the camera could be installed behind the windshield, it might cut down the drag.

  • drivers (Score:2, Funny)

    by jlechem ( 613317 )
    now all we need are 1/10 scale drivers. Can we say go speed midget racer?

  • x10.com (Score:5, Funny)

    by Uhh_Duh ( 125375 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:15PM (#4493054) Homepage

    I fail to see how can I use this to spy on girls in skimpy clothing. Is there a very tiny girl driving the tiny car I can watch somehow with the tiny camera?

    • Good Use (Score:3, Funny)

      by nuxx ( 10153 )
      Imagine the possibilities of a small car (4" long or so) with a small camera (at a fairly high frame rate) racing in and out of dressing rooms or in a shopping mall. Sure, there's the risk of it getting stepped on, so be sneaky.
      • >Imagine the possibilities [...]

        I'd be too worried about something popping up while it was trying to be stealthy.

        -l
  • What bloody format is that avi encoded in? I do a lot of video editing, but my Win2k system doesn't have the correct video codec.

  • If you can't make em fast... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by GreyWolf3000 ( 468618 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:18PM (#4493067) Journal
    Speedy" Shayne Barr races Nitro RS4 remote controlled Racecars competitively. These cars are nitro fueled, 1/10 scale, and they can go as fast as fifty miles per hour.

    Just make them look like they could go fast if they wanted. Perhaps an offset racing stripe, or a "v-tec" sticker. Check out the official Rice Boy Page [riceboypage.com] for more info.

    Ever seen a colorfully decalled-to-death crap car (usually a Honda Civic) with no power under the hood, but giving off the impression like it's powerful? Well, most of our remote controlled cars arent either and we have no hopes of competing with this guy. Just put stickers on it and any idion who sees the thing will definately be as impressed as he/she would be if it were the real deal.

    Note: "Rice boy" is not a derrogatory racist term; the website deals with this issue. Check it's FAQ before flaming.

    • Of course since the HPI nitro rs4 takes a .12 engine a quick search through towerhobbies shows that one can get as much a 1.2 horse power engine that weighs something like 7 ounces. Further one would see that the shell is painted lexan plastic. Putting these two things together you can easily get a nitro rs4 to hit the 50 MPH mark, indeed my nitro TC3 will nearly reach 60 MPH with a OS cv-r and a two speed clutch. So not only do you get a car that looks like it goes fast, it does go fast. (for someone that doesn't know typicall rc nitro fuel is 20% nitro methane, 20% lubricant (oils), and 60% alchohol so it's quite combustable. The two stroke engines in use typically have an effective RPM range of ~4000 idle to 35000-45000 top end for race quality motors)

    • For insulting questionable auto styling, I prefer beaterz.com [beaterz.com].

      Schwab

    • These cars ARE fast. (Score:3, Informative)

      by SaxMaster ( 95691 )
      I used to be into racing electric R/C trucks, but I have a friend that races an HPI Nitro RS4 like the ones on the site competatively. They are VERY fast. They can out-accellerate anything else on wheels just due to the laws of physics, and the gearing on my friend's RS4 is set up to top out at 60 MPH. Any more than that is pointless because you need to be able to see the car whiz on by. My point is you should KNOW something about what you're talking about before you start talking smack. 1.2 horsepower in a tiny little car is one HELL of a power to weight ratio that not even a Ferrari F50 could match.
      • I'd like to echo the fact that these things are powerful. After racing (non competitively) electric buggies (1/12 and 1/10) for years, I bought a 1/8 nitro buggie. After about 6 months of playing, I sold it for about half of what it was worth.

        The thing would accelerate so fast that the tires (superglued to the aluminum rims) would break the seals. I eventually moved to epoxy to stop that from happening.

        My next prob was accelerating out of a turn. I could accelerate off the start with no probs, but after letting off the throttle for a few seconds before a turn, a touch of breaks, then punch it out of a turn...all I'd see was my car doing doughnuts. I upgraded to 4wd and played with toe-in/camber to control that.

        Anyway, to keep it comfortable at full speed, I ended up adjusting the throttle to only open to halfway. About 2 weeks after I sold it, they guy was wa the track and he jumped the car over his mini-van. The thing was literally about 10 feet above the ground moving at about 50mph.

        I was glad to see that my car had gone to a loving home...And my eletric car was happy to get soem attention agian.
    • Used to love radio-controlled cars as a kid.

      I would always read in the catalog that the car would reach speeds of 60-70mph! Wow! I thought... that's awesome!

      Until the car arrived, and I quickly realized that they weren't going anywhere near that speed. ONLY THEN did I note the asterisk in the catalog where they specified "scale speeds" of 60-70mph. Nice Marketdroid double-speak, designed to fool a kid like me, and I fell for it. Talk about feeling cheated...

      If this one really, truly goes that fast (and not "scale speed"), that's pretty amazing for a model car.
    • My dad runs an R/C hobby shop.... the fastest recorded speed for an electric 1/10th scale car back when I worked for him (around 5 years ago) was an RC/10 clocked at 72MPH...

      Although I could see them being higher by now...

    • Re:If you can't make em fast... (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Speedy Shayne Barr races Nitro RS4 remote controlled Racecars competitively

      WTF, how can he race competitively? Wouldn't the pop up ads really slow him down?

      Just my .02 cubic inches.

      Beavis
  • Server is in its death throes... must be all the pervs who are clicking on the X10 ads and getting sent to his page and d/l the videos.

    Moral?

    videos + x10 + fast and furious RC cars = super slashdotting.

  • Now watch his web site go from 0 to 60Gb/month (Score:5, Funny)

    by KNicolson ( 147698 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:19PM (#4493070) Homepage
    ...in under 13 seconds. Sadly, no X-10 camera is available to see that resulting crash!
  • I've heard from people who build and race the electric cars that they can achieve speeds of 70mph. What scale are they?

    • Re:What scale is RC? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by coffeedreg ( 86096 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:50PM (#4493195)
      The fastest I've heard of a micro rc car was 56mph. That was a 1/24 scale modded ABC DTM car (modified with multiple batteries).

      Learn more at www.microrccenter.com
    • I don't really understand the obsession with fast RC cars. A couple of years ago, I built an HPI Super Nitro kit and ran it around the parking lot. It was fun. A few weeks later, I threw a $70 exhaust system on it, which increased the performance dramatically. Unfortunately, the damned thing became so fast that it was just about undrivable. Even in the biggest of parking lots, you could only run it for a few seconds before you had to cut power and turn to avoid a curb. With all this new speed, my car went through tires like mad and every crash was much more expensive.

      IMHO, R/C is a crazy money pit. The more you spend, the more you have to spend. I ended up giving the car to a friend when I could no longer justify spending $30 on repairs every time I drove it.

  • X10? I thought /. was better than that (Score:5, Funny)

    by Christianfreak ( 100697 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:21PM (#4493082) Homepage Journal
    How much money did you get for the X10 Ad? When are the really annoying flashing ones coming?

    Okay I'm only kidding. Actually those camera's look really cool, I'd probably get one if their business model didn't remind me of used car salesmen.

    I also want one of these little cars.
  • the site is on google http://216.239.51.100/search?q=cache:SlJc55fUhMQC: racenut.com/barrc/carcam.html+&hl=en&ie=UT F-8
  • stall....

    how could he put it on a car that is 22 cm long and 11 cm tall?

  • And here I was thinking that all those X10 popup adds were obnoxious and without a purpose.
  • read that initially as Go X-10 and think popup adds?

    And I thought I was immune to things on Slashdot startling me...
  • with a Tiny R/C Digi Q Cars [thinkgeek.com] and a KY-D29UCH 3-CCD COLOR CAMERA [jvc.com] not with quite as much success, but I promise not to give up.
  • I'm guessing the car can also be used to spy on women or protect the family...special offer only two days left!
  • be friendly to my poor .net server. but thank god for unlimited bandwidth per month. http://matt.yi.org/racer/ its only 3.5 adsl with 80 up. max ten connections so my i can still use my comp.

  • Wow...a legitimate use? (Score:4, Funny)

    by jwlidtnet ( 453355 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:36PM (#4493145)
    *pondering*

    So it isn't being used for porno? Or spying on someone? Or tawdry videoconferencing?

    I think this guy should be recognized more for finally discovering a legitimate use for one of those cameras than anything else.

    -D

    Unless the cars are NUDE, of course.

    • DUDE! (Score:2, Interesting)

      by cybercomm ( 557435 )
      He still can sneak up on someone! Like in that 007 movie, when Q uses a robot to sneak up on James bond while he is screwing the latest "bond chick" anyway now all the pervs will see this page and soon well have whole streets full of those cars. Oh the humanity!
      • A sweet hack would be to somehow mount one on a ZipZap [zipzap.com] sized car. Even if it was used for something as nefarious as upskirts, it's still be a sweet hack. Strapping one on the back of nitro car seems kinda easy.

  • Try again.. (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Here's one racer. [jerryshobbycenter.com]

    Oh, and this crap about how much time before you can hit submit after reply is bullshit.

  • How to make the 'Quicktime' movies run (Score:5, Informative)

    by bobdotorg ( 598873 ) on Sunday October 20, 2002 @11:44PM (#4493172)
    While the .avi played fine with QT6, the quicktime file did not.

    If you change the filetype and creator of the quicktime file to:
    VfW¥
    TVOD

    they'll work fine with Quicktime.

  • Cool idea (Score:2, Funny)

    by Joey7F ( 307495 )
    I guess the X10 car idea just sorta "popped up" ::dodging tomatos::

    --Joey
  • I guess posting a story with videos is just asking to be slashdotted.

  • Linking on slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tuffnut ( 618438 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @12:07AM (#4493241)
    I think it has really become a problem. Because for one, the victim didn't necessarily choose to be on Slashdot. Or for that matter even knows his server being ravaged by a million geeks. Slashdot's server is capable of handling the load, so what's stopping them from hosting a mirror on their site? With the exception of copyrights and such, I'm sure the admin would gladly have a mirror setup on slashdot in substitution for getting a $5k b/w bill.
    • With the exception of copyrights and such, I'm sure the admin would gladly have a mirror setup on slashdot in substitution for getting a $5k b/w bill.

      I agree the mirror thing is a good idea. But in this case I get the feeling this guy is happy with all the attention he is getting and probably won't even take that bandwidth bill himself. How many sales do you think X10 gets now that geeks think that these cameras are cool despite the way they are marketed. And why so many X10 picutures and references? Seems a little too much. Reminds me of low-budget soap operas in my country. They are just a long and somewhat interesting add, interrupted only by shorter less interesting adds. But people do watch them and bussinesses do pay sponsorships to get on the show.

  • camsoncars.com (Score:3, Funny)

    by bobdotorg ( 598873 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @12:08AM (#4493243)
    step 1. mount X-10 camera to RC car
    step 2. drive through a crowd of skirts
    step 3. ???
    step 4. Profit!

  • RC racing (Score:3, Interesting)

    by trybywrench ( 584843 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @12:15AM (#4493265)
    I use to do this kind of thing when i was in HS and actually had spare time. If you have never been to a 1/10 or 1/8 scale race i seriously advise checking it out. It is very cool. Also, the technology in these model cars is nothing short of awesome. The techniques used for battery matching, motor tuning, and suspension setup are insanely complex. Pick up an issue of RC Car Action at your local bookstore and flip through the pages. It's a great hobby if you got the time and $$.
  • Whenever Shayne shows off his fantastic little car, a nicely curved girl pops up with a commercial sign
    for X10... I read X10 has taken patent on this type of commercials... they call it Live Popups (TM)...
  • Speedy's posted a number of videos on his website where he describes the construction process. The vid where his car winds up on its roof is most entertaining. Go Speed(y) Racer!"

    Always makes me chuckle when there are videos on some guy's DSL posted on the front page
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Noooooooo! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Guppy06 ( 410832 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @12:44AM (#4493349)
    "he has hooked up an XCam2"

    He supported those pop-up bastards with his money? Say it ain't so!

  • "....as fast as fifty miles per hour."

    A lot of stock, commodity 1/10th scale electric RC cars can go 60 mph, out of the box. With modifications, much, MUCH faster. And that's not even getting into the gas-powered rigs.

    steve
    • haven't personally seen any cars out of the box that go 60... usually they go about 25MPH, which is faster than you think on that small of a car, especially considering those Tyco Turbo Hoppers in the 1980's went between 5-10MPH. And man do the parts fly off when you get a curb at 25. I had to pour $1000 into a car at dealer prices to get a car that could do 40mph... The local club's record was 48MPH, clocked with the ever so accurate measure of driving it from the back of a pickup and checking the speedometer.

      To get a car to go 60, you've gotta drain those 8.4volt batteries in a minute or two, and that'll kill even the best electric speed controllers after a few runs.

      Man, thinking back makes me want to go buy another kit sometime...

      • Re:a random thought... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Soulslayer ( 21435 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @04:21AM (#4493950) Homepage
        http://www.rccaraction.com/rc/articles/need_speed. asp

        From the above:

        "Our sister publication, Radio Control Nitro, featured Steve Pond's 101mph HPI Super Nitro RS4 (see the March 2001 issue). Prior to that, Cliff Lett's 24-cell Associated L3O Insane Speed Run car was clocked at 94mph at the Dominguez Hills Bicycle Velodrome in California."

        and

        "...on January 13, 2001 to break Guinness's published record and post a speed more befitting of an official world record title. The result? Legendary RC racer and Team Associated chief designer Cliff Lett spooled up his Factory Team TC3 to over 95mph and touched 111mph with an RC10 L30!"
  • "Speed Racer meets Racer X-10".

  • even more fun! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by gol64738 ( 225528 ) <ELIOT minus poet> on Monday October 21, 2002 @02:01AM (#4493558)
    what about mounting a cam on a remote control airplane, you know one of the one's that can do like 70 miles an hour.
    imagine how fun that would be!
    you could have your car passenger search ahead for speed traps on the freeway or you could even fly the plane to the point where you lose sight of it.

    ooh, with that right transmission control, one could fly drugs up from south america on a drone aircraft..
    • what about mounting a cam on a remote control airplane

      People already do this. Mostly for fun, however, I semi-recently read about an ecologist using a remote control electric plane (with cammera; IIRC, it was a modified Wingo or Tipsy) to observe tree top wild life in various jungle preserves. The range was something like 1 1/2 miles and was piloted by means of live video.

      ooh, with that right transmission control, one could fly drugs up from south america on a drone aircraft..

      This has been done for years now. Large R/C planes are loaded with drugs and flown over the Texas/Mexican boarder. They were discovered when crash remains were found and later they were caught on tape. Eventually, they were followed by helicopters. I don't know if this is still done.

  • Nitro's are pretty insane. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Shanep ( 68243 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @02:17AM (#4493595) Homepage
    I met up with a friend who wanted to see my 1/8th scale landmax Evo in action. He brought his little Tamiya electric so that we could play together...

    By the time I fueled my car and got it started, his batteries had run out. : )

    Once mine was running, he put his away in disgust. Anyone who's never seen Nitro RC in action has not a clue of the incredible performance.

    Mine gets up to 70kph with the single speed gearbox and 140kph(!) with the automatic 3 speed gearbox (which I wish I had).

    They can be finicky to tune though, even with a slight change in fuel.

    I get nervous every time I take it out and fire it up. Once I rather stupidly (in all the excitement) started the engine before switching on the transmitter. I pulled the rip cord and then WAAAHHHHH... off it took all on it's own, fully open (carb). Luckily I did remember to switch on the receiver so all I had to do was grab the transmitter and switch it on quickly to avoid slamming the thing into something.

    I like to think of it as an RC car that goes on 67% Indycar fuel, 15% dymamite, 18% lube. : )

    No matter where I take this thing, kids just come out of the woodwork from all directions, it's amazing what attention you get. People driving by stop and watch, kids or no kids. : )

  • I mean, what this guy has done is certainly a creative and dare I say worthy use of one of those nefarious X10 pervcams, but damn... Calling an Intel Indeo avi a QuickTime movie is pretty damn irritating, particularly given the fact that it won't [apple.com] ever [ligos.com] play on OS X without borking the creator codes [slashdot.org]. If you're lucky that'll work. And don't even get me started on divx. Just a thought to people who want videos posted somewhere like /. - think mpeg.
  • i did this with my digital camera... i'm not saying i'm the first to do so, but i've had it up for a little while.. they're really fun videos.. check them out on my website [snowontrees.net]

    the videos are located here [snowontrees.net]

    i have a few more.. i could email them to you or something if you really really like the two up there :D
  • i've got two videos up on my site [snowontrees.net] of the same thing.. i've had them up for a bit.. i'm not saying i'm the first to do this.. but they're fun videos [snowontrees.net] none the less...
  • Since I started using Mozilla's built-in popup blocking I haven't seen any of their delightful ads. It's good to hear they're still around.
  • have you checked out the specs [racenut.com] on these cars? they've modded them out more than i've done to my REAL car (yes,i drive an import [240SX]. no, i'm not a ricer. yes, all the parts i've put on are performance so far [swaybars, springs/adjustable struts, intake/headers/exhaust, chip, and matching cams])...they've probably spent more money, too...

  • X10 has tech support. Moreover, at least as far as this article implies, X10 has decent tech support! Hell with cameras, maybe these folks should write an OS. . .

  • I made a short film which is an homage to some of the great car chase scenes, except using only RC cars. It's called MiniMall Security. It's at diabolicalfilms.com [diabolicalfilms.com].

    As you can see in the barR/C videos, the sense of speed when you film a car that low to the ground is incredible.

    D

  • X10 Spam (Score:3, Funny)

    by macdaddy ( 38372 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @09:00AM (#4494930) Homepage Journal
    In a related story: in an official press release "Speedy" Shayne Barr proclaimed he would "never use email again". This comes after Speedy was bombarded with spam from X10 Inc after purchasing an XCam2.
    "I thought their popups were bad but after buying something from them, the amount of spam in my mail box has quadrupled overnight! I can't eat, I can't sleep. My children are teased at school as 'the offspring of the X-10 sucker'. We're thinking about moving to Hoboken, New Jersey and changing our family name to Clinton."

    Here's at Nakes Slashdot News, we'd just like to give our condolences to the Speedy family. Our thoughts and spam are with you.

    Coming up next on Heraldo Rivera:

    Meet the man behind the spam

    My wife left me because my internet pipe wasn't big enough

    cross-dressing transexual CTOs that use OutLook

    Don't touch that dial. We'll be right back

  • Nitro RS/4s and Micros... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by nooch ( 538215 ) <comicfu AT yahoo DOT com> on Monday October 21, 2002 @09:03AM (#4494947) Homepage

    My brother recently (a couple of months ago) put together his Nitro RS/4, and the thing is pretty damn fast. We started with a couple of Micro RS/4 kits (the 1/18th scale), battery powered all wheel drive cars. The micros are fun but your batteries start dying right away and you only have peak performance for a short while. Of course, a 6 cell pack makes for some fun. My uncle actually got us turned on to these, and his 1/18th scale micro with a nice engine and a one-way front diff. (dare I list the rest of the mods??)... well, he gets the little car up over 45mph. I will leave his big 1/8th scale cars out of this.

    My brother has been wanting to strap a camera on his Nitro, and has been looking for a good way to do it. I recommended against hooking the Canon GL-2 to the top. I jokingly suggested an X10, but am surprised, not to see it done, but to see it on the front page of /. Kick ass! These cars are a riot, and there are lots of cool hacks. You can get different bodies for the cars (not too expensive), and painting them is half the fun for me (I am not as good at making them fast, so I make them look cool). I would recommend checking out the HPI site [hpiracing.com], and check out the forum. There is quite a community surrounding these cars. There are even races for the micros here in Ann Arbor that I know of.

    I better shut up now! -J
  • if I thought it was new worthy I would have posted my own. I did this a long time ago with my R/C jeep. I even did it one step cooler. I raced by ONLY watching the TV. The jeep I have is an electric one so it didn't go so fast. The guys with the fast gas powered engines laughed at my pace. One of them let me move my camera to his car - then he slowed quite a bit after his billionth crash. It is a lot different driving from the drivers point of view vs from a grand stand.

  • what's with the mounting? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by chryptic ( 25254 ) on Monday October 21, 2002 @10:47AM (#4495921) Homepage
    I'm just wondering why he left the camera in the bulky casing?

    I've pulled one apart and rewired the AV/power to a longer cable so the small lense could be mounted apart from the bulky base.

    The transmitter itself is a single board with a low profile radio/shield.

    The antenna is a 2.4 Ghz directional. It can easily be replaced with an omni directional antana that will give a better transmition as well as lessen the impact on areodynamics.

    The batery pack consists of a small circuit board, the clips for 4xAA batteries, and a big bulky case. A lot of space could be saved by getting rid of the big ugly case.

    I think it may be possible to mount the whole camera behind the windshield.

    Just a thought.
  • More exciting is putting cameras on airplanes. Seeing something you are unable to see yourself is more exciting than the view from 2 inches off the ground.

    M@
  • Does anyone other than X10.com make a camera like this? I will never purchase from those clowns again. A couple of years ago, I tried to buy their X10 starter kit. I placed an order but they let me go for over a month without any communications before I finally called to enquire about the status my purchase (which I then cancelled).

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