USB Heated gloves for outdoors - home made

[RayStarAl]

Fairly inexpensive too:

- Two pairs of gloves, outer one with fingertip for touch-sensitive screens.

- Wires from two "reptile heating pads" for $10USD on Amazon, each 8W, USB plug comes with 3-settings.

- Two USB power tanks - I got the 8000maH 29Wh, one for each glove to last 4h on max.

- A bit of time to sew the insulated wire into place. No soldering.

Here the key use is manipulating telescope parts in the cold without taking gloves on/off - for gardening/farming which is high frequency mechanically stressful, more care about wire placement and reinforcement is likely needed.

One on left shows the completed double-glove. One on right is the inside glove showing one side of the (insulated) wire looping around. It's useful to have the 3 settings because you may only need light heat for those nights above freezing. A key reason for having one glove inside another is to minimize yanking of the wire, or having it catch on fingers. and another is to trap the heat. 8W is a fair bit of heat and it is directly delivered to the tips, nail beds, and veins on the backside. The "lobster claw" hack is of course to keep the outer fingers together for co-warmth, as they are not needed for dexterity. I can manipulate thumbscrews reasonably well, you may want to snip the ends off for skin contact (at your peril). Do note that when grasping things, you don't use the very tips nor the middle of the finger pads, and it's slightly different positioning when using two fingers instead of three. One can power both gloves from one USB tank, but it will run out earlier.

I have come across some companies that have heat transfer textiles, but they didn't deal with individuals... maybe in the future. In the meantime, I will find out how long these last in terms of bending/cracking frozen wires, but given the in-glove wires themselves are heated and the connecting wires run up the inside of my jacket, it should be ok, but that's definitely the weak point in this setting. Ski gloves generally don't have the dexterity nor the heat right to the tips.

[Poshcards]

I buy genuine sheepskin mitts, they help me all year round x

[RayStarAl in reply to Poshcards]

Mitts are nice, happy to hear they address your needs, but are impractical for my use-case: to manipulate sub-freezing metal telescope parts some 20 times a stargazing session. Looking through a telescope is a transcendent experience to many of us. It no longer needs to be cumbersome or painful in winter.

[JixarixieSparkles]

Fantastic idea! Might also work for socks…

[RayStarAl in reply to JixarixieSparkles]

Ought to work for socks, and I like the idea of the heated wiring wrapping around the veins near the ankles. The design challenge is battery location and getting the cable to it. Awkward strapping it to boot, some wouldn't want a belt or the alternative up to an inside jacket pocket. The solution to this problem relies on each person's use-case and their tolerance for 2 minutes of annoying setup. As I told a friend "if you want tea, you have to put water in the kettle and plug it in. After a bit, you move past the necessary sequence of actions because you are focused on the benefit." Naturally, folk just want to "put it on" in 10 seconds.