How to Make a Raspberry Pi Smart Bartender

In this video, we use a Raspberry Pi 3 (you could also use a Raspberry Pi Zero) to make a smart Bartender! The bartender that can make drinks by mixing up to 6 ingredients together at the same time, so you can have anything from a rum and coke to a long island iced tea. It can be customized to make any number of drinks, can be expanded to mix more ingredients, and also has the potential for connectivity with Alexa and Google Home / Google Assistant.

The drinks can be configured on the bartender with two simple buttons and a screen, and you can add any number of drinks to the bartender's repository through the bartender's code.

Please drink responsibly.

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A NOTE ON CLEANING:

After you use the bartender, you'll want to flush out the pump tubes in order to avoid bacteria growth. There is an easy way to do this in the configuration menu. Hook all the tubes up to a water source, then navigate to configure-clean on the bartender screen and press the select button. All pumps will turn on to flush the existing liquid from the tubes. I take the tubes out of the water source halfway through to pump some air through the tubes and remove all water from the pumps. Note: make sure you have a glass under the funnel to catch the flushed out liquid.

Sanitation recommendations per FDA is 1 Tbsp bleach in 1 gallon water with a contact time of 2 minutes, then rinse thoroughly for the same time (recommended weekly).

MATERIALS: (These are Amazon affiliate links)

Jumper wires × 1
3mm Outdoor Mounting Tape × 1
Wood Screws × 1
M2.5 Screws × 4

MUSIC:

*Disclaimer*
The methods shown in this video should be used
as a guide only.

HACKER SHACK ACCEPTS NO RESPONSIBILITY FOR
ACCIDENTS OR INCIDENTS ARISING FROM INDIVIDUALS
UNDERTAKING ANY OF THE TASKS DESCRIBED. IN
PARTICULAR, IF UNSURE YOU SHOULD ALWAYS CONTACT
A QUALIFIED TRADESMAN BEFORE PROCEEDING.

[EvelOttos]

Anytime you make a liquid dispensing machine it's good practice to NOT put all the electronics and power supply under the dispenser.

[juhahu]

The actors deserve a fricking Oscar holy crap

[rupertdewilde]

Bartender 2.0:
Marry it to a fridge to keep the drinks cool.
Add a IR beam sensor to confirm a cup or glass has been loaded before drinks are delivered.
Warning system for pumps running dry (out of liquid)?

[bkxxwyh]

bartender 3.0
add one proximity/weight sensor to check if there is a glass
add a touch screen to make it easy to select a drink and configure and make new beverages
and add alexa and/or google support to make it easy!
and maybe a cooling environment to store all the drinks
and something that checks if your bottles are full
and maybe a web panel!
hope you like this idea!

[Earzone]

I notice these guys haven't made another video since...the bartender must be working too well!

[billeons]

I’m not even a big mix drink consumer, but this is easily one of the best pi projects I’ve seen. I would probably add on a small cooler filled with ice and keep the drinks on ice in the back. Either remove the lid or just make a hole for the tubes.
You gained a follower

[robinGkem]

Bartender 2.0:
Use opencv and a camera to implement face identification so it can basically ask a known user if they "want the usual" or else to select from a menu

[mrt]

LCD screen, ice maker what a great add, but great job man love it

[Larry]

Is there any way to incorporate fridge into all of this, so you can serve chilled drinks?

[fyrule]

you might want to put the electronics at the side or top of the frame to avoid liquid spills...

BTW, nice project!

[john_thorpe]

A few things I’d do is redesign the whole thing and design it like this:

1. Find or make some sealed dispenser bins (something like 3” wide, 9” deep and 10” tall or something the size of the dispenser area would be that’ll hold like a half to full bottle of Bacardi, etc) sloped to the center for the tube connection, that has a sealed, but removable lid for filling/cleaning. This would prevent fruit flies, etc and can be left filled.

2. Have 4 or 6 on each side of the dispenser part (in the middle) that way you can have one for jack, Bacardi, crown royal, bourbon, triple sec, etc. I’d put a thin black piece of material between each bin with a light smoke front panel in front of all of them and put a white led light above each one. When a drink is selected that uses Bacardi (for example) the light above the Bacardi would light up and you can see it through the front panel. So the ingredients being used lights up.

3. Have a flip up lid over the ingredients bins for filling etc.

4. Have more drink recipes, and include a multi line lcd panel for instructions. For example for a margarita, when selected it would say something like place a shaker filled with ice in the dispenser area, then after it dispenses it would tell you to shake and strain, or place in a blender and pulse, etc.

5. A sensor to detect a glass, etc is in the dispenser area to prevent dispensing without one.

6. Move the electronics into a false back that’s covered to keep them from getting wet, and replace it with a pull out drip tray under the dispenser for spills, over dispensing, etc.

7. Have a selection for size of glass, example for a Long Island iced tea, you can tell it that your using a 6 oz glass and it’ll adjust the portions for that size glass, or using a 12 oz glass, it’d adjust for that.

8. Keep the multi color led lights for the dispenser area.

9. Make a port where you can plug in a computer for servicing/updates via a usb cable, etc to make it easier for updates, etc if needed instead of pulling off the back, etc.

10. Glue the black plastic sheets you used on rather than screwing them on and maybe use a silver metal corner piece to put over the corners.

11. Put rubber feet on the bottom to protect the surface you put the automatic bartender on.

12. An option of selecting drink strength from no alcohol, little, moderate to strong... depending on the persons taste.

Just a few things I thought of to take the concept to the next level.

Oh and of course google Home/Alexa integration.

[baluuu]

Another idea is maybe to implement a washing programm. So you can put all tubes into a bowl with warm water and some dish soap and flush the system for like 2 minutes. That would be an easy clean.

[pccreator]

That is fantastic! One code recommendation: Add two automated scripts for cleaning out the lines. One for cleaning out 1 line if you are switching out a single drink, and another to "Clean All". =) Great Job!

[isunktheship]

Also we need a kickstarter, these guys have silently downsized from their hacker house into a hacker shack, what's next? hacker underpass? hacker hovel?

[shawndrake]

Literally sits down to make a robot bartender, and is too lazy to drill the holes in the caps of the bottles lmao

[davecunningham]

Lad's that machine is the dogs bollox! Awesome work 👍

[giovanni]

you don't really need relay, just some mosfet transistor are ok

[juliahernandezbenet]

I would add a cleaning option that would start all the pumps, so if you put them all into a bottle of water and a glass on the other end you can easily clean them before changing the liquors or spirits :)

[kuttan]

Awesome - will try it out. You should add an option for flushing the tubes with water for cleaning all tubes in one go.

[edgebrookgazette]

Thanks for the idea! I made it but I put in a 3.5 inch touch screen and a raspberry pi