While you may question if some of the blinking lights and buttons in science fiction movies actually do anything, you’d still really like to hit those buttons just to see what happens, right? If that sounds like you, then something like this rocket ship panel from maker “r570sv” might be just the thing for your entertainment.

The build features three Arduino boards for control, and references a total of 13 works of sci-fi throughout the brightly lit-up panel. Highlights of the project include a controllable infinity mirror, and a Raspberry Pi-driven screen that displays different movie clips depending on what combination of buttons, switches, and knobs are selected. Still other buttons and lights don’t really do anything, following along perfectly from the theme.

You can see more of the panel on Instructables and in the video below!

If you’d like a rebel fighter pilot suit, complete with the automated chest box, then look no further than this excellent build from “badjer1.”

It features a chest box with the same dimensions seen in the movies that lights up randomly, and even allows bored pilots to play a game of Pong on its double-LED matrix display using a dial next to it.

The Arduino Uno-powered device can also scroll through marquee displays featuring X-Wings and TIE Fighters, and play the Imperial March as required.

You can see more about the project, including how the box and the rest of the uniform were weathered, in badjer1’s write-up here.

If you have a trash can with a lid, you’ve probably accepted the small inconvenience of opening it with your hand and foot. YouTube hacker MadGyver, however, came up with a different solution using an Arduino Nano and a micro servo to open the lid whenever someone places a hand near the unit’s ultrasonic sensor.

In order to run the device on batteries, MadGyver modified the Nano for efficiency, shedding the power LED, along with the voltage regulator. He also used a transistor to turn off power to the servo when in standby mode, and added a capacitor to accommodate for the power surge experienced when the servo starts moving.

After these mods, his trash can should theoretically function for over three years with the correct batteries! Check it out in the video below!

The Arduino web team has working hard behind the scenes improving our legacy systems. Now, it’s time to work on something more interesting for the team and more useful for our community! From here on out, we will update you every month on the latest and greatest activities…

Today, we are announcing a pair of major features that are only a mere preview of what you can expect to see from an Arduino user’s point of view:

• The blog has a new search engine that is much faster, more precise, and allows readers to filter results.
• The Arduino reference is now quicker,  mobile-friendly, and completely open to contributions. You can check out our GitHub reference repo here.

Let’s look at how those two features work and how they are implemented. The search engine is powered by our provider Algolia, offering an impressively fast search engine and enhanced UX. Our goal is to integrate it with each of our websites and finally have a unified search for all Arduino-related content.

We are going to be testing the search engine for a bit on the blog and eventually roll it out to our websites.

Perhaps what we are most proud of, though, is the new reference engine:

• Arduino users can directly contribute to the reference by creating a pull request here.
• We are going to support multiple languages. In fact, some users have already helped us in creating French, German, Korean, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, and Spanish versions.
• As soon as a new pull request has been merged, the system deploys to our website automatically, and if someone modifies the English version of the reference, all other language repositories are going to be notified as well.

This is just the beginning with much more to come. Stay tuned!

Years ago, if you wanted to track employee hours, you needed to have them punch a time card. Saunders Machine Works, however, uses a facial recognition system running on an iPad for this purpose, meaning they had to figure out how to sense employees of different heights. What they came up with is a fixture that automatically raises and lowers the tablet, using a stepper motor and linear rails.

The project employs a Lidar sensor on the bottom of the device to detect employee presence, and another above the iPad’s mounting hardware to sense when it’s at the correct height, moving until the top sensor is clear. Control is provided by a pair of Arduino Nanos.

Be sure to check it out in the video below!

While many enjoy roller coasters, few can claim the same dedication of engineer Matt Schmotzer, who 3D-printed a 1/25th scale replica of Invertigo, a boomerang coaster at Kings Island in Ohio.

As reported on 3D Printer Chat, the CAD model took only a week to complete, but 3D printing this 4’ x 8’ creation took an incredible 450 hours. This doesn’t include the countless hours spent assembling and debugging it.

The coaster runs on an Arduino Mega, using 42 of the 54 available IO pins. This allows it to not only lift and drop the coaster, but also feature details like actuated gates and restraints to keep the tiny imaginary passengers safe.

Be sure to check it out in the video below!

Do you and your friends have a favorite cocktail? If so—and if it has three ingredients—then this Arduino-based cocktail machine from YouTuber “GreatScott!” may be worth checking out.

The device is capable of mixing three liquids, which in GreatScott’s case consist of vodka, cranberry juice, and grapefruit juice (also known as a Sea Breeze), in a drink size selected via a rotary encoder and LCD screen.

An Arduino Nano provides the brains for this operation, and each component is poured using a series of three peristaltic pumps. Meanwhile, a load cell underneath the glass holder ensures that the correct amount of liquid is dispensed.

The same setup could be used to make different three-ingredient drinks with a little programming work, or it could be expanded into a multi-drink unit with the addition of a few more pumps. You can see it in action below!

If you are really enjoying a song, you may start to bob your head to the tunes, but what if you could instead create actual music with this subtle movement? That’s exactly what Andrew Lee’s “Nod Bang” system accomplishes.

An accelerometer mounted to a pair of headphones senses nods in order to dictate the beat, while four 3D-printed arcade buttons are used to select which sounds will be played. An Arduino takes these inputs and passes them to a computer via a MIDI USB interface. The board also controls lights on the buttons for visual feedback.

Be sure to check it out in action below and read Lee’s entire write-up here.

Santa’s Shop is an amazing Christmas display consisting of trains, animated figurines, a rotating tree, and several other interesting holiday-themed gadgets.

The decoration features hundreds of 3D-printed parts and many handmade characters, controlled by 46 servos and a total of 12 Arduino boards. Bringing the installation to life was no small task, requiring over 2,000 hours of labor for creators Mike and Annelle Rigsby.

More details on the project can be found in this write-up. You can also see it in action in the video below, or on display live in the window of the Brightway Insurance Agency in Gainesville, Florida this month.

When you work in a machine shop, you often need to convert numbers from metric to imperial. As long as you have to do this on a regular basis, why not make a tool to do so easily?

Instead of pulling out a phone or taping a calculator to their CNC machinery, NYC CNC came up with an Arduino Nano-based device that does this conversion in style. “The Imperializer” features a beautifully milled enclosure that magnetically sticks onto a machine, a backlit LCD, and a toggle switch to flip between metric and imperial units.

The Imperializer is a desktop or machine mountable device that does one thing: converts inches to millimeters (and millimeters to inches)!  It uses an Arduino Nano and is powered by a Lithium battery that can be recharged with a Micro-B USB cable!

If you’d like to have your own for your shop, the bill of materials and Arduino code can be found on the project page. The housing, and even a fully-assembled version, can be purchased here.