Design of a modular system for textile wearables

Abstract

The thesis clarifies the graduation project for the master program of Integrated Product Design at the Delft University of Technology. It describes an interconnection method to connect electronics onto the smart textiles that differs from any solutions existing in the market. Smart textiles are considered as the future of the clothes and are predicted to have a large potential market. However, there is no standard interconnection technique that is applicable to the wide variety of smart systems. Problems on the wearability, reliability, size, comfort and cost severely limit the development of smart textile. Thus related products are still in a preliminary stage. In this thesis, it is first explored the previous work in the field of smart textiles. User research and using context analysis helps to form the design requirements. A thorough exploration of the existing interconnection techniques and wirings help to form the first ideas to start. Then it is made into several rounds of ideations. Design decisions are made based on the design goal and the list of requirements. Practical tests are set up to evaluate and compare the different concepts as well. Finally, the work of detailing, user experience design, aesthetics, manufacturing is also carefully considered and elaborated for the chosen concept. The result of this study is a product with a highly-finished level. Elitac, the corporate company, should be able to start manufacturing after the electronics are finished. From the academic aspect, this new interconnection solution gives a promising direction for the development of smart textiles. It solves the most difficult part of this field, which is the integration of electronics into the textiles. In general, the result of this thesis should be helpful to the researchers, designers and companies in this field.