1

VICTORIA UNIVERSITY OF WELLINGTON Te Whare Wananga o te Upoko o te Ika a Maui

School of Design Te Kura Hoahoa

IDDN 412: INDUSTRIAL DESIGN Major Design Project

Project One

“Paradise Replugged”

INTRODUCTION In "Paradise Reforged" James Belich describes his view of three clear periods in New Zealand's recent history. The first, progressive colonisation, describes mass-immigration of mostly British subjects and its political and social consequences. The second, recolonisation, he describes as a strengthening of the ties between New Zealand and Britain towards a country of what he calls "Better Britons" (the New Zealanders). Commodities like red meat and butter were key ingredients to the first two stages combining to form what he calls the "protein industry". The third stage, and one for which Belich does not offer a closing date, is decolonisation. This begins with Britain's joining European Community on January 1, 1973. Since then, Belich argues, New Zealand has been unleashed from it's mothership and continues to drift around the Pacific Ocean and farther field in pursuit of new illustrious relationships. Many New Zealanders here and around the world are taking part in this very important courtship. THE KEY CHALLENGE This course takes you to the hotspots of serenading. The real challenge in this project is to define the position New Zealand takes in a global context with its manufactured products through the medium of Industrial Design - to act as a catalyst between culture and technology, between people and products. You will be working with technologies developed in New Zealand that are so new their full potential has not been realized and their implications not yet understood. You will combine these technologies with cultural characteristics that are of special significance to New Zealand and relate them to global market niches, each with their own special issues of identity. This will demand that you address a huge range of industrial design issues from formal to functional, technological to social and political to cultural – including issues of niche marketing and brand identity. You must take an explicit and strong position on all of these issues.

2

WAYS IN Identifying the issues and trying to take them all into account will have the effect of complicating matters and making design seem impossible. Taking a position should privilege one, or a few, of the issues without compromising the others and make conceptualisation, development and articulation of the design seem easy. Broadly, the issues are: Technology: Technology has always been a significant source of inspiration in design – whether, for instance, in the form of firing clay to generate an ancient ceramic artifact or using one of its main ingredients, silicon, to manufacture a microprocessor. Technology has become integral to our lives and it is your task as an industrial designer to mediate between the two – acting as a catalyst between human behavior and technology to generate useful and culturally meaningful products. In this course we are collaborating with three New Zealand companies that have developed innovative technical solutions that transform traditional technologies: The first engages a well known and surprisingly old technology – the electric motor - developed in the early 19th century by Michael Faraday and Joseph Henry and still used today in a form largely unchanged since its inception. All this is about to change thanks to new technologies, developed exclusively by Wellington Drive Technologies Ltd., that allow the motor to be configured to the product and not, as is traditionally the case, the other way around. The second option links a number of digital technologies using the sharing potential of the internet to connect; the consumer, designer, and manufacturer in a new paradigm of making. The technologies used by Ponoko currently allow designers to make, share, and sell their ideas. Ponoko offers a forum for designers to access world wide audiences and markets. In selecting this option, students will consider both the unique qualities of a new digital manufacturing system and the opportunities of collaboration with the purchaser. The antecedence of the third technology stems from two sources; wearing electronics, an example of which can be seen in the pioneering work of Rehmi Post while at MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms1 and developments of conductive polymer. New Zealand has a particular strength in this second area with the research work of the New Zealander Alan MacDiarmid and his colleague Alan J. Heeger, and Hideki Shirakawa, which earned them the 2000 Nobel prize in Chemistry "For the discovery and development of conductive polymers”.2 This country continues to make significant developments in this area through the work of Stewart Collie and others. Stewart Collie is currently with AgResearch and lead researcher/developer of SoftSwitch. He believes there is a difference between wearable electronics and wearing electronics. Footfalls and Heartbeats want to expand the former and their technology offers considerable design and application opportunities which you can explore through the medium of industrial design.

Like all innovations the implications of these technologies are far reaching but have not been fully explored and are not yet fully understood; this is an opportunity for you to reveal their full potential by exploring new and unexpected applications and scenarios within local and global contexts. See the technical brief attached to this project description. New Zealand’s Resources: These are resources that are characteristic of, or special to New Zealand and form not only the basis of our economic well being but also contribute considerably to our cultural make up. Traditionally natural resources in the form of raw materials, like timber, and commodities such as agricultural produce, were seen to be our main financial resource. More recently the government’s GIF scheme (Growth and Innovation Framework) has identified intellectual property (IP), whether from Bio Tech, Information Technology or the ‘Creative Industries’, as an additional marketable resource. More recently still, even our way of life is seen as having intrinsic value, particularly in the face of global terrorism, pandemics and overpopulation. Using these resources not only makes economic sense but, sensitively engaged, they can instil personality or identity in a product, thereby taking it beyond the mundane and everyday and giving it a new sense of value, particularly in global markets. 1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_fabric (July 2011) 2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conductive_polymer (July 2011)

3

Global Marketplace and Cultural Identity: The global marketplace is dominated by global brands that promise a certain character, performance, quality, image and ideally differentiation from similar products in highly competitive and multi-cultural markets. For this reason brand identity is often expressed in a trans-cultural visual language that means the same to people whether in USA, Italy or Thailand. However, in the pursuit of market differentiation the ‘local’ and particular as opposed to the ‘global’ and general, can take on special interest, although ideally not at the cost of the brand identity. Within the context of this project it is up to you to explore a balance that makes full use of the synergies that can exist between the two – to generate a product that has undeniable relevance in the global marketplace and speaks of a global brand, but engages your own particular local context, resources and technologies, to inspire innovative design proposals that challenge the existing and offer new perspectives on the accepted. To help you focus your design exploration use one of the following scenarios: ONE TWO THREE

Using:

Technology

Moulded Motor

Wellington Drive

Sensor Technology

Footfalls and Heartbeats

Digital Manufacture

Ponoko

To sell/promote: New Zealand’s

Resources

Commodities: (Value added)

Wood, Meat, Dairy, Wool, etc

IP Creative Industries:

Fashion, craft, film etc.

Lifestyle:

Clean green, Adventure, Sports etc.

In:

Global Marketplace

‘Body Shop’

Store in Brighton

‘Apple Inc’

Apple Store Cupertino, California

‘Muji’

Store in Tokyo

?

4

PROCEDURE You will work through a number of stages that correspond with the reviews outlined in the timetable.

Background Research:

You should conduct background research into the New Zealand technology companies, Wellington Drive Technologies (WDT) Ponoko and Footfalls and Heartbeats. Investigate their technologies, consider current application and start to identify real future possibilities for these quite different technologies. You should visit their websites and also the websites of Body Shop, Apple and Muji. Consider the brands and the technologies in depth.

1. Identifying the Issues:

In particular, you need to identify issues that can be addressed by Industrial Design and from an explicitly industrial design perspective. You will need to research all three aspects of your chosen scenario in detail in order to acquaint yourself with the relevant issues. These may well cover a wide range, from technical, cultural, economic, political or environmental in nature to issues of aesthetics, identity etc.

2. Understanding Precedents:

This is important because it provides a major insight into the cultural context that you are working in. It is important to know what has and has not gone before you both to learn from them and position yourself in relation to them.

3. Taking a Position:

This is your project in a sentence. You must be able to identify the basis for your entire project clearly and succinctly. You might not arrive at this in the beginning of the trimester, or you might shift it throughout, but certainly at the end of the trimester, you should have convinced yourself, at least, what your basic attitude is. The results of these first four points will be presented in the form of a written report at the CRITIQUE on Friday 22 July and will be amended for hand-in and assessment at the REVIEW 1: Position, Precedents + ISSUES on Friday 29 July. See submission requirements.

4. Developing the Design:

This will only happen by drawing and modelling. Studio tutorials will not be conducted with students who have not produced new material. Developing your design strongly will involve drawing and modelling at a wide range of scales for a wide range of purposes. Sketches, diagrams, detail drawings, sketch models, composition studies, prototypes, material samples etc. should all be engaged as the issues arise and are reworked throughout the semester towards a cohesive and comprehensive presentation set. The results of this stage will be presented in a CRITIQUE: Defined Concept on Friday 12 August and REVIEW 2: Position, Precedents + DETAILS on Tuesday 6 September It is expected that your proposal will achieve an increasing level of conceptual and physical resolution throughout this stage. This should be clearly evident in your Review 2 presentation.

5

MANDATORY SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS The minimum submission requirements are: Critique1: A written and visual report that documents your research into the technological, cultural and

socio-political background to your project as well as precedents or reference projects. It should visually reflect your chosen scenario and it must also clearly outline the position you are taking with the project. A synopsis of your written report should be presented as an illustrated PowerPoint presentation, lasting no more than five minutes, at the critique on the 22 July. This presentation should also contain a range of potential product concepts and directions derived from your chosen scenario.

Review 1: A week after the critique there will be a review. In this you will confirm your design direction and produce a written project brief and a Gant chart illustrating all the stages, steps and design activities you will undertake throughout your major project. Your written report will be resubmitted for assessment along with all your work to date.

Assessment Criteria for Stage One:

Extent of research and use of suitable precedents Identification of issues relating to Industrial Design Evidence of new and innovative applications of technology

as manifested in the quality and range of design proposals Thoroughness of the proposed brief and project management/methods of enquiry Appropriateness of methods of design enquiry Quality of presentation and communication

Critique 2: By the critique on Friday 12 August you will have formulated your design concept and defined it

through sketches, sketch models, schematic component layouts and initial prototypes. At this stage the emphasis may be on a number of different design configurations rather than a single solution but all of these should address the issues relating to your own design direction.

Review 2: This will be a formal presentation in which your fully defined design direction will be

assessed, scrutinized and critiqued. It is critical at this stage that you have refined your initial concepts to one considered design that is represented as an aesthetic model. Please note; at this assessment you must hand-in at least 3 initial prototypes from Critique 2. Since you will be presenting to other staff who may not have been involved in the project you will also need a brief written statement (one page A4 maximum) that outlines concisely the background to your proposal, the position you are taking and how your proposals answer that position.

Assessment Criteria for Stage Two:

Effective integration of desire, need and function in a single design concept Breadth of inventiveness Effectiveness in fully integrating the technology into the concept 3D design resolution High level of craft in the drawings and modelling Quality of Presentation and communication

6

TIMETABLE

Week Date Location Task 1 Tuesday 12 July VS 204

VS 204 Wig 301

Lecture: Introduction to Course Tim Miller Lecture: Technology briefing from David Howell , Chief Technical Officer, Wellington Drive Technologies Ltd. Studio: Identifying Issues for Industrial Design

Friday 15 July VS 204 Wig 301

Lecture: Technology briefing from Karen Bender, CEO and Founder, Footfalls and Heartbeats Studio: Project Research

2 Tuesday 19 July VS 204 Wig 301

Lecture: Technology briefing from David ten Have, CEO and co-founder, Ponoko Studio: Project Research

Wednesday 20 July 12:40pm VS LT2 Lecture: “RP & Additive Manufacturing” Mike Naylon

Friday 22 July VS 204 Wig 301

Studio: Project Research Critique 1: Report, Presentation and Ideas

3 Tuesday 26 July VS 204 Lecture: “Active Technology” Robbie Greig Studio: Design Concept Development

Friday 29 July VS 204 Wig 301

REVIEW 1: (15%) Position, Precedents + ISSUES

4 Tuesday 2 August VS 204 Lecture: “Personal Fabrication” Tim Miller Studio: Design Concept Development

Friday 5 August VS 204 Wig 301

Lecture: “Lost in Space” Richard Hovey Studio: Design Concept Development

5 Tuesday 9 August VS 204 Wig 301

Lecture: “Time and Place” Tim Miller Studio: Design Concept Development

Friday 12 August VS 204 Wig 301

Critique 2: Defined Concept

6 Tuesday 16 August VS 204 Lecture: TBA Studio: Critical Reassessment and Design Refinement

Friday 29 August VS 204 Wig 301

Studio: Design Concept Development

7&8

Monday 22 August - Friday 3 September MID TRIMESTER BREAK (Work on developing the design)

9 Tuesday 6 September VS 204 REVIEW 2: (25%) Position, Precedents + DETAILS

Friday 9 September Wig 301 Introduction to Project Two

10 Tuesday 13 September VS 204 Lecture/Studio: Critical Reassessment and Design Refinement

Friday 16 September Wig 301 Studio: Critical Reassessment and Design Refinement

11 Tuesday 20 September Wig 301 Lecture/Studio: Critical Reassessment and Design Refinement

Friday 23 September Wig 301 Studio: Critical Reassessment and Design Refinement

12 Tuesday 27 September VS 204 Project Two, REVIEW 1: (25%) Issues, Precedents, Position, Details, Presentation: COHERENCY

Friday 30 September Wig 301 Studio: Critical Reassessment and Design Refinement

13 Tuesday 4 October VS 204 Lecture/Studio: Design Refinement and Extension and Final Presentation

Friday 7 October Wig 301 Studio: Design Refinement and Extension and Final Presentation

14 Tuesday 11 October VS 204 Lecture/Studio: Design Refinement and Extension and Final Presentation

Friday 14 October Wig 301 Studio: Design Refinement and Extension and Final Presentation

15 Monday 17 October Study week /no studio: Wednesday 19 October by 4pm

Wig 301 Final Hand-in of model

16 Monday 24 October Labour Day

17 Wednesday 2 November by 4pm

Final Hand-in of all presentation material

Thursday 3 November Set up presentations

Friday 4 November TBA FINAL REVIEW (35%) Issues, Precedents, Position, Details, Presentation: RESOLUTION

7

GENERAL TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS: Electric motor technology WELLINGTON DRIVE TECHNOLOGIES www.wdtl.com

Cost

• The total engineering cost of an application-specific Wellington motor (i.e. every component designed specifically for the application and tooled for mass production) is under $US125k. The cost can frequently be reduced by adding "motor features" to structural plastic parts that are being designed for the body of the overall product. In practical terms these costs meant that a design-specific motor is economical for items that are produced in quantities as low as 30,000 pieces per year. Conventional motors are expensive to design and tool ($US400k and up), and require expensive capital plant for the production processes. These factors mean that design-specific motors are rarely economic for items produced below the rate of 0.5 million units per year.

Shapes and Dimensions

• Wellington motors can be made in a wide range of shapes from long and narrow (e.g. tube-like, with the diameter being 20% of the length or less), to wide and essentially flat (e.g. where the height is 5% of the diameter or less).

• Motors can be made in tube or ring structures where 90% of the interior volume is clear and available for passage of fluids etc. or accommodation of structural parts. This characteristic has been employed in large centrifugal fans and lighthouse beacons.

• Motor "segments" can also be made. In other words drive can be produced by a motor that occupies only part of the periphery of a driven item, rather like a linear motor.

Clearance

• Wellington motors can operate satisfactorily with a physical gap between the fixed and rotating parts of up to 3mm (conventional motors typically require a clearance of 0.2mm or less). This air gap can be occupied by (non magnetic) stainless steel or plastic, so that the driven parts can be physically sealed off from the outside world (e.g. this characteristic has been used to good effect in dishwashers, reverse osmosis water filters, electrical generators and frozen cocktail machines).

Control

8

• Wellington motors are fully controllable: speed can be varied as required between 0 and {say} 4000 rpm; acceleration rates can be set and adjusted; reversing is provided. Hitherto these features have rarely been available for motors in appliances; if available such features have been costly and unreliable.

• Wellington's electronic control and software provide a simple data interface; this is important in most large appliances (i.e. refrigerators, dishwashers, washing machines) where most modern designs use an in-product data network.

• Practical examples include the use of slow acceleration at start up in dishwasher pumps to reduce the "noise shock" that is usually noticed presently, automatic speed adjustment to compensate for occlusion of HEPA elements in air filters and periodic reversing to clean evaporator and condensor radiators in refrigerators to improve efficiency.

• Adjustable speed control can also be deployed in {say} fan arrays to give directional control over flow without complex mechanical linkages.

• Due to the electronic control, Wellington motors have in-built safety features including stall protection and over heating protection. Because of this motor size and weight can be reduced when compared to conventional motors.

Energy Efficiency

• Wellington motors use around one third of the energy of conventional motors in typical appliances. Aside from the marketing benefits the improved efficiency means that less waste heat must be removed from the end product which has considerable implications for overall design.

Vibration and Noise

• Wellington motors are exceptionally quiet with low levels of vibration. The "hum" noticeable with most conventional motors is entirely absent; the low vibration means that complicated dampers or shock absorbers are not needed. These points mean that product size and cost can be reduced and new operating features can be added. For example, a rangehood manufacturer is using the low noise feature to leave the fan running at 5% of full speed when the unit is "off"; this mode changes the air in the kitchen once or twice per hour suppressing smells and moisture; the motor uses less than 2W of power under these conditions, while the entire system is silent.

DE066ZB01 Motor and Polymer Components, Motor weight: 0.8 kg, Dimensions: 92×57 mm Visit www.wdtl.com for more information on WDT’s products.

9

GENERAL DESCRIPTION: Digital Desktop Manufacturing PONOKO www.ponoko.com A little bit about us and personal manufacturing The way products are made and distributed is changing. People routinely buy and sell products online. At the same time, computer-controlled manufacturing hardware, like laser cutters and 3D printers, provides a practical alternative to mass-production. This means one-off designs can be made on demand in a way that is a good deal for both buyers and the environment. Ponoko is an online marketplace connected to a global network of digital manufacturing hardware. It’s a place where creators can become famous and consumers can buy individualized products. And with no traditional manufacturers in the middle, everyone gets a better deal and the environmental impacts of manufacturing are reduced. We’re setting out to change the world by providing the first personal manufacturing platform that connects creators, consumers, product designs and raw materials with a global network of digital manufacturing hardware controlled from any PC. The result is an online marketplace where people meet to buy, sell, share product designs, and make them for real. The impetus for Ponoko was the disappointing experience people face when making (individualized) products – it is complex and high cost, both financially and environmentally. Encouraged by the rise of the Internet-connected ‘creative-class’, along with smarter, faster, smaller and cheaper digital manufacturing hardware (laser cutters, CNC routers and 3D printers), we formed a plan to solve these problems. Starting with the premise that the personal computing and personal manufacturing industries have strong parallels, we realized that one day everyone will be able to create and make any product from their own home. This led to the idea of mass-individualized products created by the web community and made on a globally-distributed network of manufacturing hardware controlled from any PC. And then things got quite exciting. Imagine today’s explosion in digital content creativity being replicated with products. What world changing inventions are we going to see by giving 1 billion Internet-connected people the chance simply to ‘click to make’? And what about the positive effects on the global warming problem that stem from eradicating the storage needs of finished mass produced products? Wow. And so we got busy building the start of the world’s post-industrial revolution – and called it ponoko.com. So into the future people anywhere can use Ponoko to create just about anything, on demand, with the click of a mouse. For instance, a creator in Sydney uploads their product design to the Ponoko website. A buyer in San Francisco orders the product online, has the components manufactured by their local Ponoko fabricator and shipped direct to them for assembly. Another buyer in London outputs the product parts on their own desktop 3-D printer. In time, a thousand buyers could have that one design made to order on the same day in a thousand cities around the world. The problems we solve Today’s product making and distribution model is financially and environmentally unsustainable. It is also under pressure to digitize like the music and video industries. Because today’s 100-year old product making and distribution system is so ingrained into our everyday lives and delivers so much benefit, problems are not so obvious. But when was the last time you made something? Making products today does not come easy – some major problems exist: 1) Making and delivering (individualized) products is a time-consuming, complex and expensive process.

This pain does not fit well in a world that increasingly demands instant satisfaction from mass

10

personalized and customized products at low cost. 2) Product making and distribution is cost prohibitive for new entrants without relatively deep financial

reserves. This is stifling creativity and the progress of humanity on unimaginable fronts. 3) Low cost mass production and global distribution relies on using lots of cheap energy and labour. But

these two resources are running out. 4) Product making and distribution is a major contributor to the global warming problem (according to the

WRI, perhaps 20% of the problem). Being environmentally unsustainable, the increasing ‘carbon currency’ costs also make the current model financially unsustainable.

5) Finding individualized products is difficult and buying such products is a time-consuming, relatively

complex and expensive burden. There is no easy way to find a supplier of low-cost individualized products.

These pressing problems illustrate that a new product making and distribution process is required. Ponoko is that new process. The benefits we deliver Ponoko delivers today the future of product making and distribution to the mass market: • Creators – less risk. On-demand design and manufacture is made possible, so work does not need to

begin until a consumer makes a purchase. And because product designs can be sold to a large global audience from day one, payback periods can be shortened.

• Creators – lower costs. With Ponoko, creators can now ship digital product designs with the click of a

mouse, not physical products requiring a pocket full of cash. This is Apple iTunes for products, but with YouTube style user-generated content.

• Creators – instant scalability with less cost. Ponoko’s distributed manufacturing model means the

creator’s cost and timeframe to manufacture a product for 1 customer is the same as for 1 million customers. Creators can now sell millions of products on demand at ‘no’ extra cost.

• Creators – increased control. Ponoko is specifically designed to provide end-to-end visibility and

control over the entire product prototyping, making and distribution process. • Creators – less complexity. By connecting creators direct with consumers, the traditional supply chain

complexity involving a manufacturer, distributor, wholesaler and retailer is eliminated. • Consumers – lower-cost individualized products. Because no physical product exists until purchase,

product design collaboration makes it possible for everyone to co-create and individualize ‘almost anything’ they need or want. As adoption increases, prices for Ponoko’s design-to-order and made-to-order commodity type products will become unrecognisably low.

• Environment – cut the global warming costs and product waste. By cutting out today’s supply

chain middlemen (manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, retailers), less transport and no storage of final products means less carbon emissions. And because products are only made after purchase, less ends up in the landfill.

• Humankind – explosion of world-changing products. Ponoko enables a real world creative

explosion to parallel the digital content explosion, meaning we are going to see product invention breakthroughs faster than ever before.

Visit www.ponoko.com for more information on Ponoko services

11

GENERAL PRODUCT DESCRIPTION: Intelligent fabric sensor technology Footfalls and Heartbeats Footfalls and Heartbeats will be a global leader in intelligent fabrics, with a specialty in remote physiological monitoring. The flagship product will be a base-layer garment capable of reading physiological signs and transmitting them in real-time. Physiological signs (respiration rate, heart rate, cardiac output, oxygenation levels, etc.) and the method of transmission (USB or wi-fi to cloud computing/SaaS platform or SmartPhone application) will be customized according to the requirements of the commercial partner or consumer at hand. WHY?

• To assess, diagnose or alert to health concerns • To provide information to increase performance and quality of living

The human body produces dozens of physiological outputs that signal the body’s internal state. These outputs can be used to assess, diagnose or alert when something is going wrong or as information to increase performance and quality of living. CURRENT STATE Currently, physiological monitoring happens in the following ways:

• In a laboratory/clinical setting • Miniaturized electronics and damaging electrodes (eg. Holter monitors) • In sports – heart rate monitors with awkward chest straps

GROWTH TRENDS

• Wireless - advanced wireless transmission technologies • Mobile - increased adoption of mobile devices (eg. Smartphones) • Empowerment - using personalized information to access better or more appropriate

heath services and products • Population - an aging, yet exceptionally active and independent population • Health costs - increasing costs and decreased spending in health care facilities

DIFFERENCE Footfalls and Heartbeats is building from the bottom up using a combination of textile structure, chemistry and nanotechnology. The outcome will be a base-layer garment capable of reading the wearer’s physiological signs and transmitting them to a remote location without changing the feel, style and comfort of the garment. ADVANTAGES To the wearer:

• Comfort • Ownership of medical data • Security that someone will be alerted if a dangerous event occurs • ‘Invisible’ monitoring – decreased visual stigma of requiring a medical device • To physicians/coaches: • Obtain lab results in field settings • Access to hard data to correspond with patient/athlete’s personal observations • To medical/athlete device companies: • Entry to new markets • Increased adoption in current markets

12

TECHNOLOGY PRINCIPLES The Footfalls and Heartbeats Limited (FHL) intelligent textile uses a mathematically determined knitted fabric structure with electrically conductive yarn (combined with non-conductive) to form a localized and repeatable network of sensors. This technology manipulates the weft knitting process using CAD, and then incorporates a portable power source to produce a textile structure that is capable of measuring bioelectrical signals and mechanical deformation. HOW IT WORKS Footfalls’ technology uses localized network conductivity/resistivity to determine strain. In effect, the micro-interaction of yarn intersection nodes (knitted stitch loops), vertically and horizontally results in a change of electrical resistivity and hence a measurement of the strain. Extension or compression of the textile through any axis will result in a change of electrical signal. The textile can also register bioelectric signals by direct contact with the skin. For example, the bioelectricity produced by human muscle (in the 0-20 mV range) can be picked up using the conductive yarn portion of the knitted structure. CAPABILITIES The FHL textile is able to:

• Measure strain (refer Young’s modulus) and mechanical pressure/compression. • Measure limb movement (in a spatial sense) through the determination of joint angles on

the human form. • Register the bioelectric signal produced by all living muscle. • Register temperature and moisture with an appropriate intrinsically conducting polymer

(ICP) coating. (Suggest polypyrrole [PPy] for biocompatibility) • Be laundered and dried as per sportswear. • Be cut and sewn as per normal garment production. • Conduct low voltage.

CONSTRAINTS The FHL textile is not able to:

• Deform and recover under a large cyclical (>35N) load. • Work without a power source, or one greater than nine (9) volts. • Determine point values of bioelectricity. A minimum contact area of 4 mm2 is required. • Be used as a heating element.

NANO APPLICATIONS The FHL textile might be the basis for three (3) added functionalities using nanotechnology, in particular nano-particulate deposition or atomic layer deposition (ALD).

• Solar power using either silicon or biomimetic compounds and structures. • Textile battery comprising deposition of a suitable power dense nanoparticulates

Capacitive sensing using both the micro structure of the knitted textile and suitable dielectric nano-coating. Visit http://www.creativehq.co.nz/for-our-businesses/current-businesses/footfalls-and-heartbeats for more information on Footfalls and Heartbeats.