Use 2 small zip-ties to make a longer zip-tie by pushing one trough the screw hole in the bubble from the top and the other from the bottom. Do this also for the other side. Place one loop around the hook of the lanyard on the top of the badge and the other around the wires on the bottom. (currently there are no instuctions to make the bubbles yet).

Note: the above picture show another orientation of the zip-ties and bubble but top bottom vastening turned out to be better with less risk of straining the air pressure module. Thighten the gradually, iterating from both front and backside.

To connect all the tubes we need 2 threeway connectors. Since I ran out of those I made some cutting up bigger connectors and sealing them with hot glue.

One connector splits the air for the bubble and the pressure sensor at the badge end. The other splits the airpump and the vale at the battery end.

You can write the code for the QTPy SAMD21 in anything you want. However the nice thing about CircuitPython is you get an interpreter to test your inflating and color animations live on the badge. As well as allowing anyone with an USB-C cable to make you new animations since the code is stored and accesable on the badge itself.

Install CircuitPython

Add adafruit_pixelbuf.mpy and neopixe.mpy to the lib directory on the QTPy. These are dependacies for to run the NeoPixel.

With this very basic code example you can make the bubble move and change its color with the NeoPixel.

import board
import time
import neopixel

import digitalio

bubbleLed = neopixel.NeoPixel(board.D1, 1)

motor = digitalio.DigitalInOut(board.D2)
motor.direction = digitalio.Direction.OUTPUT

valve = digitalio.DigitalInOut(board.D3)
valve.direction = digitalio.Direction.OUTPUT

while(True):
	bubbleLed[0] = (0,0,10)
	motor.value = True
	valve.value = False
	time.sleep(3)
	bubbleLed[0] = (10,0,0)
	motor.value = False
	valve.value = True
	time.sleep(5)

Note: in the current version of this badge the pressure sensor is not yet connected. So we inflate and deflate based on set times, make sure to choose a longer deflate time to make sure the bubble is completely empty before inflating again.