Planet Arduino

With Canada day and Independence day fast approaching, some makers are looking towards setting up their own fireworks to shoot off in celebration – sure you could use a match or lighter… or you could crack out your trusty Arduino and a cellphone! (translated)

To ignite the fuse, [Oscar] is using a short length of Nichrome wire which is controlled via a Mosfet by the Arduino. To control the Arduino he’s using ArduDroid with a Bluetooth module. The app lets you trigger the various digital and analog outputs, and send and receive data.

Stick around to see a few different demonstration videos of the circuit, testing, and launching some little bottle rockets!

Alternatively, if you need more fireworks you can build a much larger (wired) setup that makes use of resistors burning out to light the fuses.

And as always, make sure you’re launching fireworks where it is legal – many cities have various laws that may change when there is a holiday weekend. Always check first!

[Craig Turner] wrote in to tell us about the wireless fireworks controller he just finished building. It has eight total channels and offers the kind of safety features we like to see when working with explosives.

The image above details the launcher side of the project. The project box houses an Arduino which is powered by a 9V battery. To enable this base station the key lying on top of the project box must be inserted and turned to the on position. To the left is the 12V battery which is used to supply the igniters via a set of eight relays. In the demo video after the break [Craig] is using nichrome wire to demonstrate, but we’ve even see projects that actually burn up resistors to light the fireworks.

The system uses RF12 wireless modules to communicate with the control panel. That also has an Arduino, along with a number pad. After switching on the power the operator must enter a PIN code before the system will allow any of the fireworks to be launched.