Remember Pierce Brosnan's remote-controlled BMW in Tomorrow Never Dies? A group of Russian tinkerers do. But rather than gutting a Bimmer and snagging a phone from Q Branch, they've hacked together a driverless car using nothing more than a dilapidated Opel Vectra and an iPad.
The crew hailing from Tula Oblast installed a range of actuators, controllers and electronics into the Opel, along with a new brake actuator, steering motor, accelerator controller and gear shift for the transmission. All of it connects wirelessly to an iPad, and according to the developers, this setup can be duplicated on any car with an in-line automatic transmission shift gate.
The custom-developed app handles the car's basic controls, with a steering wheel, accelerator and brake pedal overlaid on top of a streaming video feed from inside the car. Unfortunately, the gas and brake application is a binary affair – it's either on or off – which makes it a challenging drive and a scary ride.
If you can read Russian (or muddle through a Google Translated version), you can get the details, instructions and the app through the team's site.
