Project Title
- Heart Rater
Project Team
- Sungjin (SJ) Park
One sentence that describes your project
- Winter glove that reads and indicates your heart rate zone on winter activities.
Video
Final Poster Image
Describe what your project does and how it works
- This is a winter glove that reads heart rate data from a fingertip and indicates the heart pulse with the light sensor on Arduino board during any winter activities, especially for shoveling. The mechanism of the pulse sensor is that it shoots light through fingertip and gathers blood flow pattern data. With that pattern, I made the board to blink with the heartbeat. Green light indicates that your heart pulse rate is normal and red light indicates that your heart pulse rate is in a dangerous zone which is below around 30 bpm or above 110 bpm which is an extreme condition. In the showcase, mostly elder people showed interests in my project to check their heart rates, which was great since my target audiences are elders.
Describe your overall feelings on your project. Are you pleased, disappointed, etc.?
- It doesn’t look so fancy, but I like the result of its functionality and the design outcome. In the middle of the project, I switched the device from Arduino Uno to Circuit Playground Express, and it reduced extra bulkiness on the glove, making it look much simpler. Since I pursued minimalism from the start of the project, I think I almost achieved it design-wise.
Describe how well did your project meet your original project description and goals.
- It was originally designed for athletes to check their heart rate on any exercise. Within a few weeks in the course, I decided to switch the material to wool glove since spandex glove would not give a good fit with my devices and wires strapped around it. As I switched glove material to wool instead of spandex, the final outcome became more pleasant with warm fit.
Describe the largest hurdles you encountered. How did you overcome these challenges?
- I had a few challenges. First, the wires kept falling apart after several wears. Wires were not strong enough to hold with soldering when wearing several times. Since the hand moves consistently, the seam kept moving along with the hand. I resolved this issue with double strapping the wires to the board. Also, with similar context, I tried to hide every wire for minimal look by stitching them with a thick yarn, but it got too stiff that the wires kept broken out of the board. So, I decided to go without covering them. Most parts of wires and battery part are hidden in the neck of the glove but this part I didn’t cover for such reasons.
Describe what would you do next if you had more time
- I would implement Bluetooth device on my project to wirelessly send constant feed to the phone, so that I can record daily heart rate patterns. Within a given time frame, it was overwhelming to build a functional app that can receive live feed from the sensor through Bluetooth device. If I extend this project further, I would like to complete this function.
List the final materials used in your project
- Adafruit Circuit Playground Express
- Lithium Ion Polymer Battery
- Pulse Sensor (Heart-Rate Monitor)
- Wool glove
