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    Content by Mika Satomi and Hannah Perner-Wilson
    E-Textile Tailor Shop by KOBAKANT
    The following institutions have funded our research and supported our work:

    Since 2020, Hannah is guest professor of the Spiel&&Objekt Master's program at the University of Performing Arts Ernst Busch in Berlin

    From 2013-2015 Mika was a guest professor at the eLab at Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee

    From July - December 2013 Hannah was a researcher at the UdK's Design Research Lab

    From 2010-2012 Mika was a guest researcher in the Smart Textiles Design Lab at The Swedish School of Textiles

    From 2009 - 2011 Hannah was a graduate student in the MIT Media Lab's High-Low Tech research group led by Leah Buechley


    In 2009 Hannah and Mika were both research fellows at the Distance Lab


    Between 2003 - 2009 Hannah and Mika were both students at Interface Cultures
    We support the Open Source Hardware movement. All our own designs published on this website are released under the Free Cultural Works definition
    Traces

    Stretchy Traces

    Stretchy conductive traces are great for wearables because their stretchiness makes these traces comfortable and durable against wear and strain.

    Stretchy conductive fabric traces

    Stretchy conductive fabric traces are not that hard to make. We find the easiest solution to be fusing strips of stretch conductive fabric to the garment. This can even be done after the garment has been sewn together.

    Once you get used to making them, they become so easy. In preparation it is best to adhere fusible interfacing to a large (long) piece of stretch conductive fabric and then cut this into 1 – 0.5 mm wide strips. The wider, the less resistance. They are easily fused to the stretchy fabric and to make curved lines there is no need to cut out curved pieces, you can simply stretch them around the curve. If they are too short you can also overlap them a cm or two and this is fine for the electrical connection. The strips hold nicely with the fusible for a while, but do tend to come loose after much stretching. They can be fused back on by simply ironing over them again. In most cases it makes sense to isolate conductive traces. For stretchy conductive traces a stretchy isolation method makes most sense. The isolation can also help keep the traces in place.

    Non-stretch conductive fabric for stretchy conductive traces

    Nadya Peek’s stretchy conductive traces made from non-stretch conductive fabrics look great.
    >> http://infosyncratic.nl/weblog/2009/04/12/stretchy-conductive-traces/

    Stretchy conductive thread traces

    We haven’t got (yet) many examples of stretchy conductive traces sewn with thread. This tends to be because it is just much easier to apply stretchy fabric traces with fusible interfacing. It is also easier to apply traces with fusible, after it has been sewn.

    2 Comments so far

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    2. […] example: Stretchy Traces http://www.kobakant.at/DIY/?p=1300 […]

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