When we heard about electric RC cars, we tend to think first of the toy cars that we can maneuver or control on the racetrack. In fact, the number of people collecting these toys is growing day by day. Kids are no longer the ones that are excited to play these miniature cars. Even adults have made playing these cars as their hobby. But who can blame them? The concept behind this electric type of toys is very interesting. It gives the user the liberty to control it from a distance. But have you ever thought of riding an electric RC vehicle one of these days. That might some impossible for now but a lot of people are now entertaining this idea of applying the concept of the electric RC toy cars to the real ones.
Now, how soon will full-size cars become electric RC Cars? It has started happening! Although today’s full size cars cannot be run exclusively as electric RC cars, there are many technological innovations utilizing the principles for simple processes and also for car designs. Many new cars today are equipped with keyless locks and ignition, enabling the driver to lock, unlock, turn on and off engines, lights and alarm systems. Cars with these details generally use a key fob shaped remote. A more recent innovation utilizes Bluetooth and smart phone technology to perform the locking and engine start functions in a regular car.
Intelligent parking systems are another innovation that is being added to the function of the regular cars. The first automatic parallel parking system was introduced in 2003 by a Japanese car manufacturer followed by other Japanese and German car companies in 2007 and 2009. These systems also use a key fob shaped remote to activate the system. Other new tech ideas have included accident avoidance systems that rely on car sensors to identify drifting into another lane or getting too close to another vehicle or hazard. This is an important innovation for the distracted or impaired driving. However they do not replace the driver’s responsibility.
German car manufacturers currently use full size remote run prototypes during the design process. The advantage of this system is that a remote electronics can more precisely make changes than a test driver. Electronic systems are used to evaluate steering dynamics to make design improvements in car handling and safety. Improved steering dynamics will bring the world closer to electric RC cars becoming a viable option for the road.
Although remote controlled gliders and airplanes are being used currently by the military, there are several obstacles to using full sized remote control cars on the road. Part of this is due to the unpredictability of human drivers on the road. The other obstacles are legal as local laws are not quite ready for the remote vehicle technology. In the meantime, car manufacturers are continuing with improvements to make cars more automatic and less dependent on the human driver. For now, electric RC cars can be used as a toy or hobby or in car engineering research.