wardriving with rc car
I was thinking about getting an rc car, a pocket pc, orinoco pc card, 7db mag mount antenna. So that I could wardrive with an rc car. Has anyone tried this or do you have any suggestions?
If you don't have an R/C car already, go with a pickup truck or a Hummer or something like that. You'll have more space to tape/strap down your equipment with one of those than a generic car.
If I was going to do a version of R/C wardriving, I would try and do it with a plane or a helicopter.
With a car, you can only drive it where you can see it, and are limited to a street, one of which can easily be collected by just putting the rig in your actual car and driving down it when you leave the area. A plane or a helicopter you can get it up in the air, and can get signals from other streets. The higher the antenna is off the ground the more you are going to receive from further away. An antenna that is 3 inches off the ground isn't going to get a lot.
Not trying to bust your enthusiasm for the idea, but vertical is better.
Warwalking, I used a bluetooth gps, and a Dell axim, you can get a couple hours of use from a rig like this. I got a bunch walking around San Francisco with both tucked into a backpack. This combo is small enough to strap onto an R/C vehicle of some kind, I think.
With a car, you can only drive it where you can see it, and are limited to a street, one of which can easily be collected by just putting the rig in your actual car and driving down it when you leave the area. A plane or a helicopter you can get it up in the air, and can get signals from other streets. The higher the antenna is off the ground the more you are going to receive from further away. An antenna that is 3 inches off the ground isn't going to get a lot.
Not trying to bust your enthusiasm for the idea, but vertical is better.
Warwalking, I used a bluetooth gps, and a Dell axim, you can get a couple hours of use from a rig like this. I got a bunch walking around San Francisco with both tucked into a backpack. This combo is small enough to strap onto an R/C vehicle of some kind, I think.
I'm not personally familiar with R/C stuff, but it seems that some of the car/truck ones I have seen would probably take the extra weight better than anything that flies. A helicopter would indeed be better for warflying, because just hovering up high in a populated area would be better than flying past it. Scanning the wifi channels takes a few seconds, and even in a car at 50 mph you will lose some fringe ones. Multi-antenna and multi-interface rigs don't have this problem, but that won't be in a R/C vehicle.
One of my co-workers builds R/C jets from scratch (!). He builds the molds by hand, lays the fiberglass, builds every little piece except the radio control part. They weigh 53 pounds, and will fly 200 mph. Of course line of sight goes away pretty quickly with speeds like that. He has been doing this for ten years and he would qualify as an expert. I asked him, he said his jets could carry an extra few pounds of payload, but consumer R/C flying devices cannot carry much. There are R/C helicopters designed to carry cameras, but he said they are over USD $1000.
There are two control channels (in the USA anyway), 72 mhz and 2.4 ghz.
While the controllers are very sophisticated on scanning all the available channels and picking an empty one, there are potential problems. If you use Netstumbler, it transmits on every channel. Even though they are on adjacent channels, desense can be your problem just from being physically close to it. Ham radio guys that work with repeaters know this term very well. Desense from Netstumbler could possibly overwhelm your control channel. This means you crash wherever it is.
Have you wardriven much? Using a car/bike/walking is a lot of fun as it is.
EDIT: My jet-freak friend does not build the engines either, he buys those.
One of my co-workers builds R/C jets from scratch (!). He builds the molds by hand, lays the fiberglass, builds every little piece except the radio control part. They weigh 53 pounds, and will fly 200 mph. Of course line of sight goes away pretty quickly with speeds like that. He has been doing this for ten years and he would qualify as an expert. I asked him, he said his jets could carry an extra few pounds of payload, but consumer R/C flying devices cannot carry much. There are R/C helicopters designed to carry cameras, but he said they are over USD $1000.
There are two control channels (in the USA anyway), 72 mhz and 2.4 ghz.
While the controllers are very sophisticated on scanning all the available channels and picking an empty one, there are potential problems. If you use Netstumbler, it transmits on every channel. Even though they are on adjacent channels, desense can be your problem just from being physically close to it. Ham radio guys that work with repeaters know this term very well. Desense from Netstumbler could possibly overwhelm your control channel. This means you crash wherever it is.
Have you wardriven much? Using a car/bike/walking is a lot of fun as it is.
EDIT: My jet-freak friend does not build the engines either, he buys those.
this would be cool to see.. even a pda or a ipod perhaps could find the signal.. But I'd have to think there easier ways to find aps. like large antenna, satelite, cantenna. Although a remote controlled, camera operated wifi flyer does sound pretty cool
I've actually been considering building a similar thing. More along the lines of a robot than an RC car. It would be hooked up to a 3g internet connection and I'd control it via my home computer.I was thinking about getting an rc car, a pocket pc, orinoco pc card, 7db mag mount antenna. So that I could wardrive with an rc car. Has anyone tried this or do you have any suggestions?
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