| Week | Lecture/ Discussion Topic | Assignment/Checkpoint |
| 1 (Jan 9-12) | Introduction to Natcar, demonstration, system overview, DC motor principles, Ni-Cd batteries | Ni-Cd reading, read Natcar rules, generate Ni-Cd discharge curves |
| 2 (Jan 15-19) | Car layout considerations, microcontroller operation, motor control, servo control | Mechanical assembly of cars, generate PWM for motor and servo (motor spins, servo turns), characterize servo response, microcontroller reading |
| 3 (Jan 22-26) | Magnetic field sensing, robust amplifier circuits, algorithms for mapping sensor values to steering values | Sensor amplifiers built, plots of amplifier output vs. vehicle position, working with motor and servo running |
| 4 (Jan 29- Feb 2) | Power supplies, DC-DC converters, and of course, noise sources and remedies | Power supplies for servo, cpu, and any analog circuitry (motor spins and servo turns, powered by Ni-Cd) |
| 5 (Feb 5-9) | A/D conversion, good programming practices, proportional steering control | Car able to steer when moved manually from one side of the wire to the other |
| 6 (Feb 12-16) | Extra lab hours to get cars working | Round 1 - basic functionality of cars on a real track. |
| 7 (Feb 19-23) | Interaction of subsystems, bottlenecks, computer simulation of control systems | simulate step response of vehicle using data collected on subsystems, compare to actual step response |
| 8 (Feb 2 - Mar 2) | PD steering control, PI speed control, steering-speed control | Advanced simulation, pick vehicle optimization |
| 9 (Mar 5-9) | Advanced Optimizations - servo linkage, traction limitations, all wheel braking and steering | Continue optimizing vehicle. |
| 10 (Mar 12-16) | Extra lab hours to finish up car | Round 2 - simulate NATCAR event, open to the public |
| Late May (exact date TBA) | NATCAR RACE | Go Stanford! |