You built an electric self-driving drifting car out of a DeLorean??

[Rich]

Can you elaborate on the roll cage? I'm curious how you have it fixed to the car, given the way a DeLorean is assembled. Since the frame is the double Y frame, does your roll cage actually attach to the frame, or does it only attach to the body? If it attaches to the frame, has that eliminated the ability to remove the body from the frame? Also, how does this affect the doors? Is the roll cage in the way or does it divert around the door openings?

Thanks for answering the questions!

I'm one of the visitors who got to see the car at its unveiling, am not answering as one of the team members who modified the car. Maybe one of the team members will also reply.

In the photos here you can see how that stiffening frame or rollcage intrudes above the door sills. There's also a shot of the frame during development.

The rollcage/frame makes entry and exit a tad trickier. The frame padding helps. For the purpose of their project let's guess that's a worthwhile tradeoff vs the increased torsional rigidity of the reinforced frame.

The doors open and close OK in terms of clearances and latching. But the doors do not have the inner panels/armrests on them anymore, probably due to a lack of clearance against the rollcage/frame. At 1:10 in the Marty intro video you can see the test crew pulling the bare doors closed by holding onto the window sill or the side glass with the windows down. Pulling down the door from the traditional grip location means you'd hit the rollcage/frame with your arm or hand as the door shuts.

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[Rich]

Wow. I am so impressed.
I hope you guys would share how you modified and what you have learned with all those mods.
How is electric motor system? What's the range and charging time?
Great work!!!

Again, not answering as a team member, only as an interested visitor to the unveiling. Here are some details from their media link: LINK: MARTY Media Assets

The stats do not mention range or charging time. They do list a 10kWh battery capacity.

Team and Vehicle Stats

Name: MARTY (Multiple Actuator Research Test bed for Yaw control)

Original vehicle: 1981 DeLorean DMC-12, VIN SCEDT26T9BD006712

Team members: Professor Chris Gerdes (Mechanical Engineering, Revs Program at Stanford), PhD student Jon Goh, Shannon McClintock MS ’15, Phill Giliver ’17, Wyles Vance MS ’14, Arni Letho MS ’14, Mike Carter MS, Tushar Goel MS.

Drivetrain Specs:
Renovo Motors Electric Platform
Individual left/right motors, with on-motor gearboxes, providing 5600Nm total rear axle torque
150kW total power
10kWh capacity

Chassis:
Custom rollcage
Reinforced front frame member

Suspension:
Penske coilovers on all four corners, with adjustable ride height
Adjustable camber on front with custom lower a-arms

Steering:
High-performance steering rack, with increased steering angle
Electric power steering column with custom servomotor system

Computing:
dSpace MicroAutoBoxII for primary compute, xPC computer for secondary compute

[SS Spoiler]

Like the custom lower control arms that allow tighter turning radius. It's
embarrassing having the cornering ability of a 49 Nash Airflite.....

[Rich]

Here's a video I uploaded: MARTY's BTTF-style rollout at the Stanford intro event.

They had the car emerge from its "Doc-like" trailer amidst billows of dry ice fog with (non-BTTF) music accompaniment.

LINK: https://youtu.be/xB3KxXHjngY

Note that the inner door trim is missing, also how one gets out of the car over the roll cage/frame.

Can you elaborate on the roll cage? I'm curious how you have it fixed to the car, given the way a DeLorean is assembled. Since the frame is the double Y frame, does your roll cage actually attach to the frame, or does it only attach to the body? If it attaches to the frame, has that eliminated the ability to remove the body from the frame? Also, how does this affect the doors? Is the roll cage in the way or does it divert around the door openings?

[dustybarn]

Those lower wishbones look like the bee's knees! I think a lot of folks here would love to have a set of those. It wouldn't be too difficult to incorporate a conventional swaybar that rides in the stock forward mounts.

[Rich]

A recent thread discussed ways to improve a DeLorean's turning radius. http://dmctalk.org/showthread.php?17081

I'm updating this thread since I visited Stanford's REVS program site again this week and was reminded I'd seen such a solution before.

During the visit I was pleased to see that MARTY is in residence again after a hiatus. This would be MARTY, the self-driving, electric, drifting DeLorean, the subject of this thread. The car happened to be parked in the shop with the front wheels at what was probably full lock. It's striking how much of an angle they're at, now captured in some images, which is the reason for this update.

As mentioned already in this thread installing lower A-arms so they could lose the front sway bar did the trick. Even though the swaybar's gone the other suspension mods and the frame stiffening kept the body roll down.

For those who missed it earlier here are links from previous posts in this thread to a short video showing what the car was designed to do and to one I captured at their BTTF-style rollout in 2015. Enjoy.

MARTY video by Stanford, including action shots of the rad front suspension hard at work:https://youtu.be/WNIDcT0Zdj4

MARTY's 2015 rollout event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xB3K...ature=youtu.be

[mr_maxime]

They just posted a behind the scenes video

[mr_maxime]

Also this one

[Rich]

Good post, Maxime,

Will Ken Block's job someday be automated?

In 2015 Stanford University's MARTY debuted as an autonomous drifting DeLorean EV.

Today we see what MARTY's been up to since it landed back in the lab last March, explained here in a 4 minute video and then in yesterday's press release with that video embedded:

LINK to MARTY gymkhana video

Press release Dec. 20

Judge for yourselves MARTY's leap forward; it now autonomously drifts in both directions and can drift through a tight gymkhana-style course, not just drift in a stable circle.

[mr_maxime]

I want those damn LCAs. I emailed them a couple of days ago before I even saw this video posted on Reddit. I didnt notice until today, but it looks like they cut the front section of the frame out.