Luke ANH to MINE

[Ormad Veshok]

hey everyone,
yes another n00b here on the fourms but I hope to change that. A while ago my dad bought me a Luke/Anakin MR FX lightsaber. I was thrilled and like any kid would have went out and fought with it. NOT GOOD. So, read the fourm found the problem and am fixing it. But beside the point I'm gonna take this saber and transform it and make it mine. I'm going for a style like ' Sharad Hett. I relly like the leather around the hilt. So I'm gonna get started. Any advise or comments are greatly appreciated.

Ormad

[Darth Enab]

Are you just going to customize the hilt, or convert is to a luxeon saber?

Welcome to the forums. :)

[Ormad Veshok]

yeah i'm gonna convert it to a luxeon

[Skottsaber]

There is quite a big difference between those hilts...
It would take a large amount of modification to get close

[Ormad Veshok]

yeah i know i dont want them to be exact just adding some stuff like the leather around the hilt and little stuff like that

[Azmaria Dei]

using inspiration from both to make it your saber then? ^_^ excellent! be sure to post some pictures for us to gawk at. ^_^

[Ormad Veshok]

ok here is my naked hilt
http://i652.photobucket.com/albums/uu241/starwarsluvr/023.jpg
later i'm gonna be cutting off the emitter section so its just a tube. More pics later
Ormad

ok so i was searching around the fourm and and i was inspired by galen marek's lightsaber. I think around the grip section i'm gonna wrap it in leather and then put grip over top of it. then on the front where the blade power adjust is I'd like to make that biggerand maybe put a fake crystal there or something

wow triple post oh well. I'm gonna be cutting some parts can I use a Dremmel cut off wheel for this?

[Skottsaber]

If you know that you're triple posting, then why not use the edit button...

Yes you can use a dremel, but I'm not sure if you think you're just going to put it back together or something...
It won't work like it did before so be prepared to do some custom electronics moving in there.

Also, if I can see the bladeholder on your saber correctly, it is a Luke ANH. There is not a conversion kit for the Luke and therefore you may have a harder time converting it.


And be

[Silver Serpent]

There is an edit button you can use to avoid double/triple posting. To answer your question, yes a dremel cutoff wheel will cut through your material.

Edit: Skott beat me to the punch again!

[Ormad Veshok]

Aren't the luke and anakin ROTS the same?

[Skottsaber]

Hardly.
Their internal structures are very different, not to mention the hilt design itself.

[Crystal Chambers]

There's no room for a crystal that high up on your hilt. If I understand you correctly that's where you bladeholder is.

[Ormad Veshok]

I'm not gonna put a crystal in. basically I'm gonna cut my luke saber Into the Starkiller pieces and then bolt them onto a black alumnium tube then where the crystal chamber would be I'll put my ignitor buttons and stuff like that. Saber destruction progress
http://i652.photobucket.com/albums/uu241/starwarsluvr/100_0845.jpg
http://i652.photobucket.com/albums/uu241/starwarsluvr/100_0844.jpg
http://i652.photobucket.com/albums/uu241/starwarsluvr/100_0843.jpg
next I need a 13' alumnium tube to mount these on. Until then, SANDING!

[Rhyen Skytracker]

You will probably have to have a piece of tubing machined to be able to fit inside those pieces. You will have a hard time finding some the exact size with out having to turn them down a little.

[Ormad Veshok]

I get what your saying Rhyen. If I can find one that fits snuggly than I'm gonna put some allen screws in it

[Ormad Veshok]

Alright please respond fast do they sell the luxeon LEDs at raidoshack

[Jedi-Loreen]

No, they do not.



Sorry if this wasn't fast enough for you. :roll:

[Invisas1979]

Appreciate your enthusiam but you've butchered that hilt right nice. You need to learn to use cutting techniques, a dremel, graph paper and files. I don't think you did very much planning before starting this. Rhyen is right you'll need to get a piece of alumi turned down to fit inside now you're going for a starkiller and not the hett. What are you going to use for the blade holder and heatsink?

[Ormad Veshok]

alright i pick up some thread tapper thingys and some screws going to begin tapping soon

[Ronan]

A little bit of planning goes a long way FYI...

[dgdve]

(IMPORTANT PLEASE READ) ok.. Wow I'm super sorry I didn’t get to you earlier... or at least before...

but we all learn in different ways... let’s try to fix this up to be something unique yet still not too far from its roots as a... well average traditional saber.. First STOP WHAT YOUR DOING RIGHT NOW (except the reading part). I'm here to help so please if I ever say anything that seems rude or w/e just take it with a grain of salt (deal?)... NO MORE CUTTING (deal?)... NO DRILLING OF ANY KIND (deal?)... ONLY hand sanding from this point on... I want you to true these pieces to size and dimension then let’s start from there... no point in even looking backwards so from here we can move forward with a focus and a plan for the project(cool?, we can still fix this I promise you but you gotta trust me and stop right now).

What they told you is true... the MR hilts are not made from any stock tubes so they are NOT the same ID as say mhs pieces or hardware... you can either have a piece turned down OR you can try to shim or possibly find a piece of pvc to work with.. But we will find a way to do this easy enough.

First we (as in me..) ALWAYS build from 2 separate directions... inside out, and pommel forward... lets break this down into some categories and stages.

Stage 1: Drafting, talking snaps with the think tank (forum peeps/friends)... generally this is the stage to throw out 500 idea's and see which 3 are actually "do able" then choosing the single most important of those and factoring that angle into the build... focus (or direction) comes from this stage that will help keep you not just on budget, but on course for a photo finish! (So to speak)...

Now for this build I know you started doing one thing and that has evolved (who cares, it will still turn out cool... if you chill for a sec) so for now you’re going for a "starkiller" type shroud design which is HAWT actually... it’s a good solid design so I love how you accidentally found a design base to work with... that said, I need you to sit down and start to draft out this saber (inside out remember).. post your renders here in this thread and let the guys(and girls) tell you how they did something similar and used this, or that, certain "trick" to figure different problems out. Collect those tricks they are all the difference between good and great builders and here at tcss... are the Great builder’s aka DIY kings/queens... Saber Royalty... you'll see ;). After your draft is completed and you like it, plus its 100% "do able" with your current skills and tool set (i.e. don’t try to put custom pieces into your build unless you can provide them) then we sit down and move to stage 2.

*(FYI once stage 1 is finished we do NOT go backwards... we build what we decided we liked and could afford/accomplish with very minimal changes). IF you are not 100% satisfied with your draft you owe it to yourself to restart the draft... it’s your build and who cares if it takes 2 min or 2 years as long as you’re happy in the end.

**Key things (in general) I want to see in your draft include (but not limited to), heat sink placement, switch placement, overall ID and length. Remember your inner pieces have a smaller ID then the outer sleeve/shroud pieces so don’t forget to take that into account. Also what Skott says is correct about not being able to get a conversion kit so DO NOT THROW AWAY THE ORIGINAL BLADE HOLDER, you may need to modify that and it also has all the cut outs for the pieces that go on the emitter end... yes its plastic but ehh work with whatcha got..

*** A note about starkiller type sabers... in order to make them as strong as possible you really want to make the interior sleeve a full length pipe with the shroud/handle pieces slid over and screwed in place(do you see what I'm saying or?) ok now are we ready for stage 2?

Stage 2(getting there)... now deep breathing exercises or... laa maz or something kind of meditation is needed for this stage... Patience is a virtue and all that... but now we have our draft sitting on the table all nice and stuff... measurements all there, ripe for the taking... time to begin the stocking issue (unless you got all the stuff on the draft in stock? at your house?)... List EVERYTHING you can think of and divide those sections up by sources. Tcss is awesome for this part, because (lol) they have everything saber wise, oo and cool key chains too. Basically just go order everything and start your breathing exercises... man next day air is slow when it comes to getting your saber parts in..... but you'll see why we don’t do any building or cutting in this stage later on.. But by the end of stage 2(which waiting sucks so yeah be patient) we actually have some great progress on our build before we've even started right? All the drafting... all the sourcing and purchasing of parts/equips... once you have EVERYTHING you could possibly need (and hey let’s not kid ourselves get 2 or 3 of a few things) then we can move to stage 3...

Stage 3 R&D (let the good times roll)... basically you are now FREE to cut and freaking have a good ole time (this is my fav part)... here is where you take some of those "extra" parts and play around.. Build mock grip sections... test it... post a shot... decide naw I think I’ll try a shorter version... build some semblance of a chassis to hold your electronics (can you say tcss chassis discs? no I don’t work here but I love this place so). Anyway this stage takes as long or as short as you want it to, I mean you have the draft you can build to spec and (provided your math is good) you'll be pretty happy, but playing with mocks is more fun than renders are to me so this is my spot (I may not actually go further unless I really love a build lol). Anywayzz moving on once you’ve got stage 3 completed you can move to wiring and electronics(stage 4), then on to stage 5 full production(well prototyping)... but that for most of us is a finished build since here is where you would "shop" your design to companies for actual production (on their end).

Wow I really hope you can gather all that... let me know if you need anything I'll help you as much as possible to push this build into the right direction but no no cut yes yes read and make draft gogo go fast (and if your embarrassed you can send it to me in a PM).

***you can’t use the shout box/chat or send pm's until your acct is 2 wks old***... again more patience

[Jedi-Loreen]

Dave, what you wrote is really hard to read.

Try separating your 3 stages into paragraphs for each different idea within that stage. And use real punctuation and capitalization, not "..." which I guess is supposed to denote separate sentences.

I know you weren't taught how to write that way in school. ;)

[dgdve]

OMG that is going to be so hard to edit, but Consider it done! (and your right as usual :P)

EDIT!: I think its pretty good now :) (hopefully, its understandable now) thx girl~dve

[Jedi-Loreen]

That's a bit easier to read now.

Thanks. :)

[Ormad Veshok]

dvdge thank you finally some advice instead of just telling me what i did wrong here is the draft(i think this is what you meant) all labeled and my parts have been ordered
http://i652.photobucket.com/albums/uu241/starwarsluvr/002-9.jpg
the width of the luke parts is 1.25. it was kinda hard to read

[dgdve]

thats more of a render(still good yep), but your going in the right direction and thats PROGRESS!! (and see who cares about the haters, it even looks cool on paper right?) but I need to see more detailed measurements and a breakdown.

- show me the inner most part. its length, its ID, and very important its OD.. then give me a layering of the other pieces following the same guidelines finishing with the little stupid things like switch boots or little decorative stuff. (cool huh?)

- show me what is happening with this blade holder(modified?), the single most important thing about an LED saber is... thats right the LED so lets figure out this heat sink/blade holder situation BEFORE we decide on a few details(cool?). I've done a lot of conversions over CL... (A LOT) and 90% of them use modified PLASTIC blade holders and original MR blades(drop the diffuser and add some wrapz and your good), its cheap and works great... and unless your really doing some serious dueling you wont even notice... EVER(just please dont cut any at ALL on that bh until we see what were working with.)

If you do those things that lets us work this thing from the inside out. You see, changes in there affect out here more then changes out here affect in there so thats why I do it that way and there is no correct way to build... thats the beauty of DIY. Anyway I hope this helps I know you can do it if you just have the right roadmap.. and remember my friend.. its not the destination.. its the journey.

One thing I will say (on the others behalf) is similar to my first post "we all learn in different ways", they are really trying to help (in thier own ways) and Ive found (since I'm old) that sometimes people seem harsh or rude online(not sure why lol, but even jokes dont come out right..) but they totally dont mean things how they are written..(somehow you get it?, idk maybe its just me but ehh) but you'll see they ALL want your build to come out sweet.. being the net and being as big as the tcss family is.. there are bound to be a few drunk uncles LOL(just ignore them)

*one note: I know your excited but you must be patient, especially when moving between phases (i.e. try not to buy anything yet, were still in the free stages, deal?).. remember I'm trying to help you finish this with as little investment and excess waste parts/materials as humanly possible.

**Render looks cool though ;)

[parfaitelumiere]

for the internal tube to fix them together you can choose european sized tube,depending on the internal diameter.
I know in USA you use inches for diameter,or gauge too.
Here in France we use millimeter.
FOr example a 1,5" OD tube 0,125 wall will be a 38x 3mm wall instead of 37,5 x3,125mm,so it can help to choose european tubes.
Here I have some 31-35 aluminium tube(about 1,4" external),it's used for the construction set,maybe it can work for your saber,if it's good for you,please let me know,I can send you some aluminium tube for your saber.

[Ormad Veshok]

can some point me in the direction of wher ei can find some info about connecting the LED to the sound board and studd like that and i need specifics not just the sound section please

[Azmaria Dei]

can some point me in the direction of wher ei can find some info about connecting the LED to the sound board and studd like that and i need specifics not just the sound section please

look at any wiring diagram for whatever sound board you're using and it'll tell you how to wire it in. unless you're asking how you solder the wires, in which case please refer to any soldering tutorial on youtube.

if it's an MR/FX soundboard, wire the LED outputs to the LED - that's all there really is to it.

[Skottsaber]

Yep there are is a thread full of guides in the Cutaway views and wiring diagrams section.
Also, you won't be able to fit the stock housing,bladeholder, and battery pack in the tube you bolt your hilt pieces to. You will need to work out some sort of bladeholder and remove the board from its stock housing.