My lack of planning ahead to leave time for coding included a lack of planning ahead by charging the battery. We’d ordered a 1200mAH battery from AdaFruit Lithium Ion Polymer Battery - 3.7v 1200mAh ID: 258 - $9.95 : Adafruit Industries, Unique & fun DIY electronics and kits so there would be plenty of wear time for the hat. If the dog was wearing it, we wanted it to be brightly lit for a long time, otherwise what would be the point?
Now that I had verified the sewing, and found some workable code to repurpose, I needed a power source! I plugged the battery in to charge while we ate and the kids and wife got their costumes ready. It didn’t have time to finish charging, so I left it off until we got to the event, so as not to waste power.
We walked around Greenfield Village for at least an hour and a half in the dark, lit mostly by jack-o-lanterns and torches, with occasional floodlights to show off a particular attraction. My family reports that I was always easy to identify and find, even in a crowd of thousands in the dark. I think we should subtitle this hat the “Come find me in a crowd” hat.
I’m happy to report that with random blinking of LEDs, having no more than 3 lit at a time, the battery ran for the whole time we were there. I’ll have to test it later to see how long it actually lasts, but we got at least 90 minutes from it on less than a full charge.
Unfortunately, I had to finish my (not hat related) lab report when we arrived home, so that left no time to study for my midterm exam. Fortunately, it’s on embedded electronics, so I hope to pass anyway.
