It's Winter! and as we all know it gets pretty dark early. Most cyclists/Motorcyclists will regularly ride after dark in the winter months, making lights an essential piece of kit, to aid visibility. It comes amid increasing concern over the number of accidents involving them. So I decided to make Safety lights for Helmet and Jacket which can help to avoid causality.

The best part about this project is its total beginners friendy it does not requires any special skills like soldering.

So let's make DIY illuminating Helmet & jacket!

Step 1: Watch the Video!

If you do not want to read all the stuff you can watch my video tutorial!

Step 2: Everything We Need!

1) Helmet - It can be any helmet of your choice

2) Jacket - I will recommend a cotton Hoodie or Sweatshirt it makes sewing easier.

3) El Wire - It's an Electro-Luminescent wire it glows when AC voltage is applied.

3) Controller - To drive the EL wire we need a controller which can produce AC using AA batteries

4) AA battery - These are needed for the controller.

5) Hot Glue - For sticking the EL wire to helmet.

6) Needle and Thread - It is required for sewing.

Step 3: Preparing Helmet!

First I'll recommend cleaning the helmet with some IPA. So any dirt or oil present will get washed away. Now heat up the hot glue, then just use small drops of it to secure the EL wire. Do not use too much hot glue because it will make things look ugly.

Now from here, you can be Creative and make your own design. I just followed the edges and the way I wanted, in the end, it turned out to be great!

lastly, I used the Hot glue and secured the controller on the side of the helmet and it was done!

Caution:

Please be careful while using hot glue it can be painful if touched. Never lay a hot glue gun on its side. Place a piece of paper or cardboard under the safety stand to catch hot glue drips and prevent damage to the underlying surface.

PS: If you don't have hot glue you can use scotch tape.

Step 4: Sewing the Jacket!

Just like we did with the helmet we can do the same with the jacket and stick the EL wire to it but, many of you might not want to do it because it would ruin the jacket.

So this time we will use Sewing Method. Just take a needle and thread and sew the thread in such a way that it holds the EL wire in its place. I'm no expert in Sewing So I asked my mom to do it for me.

Once again you can be creative and do it as you wish!

Caution:

While sewing do not puncher the EL wire otherwise it won't work. Make loops around the EL wire by sewing so it stays in its place.

Step 5: Powering the Wire!

To power the EL wire we will use this readymade controller you can make one by yourself as well lemme know if you would like a tutorial on that as well,

This controller just take two AA battery and it has three function,

1) Continuous ON

2) Blink (~0.6 sec)

3) Fast blink (~0.4 sec)

Just plug in the controller and you are ready to rock.