# The Frankenstein Car is here! How a College Kid Made His Honda Civic Self-Driving for $700



## Retired Senior (Sep 12, 2016)

*This Retired Senior (ME!) is now truly afraid... when kids start building their own driverless cars, and take rides in them for fun...the writing is on the wall. I remember going to 90 Acres Park on the border of Fairfield, Bridgeport and Trumbull in the 1960s and watching rocket enthusiasts send their rockets soaring into space. I also recall the kids with the remote controlled planes and helicopters playing with their gas powered toys... Who knew that these toys would - in time - evolve into today's military drones?









http://us11.campaign-archive2.com/?u=47c1a9cec9749a8f8cbc83e78&id=23c3b111e0&e=70d717bde8

The Rise of DIY Autonomous Cars
*
If a Tesla's too expensive, why not fit self-driving capabilities to your own car. Our own Tom Simonite reports that some people are starting to use off-the-shelf components and open source software to imbue their vehicles with Autopilot-like features. The mods are based on plans made available by autonomy start-up Comma.ai, which released code after its technology, intended for sale, was questioned by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. There appears to be little stopping consumers from making such tweaks to their vehicles-other than their own limits on personal safety.

*Full article*
*Intelligent Machines*
*How a College Kid Made His Honda Civic Self-Driving for $700*

Who needs a Tesla when you can build your own automated copilot using free hardware designs and software available online?


by Tom Simonite
February 21, 2017
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/...elf-driving-for-700/?set=603690#disqus_thread

Brevan Jorgenson's grandma kept her cool when he took her for a nighttime spin in the Honda Civic he's modified to drive itself on the highway. A homemade device in place of the rear-view mirror can control the brakes, accelerator, and steering, and it uses a camera to identify road markings and other cars.

"She wasn't really flabbergasted-I think because she's seen so much from technology by now," says Jorgenson, a senior at the University of Nebraska, Omaha. Others are more wary of the system, which he built using plans and software downloaded from the Internet, plus about $700 in parts. Jorgenson says the fact that he closely supervises his homebrew autopilot hasn't convinced his girlfriend to trust the gadget's driving. "She's worried it's going to crash the car," he says.

Many tech and auto companies have begun testing modified cars on the road in recent years. Jorgenson's vehicle is in the vanguard of a more ragged, grassroots test fleet taking shape as tinkerers around the world strive to upgrade their own vehicles with computing gear that can share driving duties.

Motivation comes from the fun and challenge of getting the technology working-and the prospect of making driving easier. Kiki Jewell, who set out to make her Chevy Bolt self-driving as a learning exercise, says her spouse has been strongly supportive, partly out of self-interest. "My husband's happy I'm interested to ease his commute," says Jewell, who lives in the Bay Area.

Jewell and Jorgenson's projects were enabled by a fit of pique last October by the founder of Comma.ai, a San Francisco startup that was developing a $999 device that could upgrade certain vehicles to steer themselves on the highway and follow stop-and-go traffic. Founder George Hotz abruptly cancelled plans to launch the product after receiving a letter asking questions about its functionality from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In November, he released the company's hardware designs and software for free, saying he wanted to empower researchers and hobbyists. (Hotz didn't respond to requests to talk about his strategy.)









College senior Brevan Jorgenson's car can steer itself on the highway thanks to this device he built and installed using $700 in parts.
Jorgenson set about ordering the parts needed to build up Comma's device, the Neo, the same day Hotz dumped the plans online. He had been following Comma's fortunes, and he happened to own a 2016 Honda Civic, one of the two models supported by the company's software (the other is the 2016 Acura ILX).

A Neo is built from a OnePlus 3 smartphone equipped with Comma's now-free Openpilot software, a circuit board that connects the device to the car's electronics, and a 3-D-printed case. Jorgenson got the case printed by an online service and soldered the board together himself.

He first put his life in the device's hands in late January after an evening college class. "It was dark on the interstate, and I tested it by myself because I figured if anything went wrong I didn't want anybody else in the car," says Jorgenson. "It worked phenomenally." Subsequent tests revealed that the Neo would inexplicably pull to the right sometimes, but a software update released by Comma quickly fixed that. Now fully working, the system is similar in capabilities to the initial version of Tesla's AutoPilot (see "10 Breakthrough Technologies: Tesla AutoPilot").
Article continues... had to edit it to fit space requirements


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## Maven (Feb 9, 2017)

Wadda wanna bet that half a dozen car companies are looking at this kid's work to steal his ideas?


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## Jermin8r89 (Mar 10, 2016)

Retired Senior said:


> *This Retired Senior (ME!) is now truly afraid... when kids start building their own driverless cars, and take rides in them for fun...the writing is on the wall. I remember going to 90 Acres Park on the border of Fairfield, Bridgeport and Trumbull in the 1960s and watching rocket enthusiasts send their rockets soaring into space. I also recall the kids with the remote controlled planes and helicopters playing with their gas powered toys... Who knew that these toys would - in time - evolve into today's military drones?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Hey look what i can do. No more responsibilities and work. Yay! I just build my own smart jail


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

Maven said:


> Wadda wanna bet that half a dozen car companies are looking at this kid's work to steal his ideas?


"We all stand on the shoulders of the ones before us."


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Maven said:


> Wadda wanna bet that half a dozen car companies are looking at this kid's work to steal his ideas?


I still like a car I can turn sideways with acceleration and can lock up the brakes and send it into spins.
Machines are removing SKILL.


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

Retired Senior said:


> *This Retired Senior (ME!) is now truly afraid... when kids start building their own driverless cars, and take rides in them for fun...the writing is on the wall. I remember going to 90 Acres Park on the border of Fairfield, Bridgeport and Trumbull in the 1960s and watching rocket enthusiasts send their rockets soaring into space. I also recall the kids with the remote controlled planes and helicopters playing with their gas powered toys... Who knew that these toys would - in time - evolve into today's military drones?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Thank you for posting this DIY article. I recall meeting a GM engineer working at the Oshawa research centre and he was saying there was a severe shortage of engineers in this area. So if we have kids buying off the shelf components than that means only one thing. We're here. I remember last year a great many posters here kept saying we were years away, appears now we were only weeks away.



tohunt4me said:


> I still like a car I can turn sideways with acceleration and can lock up the brakes and send it into spins.
> Machines are removing SKILL.


We could no doubt build these skills into our new machines.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Kid ought to be putting a cam in his engine and 2 four barrel carburetors. Not " programming" it to drive itself. Doesn't anyone like tearing the rocks out of cement with tires anymore ?


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

*A Lawsuit Against Uber Highlights the Rush to Conquer Driverless Cars*
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/24/...vandowski-waymo-uber-google-lawsuit.html?_r=0

I recall this incident and the quick purchase of Otto. If this lawsuit against Uber is won than this may be a fatal error with gigantic financial ramifications and the very existence of Uber.

Here is my favourite quote from the article.

"Robot cars would also allow the ride-hailing service to avoid one of its biggest headaches - its drivers."

More importantly, the entire crux of the race for autonomous vehicles is no longer technical. Sensors and cameras mean nothing without the learning machine AI aspect. The engineering side is moving fast and now it is a race to utilize post cold war Russian mathematics. These new algorithms known as Support Vector Machines, basically have formula's change themselves when information is added or deleted. Combined with Naive Bayes we now have a 3 dimensional hyper space.

Analogical learning has arrived and Uber's Travis wants the autonomous teams to move quickly. The more Otto spends on the road the quicker it learns. The race is now set with or without the permission of the regulators. Autonomous race has gone from laboratory to busy roads and highways, the new war for the race to patent autonomous car is moreover a race for transportation AI.

Learning machines might need to drive 10's of millions of miles. Another possibility is a breakthrough could happen tomorrow. Whichever outcome, politicians need to collectively confront the fact that this technology will be a common sight and part of our everyday lives, whether we like it or not.

The era of big data necessitates that these Learning Machines go to school which of course means the roads and highways are their new and most important classroom. As we know all too well, classrooms can be messy and sometimes bloody spaces.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Karl Marx said:


> *A Lawsuit Against Uber Highlights the Rush to Conquer Driverless Cars*
> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/24/...vandowski-waymo-uber-google-lawsuit.html?_r=0
> 
> I recall this incident and the quick purchase of Otto. If this lawsuit against Uber is won than this may be a fatal error with gigantic financial ramifications and the very existence of Uber.
> ...


UNSUSTAINABLE !


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

tohunt4me said:


> UNSUSTAINABLE !


One thing to remember is that Americans aren't the only players in this race.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Karl Marx said:


> One thing to remember is that Americans aren't the only players in this race.


It's the Globalist Agenda 21 goal !
Elimination of personal vehicle ownership.
" Drove my Chevy to the levee,and they were singing Bye Bye miss American Pie"- Don Mclean


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

tohunt4me said:


> It's the Globalist Agenda 21 goal !
> Elimination of personal vehicle ownership.
> " Drove my Chevy to the levee,and they were singing Bye Bye miss American Pie"- Don Mclean


Brave New World


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Karl Marx said:


> Brave New World


Transhumanist nightmare ruled by corporations and enforced by Robotics and Artificial Intelligence wired into everything.


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

tohunt4me said:


> Transhumanist nightmare ruled by corporations and enforced by Robotics and Artificial Intelligence wired into everything.


Looking forward to the new Bladerunner.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

One good Solar Flare aligned properly . . . with the earths polar shift weakening the Geo magnetic shield which they wish to call " Global Warming" to levy world taxes . . . one good Flare shall wipe the Grid and restore balance to man and nature.
Humming " I'll follow the Sun"- Beatle's

It almost happened in 2013 . . . .


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

tohunt4me said:


> One good Solar Flare aligned properly . . . with the earths polar shift weakening the Geo magnetic shield which they wish to call " Global Warming" to levy world taxes . . . one good Flare shall wipe the Grid and restore balance to man and nature.
> Humming " I'll follow the Sun"- Beatle's


You just had to throw in that Black Swan, damn you.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Karl Marx said:


> You just had to throw in that Black Swan, damn you.


Better to invest in learning to salt and can meat,and dry vegetables than to invest in Robot cars. An internship with the Amish may prove more useful.

A milinium into the future may still wonder how the pyramids were built when an unprepared society over reliant on technology invents the spark plug again thousands of years into the future . . .

Polar shift alone ( without Solar Flare) will melt the ice caps,then they will re form on once arable lands and a new equater will establish. It has happened before,and is happening again.


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## Karl Marx (May 17, 2016)

tohunt4me said:


> Better to invest in learning to salt and can meat,and dry vegetables than to invest in Robot cars. An internship with the Amish may prove more useful.
> 
> A milinium into the future may still wonder how the pyramids were built when an unprepared society over reliant on technology invents the spark plug again thousands of years into the future . . .
> 
> Polar shift alone ( without Solar Flare) will melt the ice caps,then they will re form on once arable lands and a new equater will establish. It has happened before,and is happening again.


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## tohunt4me (Nov 23, 2015)

Karl Marx said:


>


Another product of a disposable society with no pyramids to leave behind. Only faux stone prefab high rise apartments which rot in 10 years with no maintenance.

The Archaeologists of the distant future will make up names for these "gods" and claim their eyes point towards distant stars and planets . . .
Someone will find a coin and declare it a religious token . . .


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