This project was developed as part of the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering course The Art of Making: An Introduction to Hand-On System Design and Engineering
Inspiration Behind Handlebar Hero
The CDC reports: "Nearly 1,000 bicyclists die and over 130,000 are injured in crashes that occur on roads in the United States every year."
This raised the question: How might we design something to make riding a bike safer?
The concept of the Handlebar Hero was intended for bikers to signal their turns to other traffic on the road in a safe manner. The rider can turn on LED arrows to signal to drivers which way they are turning without ever removing their hands from the handlebars. This could increase biker safety by making them visible to other vehicles on the road, giving other traffic time to slow down before a biker turns, and potentially removing risk associated with removing one's hands from the handlebars to indicate turning.
Watch the Handlebar Hero in Action
How It Works
1) The rider touches their thumb to the conductive fabric sewn into the sleeve .
2) This touch signals the neopixels on the back of the sweatshirt to light up indicating the direction of turn (right thumb = right turn arrow).
3) There is a speaker in the hood that is also signaled by touch which begins playing a turn signal sound to let rider know they are signaling a turn.
4) When the rider releases their thumb from the conductive fabric, the lights and speaker turn off.
5) If the rider wants the lights to change brightness, they can adjust it using the potentiometer located in the hood.
What is Inside the Hood
Rider Interacting with Capacitive Touch
A Closer Look