For the mechanical side of the power wheels project, the brake was bent a little more to have the handle in a more convenient location. A rubber grip was also added to the end. The chain kept breaking during testing, so a smaller 16 tooth sprocket was changed out and a stronger # 35 roller chain was used. While the chain performed better there was not enough torque on the drive shaft to get the car going off the line. There was also a problem where the motor started to smoke after running for a few minutes. We got a bigger 5-inch sprocket with 40 teeth and the car performed much better the second day we tested it.

On the electrical side of the project a few things have changed. Since our steering has been made modular we needed the throttle wiring to also be modular. To that end we got some marine grade Water proof connectors. I spilt the cable at the end of the steering and added another set of connectors between it and the esc so now throttles are easily swapped out. 

The other big change made is reincorporating the power meter into the build, so we can monitor current draw and battery voltage.

Next thing on the to-do list is to insert our battery disconnect switch and clean things up a bit overall so we can begin proper testing of the system and find its limits. For now though, we did preliminary testing and everything seemed to be working great overall, a big improvement over last year’s design.