Been thinking that a good middle school STEM hook would be simple racing on an oval indoor (gymnasium basketball court) track delineated by large cardboard boxes (big enough to be detected by the SRF05 sonar proximity detectors) on the inside. I imagine a ten lap race. For six laps the kids control the cars with their radio transmitters. For four laps the cars are autonomous.

I think I can design a PBP template that would make coding the PIC reasonably simple. The template would contain the code state machine. The students' job would be to choose the steering/wheels commands associated with each state.

I have a question for you all.

If I were to add a black tape line around the track, what electronic gimmick might I put on an RC car to make it into a line follower? Is there a commercially available light source and photo cell combo similar to the pre-canned SRF05 sonar device?

Ken