Im also intent on watching this thread. I havent made the transition to clip-ons yet but have considered it. Im also a bicyclist and miss it during the winter months.
After four consecutive night rides, these are working fairly well with 14500’s. Ride for 20 minutes, cycle the heaters on for ten. Repeat. It’s quite a pain wiring yourself up though. If you have chronic cold tooties like me, they’re worth it. :money_mouth_face: Once I get around to it, I think modding these to run 5 volts off of 4 18650’s will be the way to go. -Matt
Thanks for the update, I am still thinking about this for a winter camp trip - would save hauling in one pair of heavy boots.
How flexible are those insteps - do you feel them readily or are the biking shoes pretty stiff in the front for the clip ins?
SPD shoes are really stiff- they have to be. Can’t feel the inserts at all.
I love data; thanks for that Gauss.
Finally got the foot warmer mod done. Google Workspace Updates: New community features for Google Chat and an update on Currents! Box contains 4 18650’s and puts out five volts.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/310768896902?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&\_trksid=p3984.m1497.l26499
Toasty tooties @ 19 F. Trial and error found me the hot wire and ground on a usb cable. A little shrink-wrap, a little solder and I’m a happy guy. :bigsmile: Run time is over three hours, more than enough for a 30 mile ride.
Sounds great. :bigsmile:
Google: “You do not have permission to view this album.” :~
Got ’er fixed.
Thats a nice looking setup you’ve worked out. Thanks for posting the details.
After seeing some heated boot insoles at the local ski shop for $500.00 last week, I ordered some of these from AliExpress for my Spouse’s AT Ski boots. The plan is to glue them to the already existing high quality insoles, and power them with ENB USB power packs.
The seller has not even shipped them yet after 5 days, presumably because he is busy at his second job as a CS rep at Fasttech.
Nice, I haven’t seen those yet.
My next project is with carbon heater flex tape.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/321229410714?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&\_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649
Russia is the only place I could find it. I am going to try installing it around the inside perimeter of some new spd’s and put the plug right in the heel of the shoe.
True plug-n-play!-Matt
Nice, I haven’t seen those yet
Cool mod!
These carbon fibers look interesting… maybe a kind of cloth with these fibers in it as a 18650 sleeve…that would make a nice hand warmer.
How are these carbon fibers connected to a wire?
Edit: here are some pictures and notes how to wire it up…you can also purchase it there without shipping costs…
I agree those carbon fibres are an interesting find. I get the impression that this works like a filament. I assume there must be some sort of formula for what sort of heat you get for given configurations. For example if you wanted to power it from an ENB Battery pack (which seems like a convenient method for most BLF’ers), I guess you’d be working with an input voltage of 5V? In the picture of the long run he made for a jacket insert, I wonder what sort of input he had to use for that, and what kind of current that would draw. Getting those wires attached to it also looked like an interesting challenge. One technique that may work would be salvage some of those conductive pads from those TENS machines that Fasttech sells (they have 2 different models with different pads) and place them into a pouch in the carbon fibre tape as your attachment points.
I think these pads are not made for constant current.
Sewing a copper cable on looks not so difficult but I was wondering if it will oxidate especially in a sweaty shoe…
……
The formula is ohms law ;).
U=R*I
The spec is 8 Ohm per meter for the wider tape so you will get:
U=5V and R=8
I=U/R=5/8A=0.625A
P=U*I= 3.125W. (Shorter way would be P=U^2/R)
………
But!: the voltage will depend on the load and on the power bank you use, the resistance is specified with +–1Ohm per meter, the resistance will be different on the edges and so on…
———-
But all in all not real difficult, you just have to try how much power you need and then you calculate how much resistance would be adequate. You can always use some heater parts in parallel and some in series…
I’ve been testing the carbon heater tape today. Nothing real scientific. I have not seen anything like it before. I cut the tape in half (one for each shoe) and applied 5 volts to it. Not much heat at all. Folding one strip in two, however, made quite a bit of difference. That’s the ticket! It heats VERY evenly, more so than my other shoe heaters. The shorter the strip is, the hotter it gets. I’m thinking about hot-glueing it right to the inside perimeter of the spd.
can’t see the pictures
Definetly like to see more pic’s for sure. I ended up ordering two of the footbed warmers from Ali, but would also be open to ordering the tape before the others come in. It was –35C here last night, (getting balmy right now, has warmed to –25C), so wish I had them already.
I don’t know why, but right-click the placeholder and select “view image in new tab”
Something’s wacky over here…… O.K., Think I got it now……