A serious tongue in cheek question...

[ChallengerGuy]

So, I am showing a friend a picture of a fray track (the black track). And he asks, is there a computer car that you can race against? Which brought to mind the recent talk about the Google self driving 1:1 car.

Here's my point. I will believe Google's idea for a self driving car on the streets is a good idea when technology can deliver me a SLOT car that can "always" beat any human driver on a slot car track. Pick a scale. I would like to know if its possible for a computer-controlled car to beat a human in the various scales of slot car racing. Of course, HO would be the most difficult due to size of course, but there's my question. LOL.

PS - Just to be clear, I love technology but I find it odd that we are so focused on rushing a self driving car to the streets when we still can't make a car run on a slot car track and consistently beat a human. That's the challenge that would win me over to the "it's a good idea" camp. Maybe.

:)

[MrAdept]

I have looked at this occasionally as it would be great to have an automated partner or 2 to race against.
If you search for self drive slotcar -anki (to get rid of all the anki drive reviews) there are some interesting articles at various levels of control for the car, (bar coding the track pieces for example).
The one I liked was this one -
http://armdevices.net/2010/06/22/self-d ... freescale/

https://www.facebook.com/Slotcarsandtra ... 2063013041


Mark

[dreinecke]

I believe a computer would be faster. As soon as it "learns" the track it will brake and accelerate all all the right times. I don't believe a human could replicate the precision that a computer has that would make it quicker.

I'd have to noodle it more, but that is my answer to an interesting question.

[ChallengerGuy]

I've seen a few videos where a guy gets an arduino to control the slot car. I liked that concept. And sure, the concept of just being better than the worst driver is a good thing! LOL. And not that high of a hurdle either.

I was also thinking that with a google car, what people are not thinking about is all the congestion that will inevitably happen: I will have the car drive me to work and then circle the building for 8 hours until I am done. Oh, and send that other car in my driveway to go pick up my kids from school. You get where I am going with this right? If we think traffic is bad now with some of the lowest gas prices on record, imagine the congestion when we have all those currently idle cars just moving about on their own. It'll be Aurora Model Motoring but in real life.

As for a computer beating a human, I still think the application of technology to physically control (and beat) the best slot car drivers is something I will never see. But it's definitely a fun thing to argue about. I am just biased based on my experiences in Fray racing. Or maybe I am just racing against a bunch of androids disguised as organic humans?

[FootScoot]

Maybe I'm just old school, but a driverless car kind of freaks me out. What happens when the computer goes bonkers? Will it have built in backup computers like modern planes? I'll just stick with things the way they are. :)

[ElSecundo]

Not sure that comparing it to slot cars is valid. When it comes to 1:1 cars, we have several multi-billion dollar companies investing huge amounts of money into research to make cars drive better than humans. In the slot car world, there may be hundreds of thousands of dollars invested -- not billions.

When it comes to pass (and it will), the driverless car will be WAY more efficient in traffic, and WAY more efficient in parking situations. They'll also be subject to hacking and computer glitches, and 'enemies of the state' will have a hard time avoiding fatal accidents.

[Czar]

[HomeRacingWorld]

Nothing new really. When I race, it has been said my car was driverless.

Doing it for years. :)

[ElSecundo]

[Joe Stricklin]

Check out scorpious digital.. can run many ghost cars