Prototype Two of the PAM was an adventure into conductive thread and really tiny LEDs.  We felt PAM1 was too unpredictable and looked scraggly, so with PAM2 we went for a more elegant, stable design.  A zipper, instead of brass balls, was introduced to facilitate solid connections across the necklace halves.  Tiny surface-mount LEDs were used so that they could be embedded in the now fabric necklace body.  And finally, the battery holder became an aluminum housing.  The whole idea was to make an object that looked good an improved on the functionality of PAM1.

It is an understatement to say that conductive thread is difficult to work with.  It is not good at sewing and holding fabric together, and it is not good at conducting.  It frays and it is quite tiny.  As a team, we wrested to get PAM2 up and running and we did... kinda.  PAM2 was built like a peanut butter sandwich.  The three runs of conductive thread were sewn into lace strips, then the zipper was connected along with the LEDS, then it was time to close up the entire assembly (the two slices of bread) into one cord, or sandwich.  That is where it all went wrong.  Conducting thread likes to fray, and those little fray hairs like to touch other hairs and make short circuits.  Instead of spending hours debugging, taping, and sealing the thread, we decided to move on to PAM3.