LED Pants

Want to add LEDs to your pants and still be able to wash the pants? I wanted to make some pants that light up for a friend. He needed something easy to wear that could function outdoors in high temperatures and dusty conditions and be able to be washed.

I am an experienced sewer but had never worked with LEDs or electrical circuits before. I'm still bitter that I was forced to take Home Ec in high school, but was not allowed to take shop class. I could not find any instructions on the web that answered by very basic questions, so I've written this Instructable with others like me in mind.

Basically, I built the circuit, placed the LEDs into holes in a vinyl strip, and then covered the back of the strip with Velcro (TM). I sewed the other side of the Velcro onto the pants, pulled the wires out the top of the LED strip, connected them to a 9-volt battery and stuck the battery in the front pocket.

Be sure to review the circuit diagram for an overview of what's to come!

Step 1 Materials

You will need these tools and materials:

Pants - be sure there are no pockets covering the side seams

1/4 yard vinyl - pick a color that matches the pants or consider getting a shiny silver vinyl to act as a reflector for your LEDs. Here is one example (scroll to the bottom of the page)
silver vinyl

2 yards 2" wide sew-on (Non-adhesive) Velcro (TM)
1/4 yard woven cotton fabric- any color will do, I used a medium weight black

22 gauge stranded wire - this is from Radio Shack .
I got 22 gauge because that's all they had. I got stranded wire instead of solid since it's less rigid.

30 LEDs of your choice - I got these ultra-bright white LEDs because I wanted as much light as possible.

Two 9-volt batteries

Solder

Electrical tape

Needle-nosed pliers

Wire stripper and wire cutter

Single-edge razor blade

Rotary punch - available at sewing, crafts, and leather stores. You can use pretty much any tool that will cut 5 mm holes in the vinyl.

Soldering iron or gun

Cutting board - I used this old cutting board as a work surface when soldering.

Webpage to calculate the size resistors and batteries you'll need LED Series/Parallel Array Wizard

Appropriate resistors for your circuit - I used six 82 ohm 1/4 volt resistors and one 220 ohm 1/4 volt resistor in each circuit (for a total of twelve 82 ohm resistors and two 220 ohm resistors). Radio Shack does not carry these exact resistors so I bought these on-line. If you can't find the right ohm resistor, go up to the next one. Do not use a resistor with too little resistance because you could blow out the LEDs.

Scissors

Yardstick or tape measure

Thread

Seam ripper

Sewing machine

Comments

[robert.d]

Hi,I read an article of yours at http://www.talk2myshirt.com/blog/archives/540
where you talked about led pants, which is really interesting to me.
It is a really good idea to make them such attractive. I have ever see the led strips at http://www.hero-ledstore.com , but I am not sure if they are the same. I just like the ideas you have, really interesting. It can also be used for traffic policemen vest or shirts -:).

[LouiseJohnson]

Hi Robert,

I didn't even realize that my instructable has been discussed on talk2myshirt.com. What a nice surprise!

It would be a lot easier to buy strips already assembled and it might make them more rugged. I made my strips myself - which took awhile, and they tend to be fragile.

Yes, there are lots of other clothes that can be lit up, making parties even better!

Louise

[imarzouka]

I actually prefer using this calculator over ledcalc. Here is a direct link to the schematic for the same configuration:

http://ledcalculator.net/default.aspx?values=9,3.7,20,13,0

[flio191]

wow, thank you so much for this calculator... this was really helpful

[ledlightmaker]

 It is very interesting.

[japala]

I would have liked to see a link to http://ledcalc.com and not to some other site as the shot of the schematic is from ledcalc...

[sklarm]

is this really trade marked? I made a jumpsuit of similar design in 2003 with the same goal "washable". Mine included a microcontroller that sequenced different colored LEDs on the legs and arms of a jumpsuit.

http://screwdecaf.cx/ledjumpsuit.html

[LouiseJohnson]

No, this is not trademarked. I chose the Instructables Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike license which they describe as: This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. Others can download and redistribute your work just like the by-nc-nd license, but they can also translate, make remixes, and produce new stories based on your work. All new work based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also be non-commercial in nature. BTW, that is a really cool jumpsuit!

[a.doovz]

Excellent instructable. The velcro idea is brilliant.

[sbdesigns]

"I am an experiened sewer" lol. Have you seen Master Splinter about?

[arthur92710]

step 1 Materials
I used six 82 ohm 1/4 volt resistors and one 220 ohm 1/4 volt resistor in each circuit (for a total of twelve 82 ohm resistors and two 220 ohm resistors)

thats 1/4 watt

Nice pants! I want some

[tradergordo]

Imagine what you'd be making today if you had been able to get into shop class instead of home etc? :)

[frollard]

Neat instructable - why not just make it 14 LEDs so that it has a uniform resistor design?

[LouiseJohnson]

Perhaps a little stubbornly, I decided to stay with the 13 LEDs because I had all the resistors for that circuit and had already made the holes in the vinyl.

[frollard]

hehehe, I'm forced to laugh that your step is called "plan the circuit" and that "it was relatively unplanned" is the reason ;) I still like it.