Hey, I’m creating a wearable LED jacket, for my year 12 HSC major, to increase safety on the roads when excersing in dark lighting conditions. I’m currently using the Lilypad Arduino 328 Board, with the lilypad coin cell battery holder and I’m currently running 8 mirco LEDS. Everything is working fine, however, the lights when connected to my computer are very bright, and then when connected to the power source (3V) it is not as bright. Would anyone know any bigger power sources I could connect to the 328 Ardiuno power source?
My lilypad doesn’t have any USB connecters, I do have the FTDI thought which i use tot connect my lilypad to the computer. I know I should have bought the lilypad ardiuno board to connect LiPo battery easier, in hindsight. However I only have a couple of weeks to fix this problem.
1 pic is the lilypad circuit with coin cell battery and conductive thread. 2 pic is the outer of the jacket with the LEDs showing.
Hey @Stephanie40987, looks like you’ve got a great project underway! We’d love to see it over in the projects section when you finish 
A coin-cell is certainly too small for running that many lights though, but the good news is that you have a couple of options for a good power source.
1. Long-term, rechargeable solution
A lipo battery and a power-boost will give you a rechargeable 5V supply for your lilypad, giving maximum brightness. You will just need to connect 5V to the charging inputs to charge the battery.
You can charge from a USB lead using the powerboost 1000c instead, but it’s significantly more expensive.
2. Cheap solution - Non-rechargeable but definitely gets over the line for assessment!
Put three AA batteries (non-rechargeables for max brightness) into this battery holder to get a decent 4.5V supply which the lilypad will be happy with - you’ll be able to connect it directly to the power input of the lilypad, which accepts 2-5V
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Thank you so much! Will most likely go with the cheap solution for the upcoming assessment.
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Edit: Dang! I specified the wrong battery holder. AAAs will work fine too, you’ll just get a significantly shorter runtime. I’m sure you can find your way from here anyhow.
I think the simplicity of just going with AA/AAAs is best. Rechargeables can be a headache because you have to be careful not to over-discharge them.
That and during assessment I’m sure it doesn’t take much imagination to see how the system could be made rechargeable - you were just after a cost-effective solution.
