Copper plated traces are flexible and solderable. Start by painting with conductive paint directly onto the fabric where you want the copper to plate to. Then you’ll need to prepare the plating process. It takes only a few minutes to get a nice layer of copper.
More information on the plating process can be found here:
>> http://web.media.mit.edu/~plusea/?p=554
Step-by-step
Paint with silver paint on fabric. If it is a new fabric it might not be as absorbent and the paint will stay on the surface. This is not necessarily a bad thing. Fabrics that absorb the paint well will get plated on both sides, but the plating take the texture of the fabric, rather than look like shiny metal adhered to the surface.
To make things easy connect all traces together in one point. This way you only need to attach the negative pole to one place. After your circuit has plated you can then disconnect the traces by scratching or cutting them with a knife.
Samples of plated traces on different fabrics.
Plated fabric circuit.
brilliant!
[…] up using alligator clips. I think when I redo this project I would either like to experiment with creating copper traces or just cut the circuit out of conductive fabric and adhere it to the […]
What fabrics can absorb the paint, hence the copper on both sides?