Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Smart Home
  3. Entertainment
  4. Photo Galleries
  5. News

Witness the fire power of this fully armed and operational Death Star fire pit

Add as a preferred source on Google

Whatever you made in your high school welding class, it probably didn’t end up like this. Reddit user Alphacodemonkey showed off his amazing Death Star fire pit, which he received from an auction winner. It was created by a local school’s welding class and looks amazing.

Believe it or not, it’s not the first of its kind. Last year, an 84-year-old man, Kenneth Triplett, built a steel fire pit that resembles the Death Star, at his granddaughter’s request. (Maybe she was inspired by this Darth Vader fire pit?)

Triplett, a New Mexico welder who has been designing custom-made fire pits for friends and loved ones in the past few years, didn’t know what the Death Star was. His granddaughter Jennifer Allison sent him photos and, along with the help of a Native American artist, he made the fire pit.

Allison shared some images on Reddit under the username Bandia5309. “He makes many of these as gifts, this one was one I requested,” she wrote about the project. “He’s sold other Southwestern designs. He has little knowledge of Star Wars or just how awesome this is.” Allison received an enormous response and asked her grandfather if he would be interested in making these available for sale. The grandpa-granddaughter duo opened an Etsy page and are able to run a decent business.

For a 30-inch diameter fire pit, you can purchase one for $1,000, while the 37.5-inch costs just $300 more. Customers can also request their own personalized version at no cost. Here’s the catch: To get one of these shipped to your house, it will cost you another $300 to $600. This fire pit may cost an arm and a leg, but telling your friends that you’re firing up the Death Star in your patio is priceless.

Maria Mora
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Maria Mora is a creative, media professional fusing a background of audio production with editorial writing. Technology…
Apple’s new AI camera features come with a bizarre iCloud storage tax
HomeKit Secure Video footage doesn’t count against iCloud storage, yet adding Apple Intelligence to more cameras means buying increasingly massive storage plans
Electronics, Phone, Mobile Phone

Apple is making HomeKit Secure Video a lot smarter. Its new Apple Intelligence features can describe recorded activity and let you search camera footage using natural language instead of digging through clips yourself.

Getting those features across several cameras is where things get weird. The 2TB iCloud Plus plan supports Apple Intelligence on one camera. Two cameras require 6TB, while five require the 12TB tier. All that extra storage is required even though HomeKit Secure Video recordings don’t count against your iCloud allowance.

Read more
Hands-On with Haier at IFA 2026: There’s a camera in everything
From AI-powered fridges and washing machines to robot-assisted laundry, Haier’s vision of the smart home is getting seriously intelligent.
Haier Booth at IFA 2026

If I had to sum up Haier’s entire IFA showcase in one sentence, it would be a camera here, a camera there, and a camera everywhere. But after spending some time with the products, I realised the cameras aren't really the point. The interesting part is what Haier is doing with all that visual information.

From fridge to oven, AI is watching

Read more
Shark ChillPill first look: A surprisingly cool EDC route to beating the heat
A triple-mode cooling gizmo that deserves a spot in your EDC kit.
Person using the Shark ChillPill.

I first saw the Shark ChillPill on social media and thought it looked like a pretty interesting little gadget to try. Taking it out to the golf course on a warm day seemed like the right way to put it through its paces, because the ChillPill has three different ways of cooling you down: a high-speed fan, a mister, and a chilling plate that makes direct contact with your skin. You can't use all three at once, which is a little disappointing, but I was curious to see how each one worked in the heat.

Unboxing the Shark ChillPill

Read more