The Purpose When initially planning for this class project, every idea I came up with had some component that couldn’t be washed (like a battery), or that required more soldering than sewing (most sensors), alongside some component that could be sewn directly into the garment.  This seemed like a […]

  Done this week: Redesigned the bracket to work with magnets; schematic above, minus cover. Purchased / Recieved LED diffusing plastic, seems like it should work. Final design for the fabric portion is set, but still needs to be built. Identified all the needed code for trinket I2C slaves.   Issues: […]

  Done this week:     Iterated on shell design.  Test prints can be seen above; I think the final version is all planned out, but still needs to be printed. Scaling plans back to fit into time left.  This is mostly triage just now — prioritizing the essentials.   […]

  Done this week: Sewed in snaps to the test poncho, along with some neopixels; tested a removable connection to an arduino via alligator clips on unsewn end of the snaps.  Works fine when everything’s connected; loss of data or power also seem fine.  Loss of ground leaves the neopixels […]

Done this week: The test poncho is sewn, which gives me a sense of size and lets me test for weight. I’ve tested all the candidate fasteners as parts of simple circuits (lighting a single LED), and they all work fine.  Some of the stronger magnets require a fair effort […]

Done this week:   More parts came in: now I have a full assortment of magnets, snaps, and magnetic snaps to play with. (Old snaps in upper right, lower left; also, weird tiny or customizable size perfboards in upper right.) Poked at the fasteners with a multimeter to test resistance. […]

  Done this week: Some conceptual work: I’ve investigated a few patterns for Ponchos — Eleanor showed me a short poncho she’d made (Thanks!), and I found a few other designs online.  I’ve cut the simplest in muslin to use as a testbed, to test sizing and weight of attached […]