Crafting a Hat Headlamp

Here you will learn to make a simple circuit to build a hat headlamp without any computing boards, but it is optional to use a ATTiny board or another arduino based boards too.

Materials:

• White or Black Cap.
• White Neo Pixel LEDs
• ATTiny
• 1 or 2 - 3v Battery
• Conductive Thread
• Copper Fabric
• Conductive Tape
• Cotton Fabric
• Black or White Cotton Thread
• One needle

I started this project with two options, one was a pair of mittens with fade in/fade out led lights for bike riders while the other option was to build a hat with a lamp hovering over it to read at night within a personal space. Then, I decided I could make a better circuit with the hat to make a touch sensitive sensor to turn the lights on and off as well as intensifying or dimming the lights with the ATTiny.

I could not program my ATTiny so had to make some changes to be able to create a touch switch on and off. To build my switch I cut two squares of conductive fabric and sewed to a piece of fabric which I would sew onto the inside of hat. I used conductive fabric to sew my two pieces.

Then, I build a little pocket to hold my 3v battery in which I also put two pieces of copper tape on each side. Right after, I knotted two strings of conductive fabric inside on both the power and ground sides to lead my circuit. I sewed in the battery pocket with black thread to blend in with the hat.

I sewed in the positive side of the battery around the hat through the back and the negative side on the front side.

Then, placed 4 LED's instead of the neopixels because I purchased nano neopixels which were too small to solder on the hat. I soldered the conductive thread (which was really difficult to not burn, so kept the heat to the minimum) on each ground and positive ends.