The Wearaboard

Update: I have ordered the Wearaboard from Shapeways and I am happy to report that the print quality is excellent! If you want one of these, I recommend them to print one.

Breadboards are a great way to prototype a smartstrap project but besides duct-tape there is no easy way to carry them around like you would with a real smartstraps.

To help me and other teams who are using breadboards for prototyping and want to wear them I designed this 3d-printable Wearaboard. 

The Wearaboard is a wearable arm plate (tm) that includes a standard size breadboard, a Pebble watch and a smartstrap connector to connect your watch to the breadboard. It also includes two pairs of standard 22mm bands attachments to attach it to your arm.

It took a few prototypes to get there but the result works very well and is definitely stylish! 

Design and Source Files

The Wearaboard was designed with Autodesk Fusion 360 and the files are released under the CC-SA License. 

It should be pretty easy to change the shape of the breadboard if needed or make other adjustments required for your project.

Printing and assembly

3D Printing

Prototypes were printed on a Lulzbot mini printer with PLA plastic. We used CURA to send the STL file to the printer, printed it flat on the bed and turned on support structure and a brim to get the best output quality. 

After printing, you will have to remove the support structure with pliers, sand or file the 22mm slots and you will probably have to re-drill the 1mm holes that hold the band.

Smartstrap connector

We followed our official instructions to build the smartstrap connector. 

The connector sits flat under the watch and the wires run in the back and through a hole under the breadboard. 

The breadboard fits snug into its space and if needed you can use double-sided tape to hold it in place (I did not need that, it was snug enough).

The Pebble will snap in place. To remove it, you can push the Pebble from the back or pull on the right side buttons.

Future Improvements

Pebble can provide up to 20 mA which is enough to run the basic smartstrap example shown in the picture but will not be enough if you want to add lots of peripherals on the board. A future version of the Wearaboard should include a slot on the bottom to fit a small LiPo battery and maybe a 5V up-converter to charge the Pebble and power 5V peripherals.