This remote controlled car is silly but very useful

Confession: When BougeRV told me about their animated lighting remote control wagon, I called him up for a laugh, hoping to spoil him in a review. It’s ridiculous, no doubt. But the DuneRover also proved to be very capable, with enough torque to flatten hills even when carrying more than 200 pounds of gear. It can also traverse soft sand that outperforms conventional wagons.

As someone who regularly uses a variety of wagons to transport all kinds of gear, the DuneRover is an epiphany. But what BougeRV sent me was a Kickstarter prototype, and it shows.

Production units won’t ship until February 2027. So what follows is less of a review and more of a risk assessment for those considering backing Kickstarter. That way, you can decide if it makes sense to set the pre-purchase price at $467, a supposed 48 percent discount off the final list price of $899. (Although I bet it will always be sold at some kind of discount.)

Frankly, $500 isn’t unreasonable for a truck. Prices start at around $40 for a rickety model that will only last a few months, $300 for something durable from a well-known brand, and closer to $800 on the high end. And none of those cars provide motorized assistance.

Let’s start with the silly stuff. The truck has LED light bars on the rear that are on by default and can come in handy when camping after dark. You can disable them through the app, but you must do this every time you restart the wagon. Obviously, the default for a battery-powered device that is used primarily during the day should be off.

Then there is the remote control. I think I know what happened here. The product designers had a choice: run a cable through all the folding mechanisms that separate the motor from the handle or make it wireless. Wireless won and then someone from marketing said, “Hey, I have an idea!’

I mean, a remote-controlled wagon is so absurd it’s fun, and it prompted a lot of happy pointing from onlookers during my testing. Maybe that’s enough?

The DuneRover is no joke for hauling gear. It is equipped with two brushless gear motors, each producing up to 400 W of power and up to 33 Nm of torque. The carriage is activated by a trigger embedded in the handle that you press naturally when you pull the carriage. Walk faster and the car will roll faster. Sometimes the cart lurches forward with that initial pull before settling into your walking pace. It’s not dangerous, it’s just unexpected. Release the trigger on the handle and the cart will stop, even on a slope.

Pulling an oversized load weighing more than 200 pounds up a 10 percent grade required minimal effort, but only one-tenth of what would have been necessary without motor assistance. Even on that steep grade, the truck stops (with an inch or two of kickback) as soon as I release the trigger. However, repeated stops and starts on inclines seemed to confuse the DuneRover, occasionally causing the engines to become jerky as soon as I started walking again. A simple on/off switch resumed normal operation.

The motors also regulate speed when walking downhill with a heavy load. With the trigger held, the controller did a good job of monitoring changes in acceleration and counteracting the speed of the car to maintain my walking pace. When I stopped, so did the car, even on that 10 percent grade with a load of over 200 pounds.

However, the engines are not powerful enough to carry the same load through soft sand. The large beach wheels performed much better in the sand with loads weighing about half that and should be great for families carrying a cooler, snacks, an umbrella, a toddler, and toys for a day at the beach.

I like that the DuneRover easily transformed depending on what I needed to transport. The sides can be opened and folded to convert the cart into a cart for transporting large items or an older dog. You can also unbuckle the sides but leave the straps connected to create more volume inside the stroller. I used this setup a lot. Just know that you’ll want to bring some bungee cords or cargo nets to keep everything safely in place.

My prototype suffered from intermittent rolling resistance with the engine off. The car rolled fine for five or six feet, but then the wheels attached to the motors would brake, drag on the ground, and then come loose after a second or two. BougeRV assures me this is not something their production wagons would display. I ended up leaving the engine running during all of my testing, even when I didn’t need it. The 82.14 Wh battery was more than up to the challenge.

I used the DuneRover to haul gear from a beach house along the same route where I tested BougeRV’s original electric van. Six times I took the DuneRover down a road with a gradient of 5 percent at one end and 10 percent at the other. After six kilometers (3.73 miles) of soft sand, hard asphalt, wooden ramps and gravel, the battery still showed 74 percent charge. Not bad.

The removable battery features a 100W bi-directional USB-C port, making it a fairly capable power bank. It can also be charged from a 100W solar panel connected to its XT-60 connector, thanks to a built-in MPPT solar controller. My prototype’s battery isn’t protected from rain, so I tested it in dry conditions, although BougeRV promises “IPX6 protection for the entire vehicle” on the production version.

The DuneRover is a beast weighing 59.5 pounds (27 kg) with the battery and wheels installed. It is also quite thick when folded. The quick release front wheels can be removed if a flatter package is required.

Overall, I’m impressed with the DuneRover prototype I tested: it’s capable, versatile, and has proven to be a huge help over the past few weeks when moving things between a vacation home, a house, and an adventure van. Like most BougeRV products, it gets the basics right, but not without some annoyances and inconveniences. I would expect the same from any shipment to Kickstarter backers early next year. year.

All photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge.