Fabric with electrical components

Abstract

Interlacing equipment may be used to form fabric. A component detector may be used to feed strands such as a conductive strand to the interlacing equipment. One or more electrical components may be mounted to the conductive strand. The component detector may have a sensor configured to detect the presence of the electrical component as the conductive strand is fed to the interlacing equipment through the component detector. In response to detecting the component with the sensor, the interlacing equipment may automatically adjust interlacing operations in preparation for receiving the electrical component. For example, needles may be lowered in a knitting system, select warp strands may be raised and lowered in a weaving system, or a carrier may follow a modified path in a braiding system in response to detecting the electrical component. The fabric may have a different construction in regions where the electrical component is received.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.