Hi, I am a mechanical engineering student completely new to robotics and electronics and I am in need of a little help. Basically, we have a project to design a stair climb robot and I need help in wireless controller part. The robot will be driven by 2 wheels with individual motors for steering. Another motor attached to a pully system will control a mechanism to lift the whole robot. I have done some research but don’t really know where to get started. I’m unsure whether to use Arduino (which I have never used before) or just an RC controller. I also don’t really know what components I would need in order to make this all work. We are in fairly early stages of design so haven’t quite got the required motor power and torque requirements, but the lifting mechanism motor will need to be more powerful than the wheel motors. Any help would be greatly appreciated 
Hello @leggyc123 and welcome to the RobotShop forum,
Sounds like an interesting project! I hope you will share it in the Robots section when it is finished!
I’m unsure whether to use Arduino (which I have never used before) or just an RC controller.
Most likely you will need a motor controller as the Arduino will probably not be able to control your motors. You should choose the controller according to the characteristics of your motors, taking into account their nominal voltage, continuous and peak current, and the control method. You can find more information about this here:
You already mentioned that you want to control it remotely, in this case, you would need a controller that supports RC and of course, a remote control (transmitter and receiver), you can find some options in the Wireless RC / PWM Servo Controllers section of the store.
If you want to add sensors or want the robot to be autonomous then you will need a microcontroller, as you are a beginner the Arduino is an excellent option as there are many tutorials available. However, if all you need is to operate the robot with a controller then you will only need what I mentioned above, and of course batteries.
I hope this information can help you out!
Let me know if you have any other questions 
Hi @leggyc123
as @geraldinebc15 already stated, you’ll need a programmable controller to solve the task.
How else would you align the bot with the edge of the stair? You’ll need several sensors for climbing up and down a stair, maybe even a camera system with AI edge recognition?
I’d suggest looking for a more powerful controller which is still 5V compatible, since many sensor/driver devices aren’t 3.3V tolerant. ( you can mess around with logic level shifters, but I wouldn’t recommend that for an electronics novice)
Maybe it’s cheaper to build a smaller scale model first (and smaller stairs) to get a proof of concept before you waste money on the big/powerful stuff.
Thanks @geraldinebc15 and @o_lampe for the help
The robot doesn’t require any AI or sensors to meet the specification (although it would be a nice touch to the design) and our budget is fairly low so we can afford to produce a scaled down prototype first. From what I could find online I need and RC remote and receiver, the 3 motors (still not got the power and torque requirements from my other team members yet), a dual motor controller for the differential drive setup and another motor speed controller to operate the other motor mechanism. Does this sound about right?
Sounds good @leggyc123,
the lift-motor might need an encoder or endstop switches in the mechanik.
Instead of RC equipment I’d suggest a PS2 wireless controller. They are much easier to integrate in software (IMHO)
If you (or your teammates) need help with the motors torque calculations this tool might come in handy: