===== Final Project: E-textile & Wearables application for ParaRowing Olympic Athletes =====

(25/01/2018)

==== My motivation: ParaRowing Olympic Athletes  ====

The problem: Difficulty of arbitration and damaging current straps.{{  :fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:30.png?nolink&400x205}}

{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:29.png?nolink&180x139}}

==== The idea: A E-textile vest coupled with back support  ====

  * Back Support: The Idea for a back support comes from the fact that by offering {{  :students:28.png?nolink&200x218}}
  * E-textile application:
  * How should it work:

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==== What I did: Step-by-step production ====

  * __STEP 1:__  Research for inspiration of back supports and build electric circuit.{{  :fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:18.png?nolink&250x152}}{{  :fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:27.png?nolink&150x150}}
During this first step I did a research on back supports for upper back that already existed and fit my purpose and also make with breadboard, cables and a button for the touching function.

  * __STEP 2:__  Design in Rhino of the vest and electric system that should be couped with vest and grasshopper for the different patterns for back support
{{:students:11.png?nolink&250x141  }}**THE VEST**: In this step things got a little more complicated with the software designs but after finding an inspiration I designed in Rhino using the 3D body model with had for dimensions. But using different layers and the previous experience with Rhino helped to shorten time. {{  :students:images:12.png?nolink&250x141}}

**THE CIRCUIT**: After dimensioning it I transformed from 3D to 2D made some arrangements and created the electric system in a different layer based on this 2D design of the vest. This step was necessary for the laser cutter, since I knew I waned to use it for cutting different e-textiles and testing with them.

{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:4.png?nolink&230x130  }}{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:2.png?nolink&230x130  }}**THE BACK SUPPORT**: For the back support I decided to apply the knowledge acquired during the textile as scaffold week, where I used wood to make a back protector. This experience made me very confident that this technique would work. Therefore using the grasshopper function of rhino to design different patterns.

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  * __STEP 3__: Cutting and testing with different materials
This was the most fun part of the process and thanks to the laser cutter and rhino files I could cut the vest and the circuit using different materials to test their level of accuracy and chose the final one for the first prototype.

**THE VEST**{{  :fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:14.png?nolink&200x178}}{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:13.png?nolink&300x282  }}: For the vest I waned to test different textiles resistance and flexibility. Therefore cut the vest in the laser cutter in 5 different materials.

**THE CIRCUIT**: Same idea as for the vest but with conducting textiles. For this step I selected 3 different materials and tested their accuracy with stretching and water resistance.

At the end I chose two combination of textiles for the vest coupled with the conductive path. Voltmeter was used for measuring conductivity.

The conclusion I have made by testing drove me into thinking a not so stretchy textile should be used as base for the circuit.

**THE BACK SUPPORT**: Still with the same inspiration of different materials I used the laser cutter for two different materials: Acrylic and Wood

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{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:16.png?nolink&230x313  }}{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:15.png?nolink&275x284  }}{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:17.png?nolink&260x237  }}

{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:25.png?nolink&250x360  }}

  * __STEP 4:__  Assembly - First Prototype finished
{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:22.png?nolink&300x402  }}{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:21.png?nolink&300x242  }}{{:fabricademy2017:students:detoledomotta.naiadelara:26.png?nolink&300x400  }}.

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  * __STEP 5__. Improvements - Second Prototype
What changed

Further suggestions of improvement:

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===== Fabricademy knowledge applied at the end =====

Back support - Textile as scaffold and a lot of grasshopper design for different pattern ideas and use of laser cutter for production.

Circuit - E-textile experiments with conductibility, stretch levels and water and silicon resistance.

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