ESP8266 RC boat

This project details the construction of a remote-controlled boat powered by an ESP8266 microcontroller.
The boat establishes a Wi-Fi access point and is controlled via WebSocket commands, offering an engaging exploration into IoT and robotics applications.

Materials:

• 3D printed boat
• ESP8266 NodeMCU;
• SG90 servo motor for the rudder (simple and affordable);
• Brushless motor (fast and powerful);
• Batteries
• 3 LEDs for debugging:
  • Power supply to the controller
  • Client connection to the WebSocket server
  • Command received from the client

How it works

On the ESP8266, I configured the following:

• A Wi-Fi access point with a static IP address, enabling smartphone connections.
• An HTTP server that served an HTML page with a user interface.
• A WebSocket server to handle requests from the UI controller.

Client UI

Direction control

Speed control

Final version

You can read more in this article