May 26th: Finished initial power sources!

Since I have some experience designing PCBs for other projects, this time I decided to run the project off an ESP32 SoC instead of using a devkit. This took some research, since I had no experience working with SoC's before. After watching some videos and looking at a few tutorials online, I designed a usb power circuit for the ESP32, one of the main parts of the whole design. THen I went on to designa power circuit for the lipo input. i decided that using the lipo to power both the ESC's and the ESP32 was the best decision. When I was done, I ended up with this:

Next, I worked on choosing the parts for the RC car. I decided to do a single 3700Kv motor paired with an ESC and a 35 kg servo. I also decided to include a fan for thrust at the back of the car. This required another ESC and thus another connection to the ESP32. I then put their connections in KiCad and ended up with this:

Finally, I started adding some sensors to the RC Car to send back as telemetry, such as an accelerometer and ToF sensors to detect imminent collisions. This is something I need to work on next time. I also added some brake lights and headlights.

Total time spent: 5h

May 27th: Finalized Power Circuits And Added More Sensors + Outputs!

Today, I worked on fixing the wiring for the MPU6050 and the lights. I decided to have 4 sets of lights with 3 neopixels in each set, allowing me to have split front headlights and split brake lights. Instead of splitting my PCB, I decided to have the lights separate and instead run their wires into the PCB. I also added 2 ToF sensors for collision detection. I decided to use a breakout for those. It took me a while to figure out how to wire the SDA and SCL lines to the MCU since they need pull up resistors, but I figured it out. I also added a fan for a speed boost at the back. I am currently working on adding a hall effect sensor to measure RPM. I also added a way to read the voltage from the Lipo battery. This is my current schematic:

I also took some time to pick out parts:

Motor + ESC 2x Servo Lipo Splitter to power the Motor ESC, Fan ESC, and the MCU EDF Fan

I still have to add the telemetry and work on finishing the hall effect sensor. I currently am having a hard time trying to get the 5v from the hall effect sensor down to 3.3v since I'm new to voltage divider. I might end up using an IC for this.

Total time spent: 2h