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Origin
03-17-2012, 09:39 PM
Hello all, I have recently got into custom sabers. I currently own one but I purchased it prebuilt by someone else so I have many questions on what all is needed for what i want. I would like for sound to be used. I know I need a swing sensor, clash sensor, battery pack, speaker, LED, heatsink,LED Driver, and I believe that is all.

My attempted wish is to place all of this equipment in the hilt style 4 and short choke style 2. My two big questions are does anyone know if this will fit? And, Do I need that Petit sound crouton thing or not?

Again, I am the newest newb, so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Arryck Corso
03-17-2012, 10:48 PM
Well first of all welcome!!!

Now, if you want to add sound to your saber the Petit Crouton is a great place to start. You'll find that most people here have used this sound module with great success.

If you choose to go this route, the Petit Crouton (PC) is a main component you'll need. The swing and clash sensors are integrated into the board itself, so you won't have to worry about buying those separately. Next the PC acts as a LED driver for your main LED. There are settings with in the PC that allow you to adjust what current you run your main LED at. As far as your main LED is concerned the store offers a variety of options. The most convenient would be to use either the Rebel or Seoul module kits that contain all the necessary components your mounting your main LED. Yes you will need a battery pack and there are a number of different options you can pick here too. The store now offers a very convenient 7.4v Li-Ion battery pack that is all ready wired and protected properly with a protection circuit board (PCB). And of course if you want sound you'll need a speaker.

You didn't mention this on your list but you will also need some means of turning the saber on/off. Again the store has a multitude of options to choose from as far as switches are concerned. If you decide to use the PC you'll need 2 switches. The first, your main power switch, can be either momentary or latching. The PC accomodates this. The second switch however needs to be a momentary switch as its function is to activate the auxillary sound effects of the PC.

Now based off you're rendering, you shouldn't have any issue with making all this fit. I know it sounds like a lot, but with a little creativity it's easily accomplished. The best part is there is no specific way of doing this. The store sells components to build an internal chassis, you can use PVC....you name it, it's probably been done.

Finally, I would suggest you take some time, and by time a mean a month or two, and READ. Just pick a thread and start reading. I can guarantee you that any question you have has all ready been asked and has all ready been answered. Trust me on this!!! And if you find something you do need further explanation on then ask. This is an amazing community of people who are willing to help. But you gotta do a little leg work yourself first.

Hope this helped a little and good luck!

TuxedoCartman
03-18-2012, 02:17 AM
Aside from everything Arryck Corso said, I would add that you should take the time to read the instruction manual for the Petit Crouton through two or three times. That alone will answer a lot of questions you'll have for what you need, if you want sound. The directions are very straightforward in that manual as to what you need for a complete setup for a saber with sound. If you still have questions about what you need after reading the Petit Crouton manual... read it again! Because I guarantee the answers are in there. While waiting for your parts to arrive, read it for fun. You should know that manual inside and out before applying solder to your saber for the first time. I just finished my first saber with minimal electronics experience, simply by reading that manual and posting a wiring schematic on here for veterans to double check for me.

As for space, you should be fine. My first saber consisted of a 3" double female, a V-grooved ribbed extension (which is much narrower on the inside than most MHS hilt pieces), Petit Crouton, a choke style 3, and one long and one short AV switch, speaker, recharge and RICE ports. It's tight... very tight... but everything fits. So you should have no trouble at all with using a standard MHS hilt piece with a choke.

Only two things with your design stand out for me...
1. You'll need two switches to work the Petit Crouton. Where and how are you mounting the extra switch? What about a recharge port? RICE? If you're not using these, you're only using about 10% of the Petit Crouton's abilities.
2: Using that pommel, how are you planning on mounting your speaker? Where do you want the sound to come from? Just something to think about, if space is an issue on your saber.

Origin
03-20-2012, 10:22 PM
Thank you both for the quick responses. I will follows these directions and see what I can make of it. I totally did not think about that pommel, thank you for pointing that out. I will look and see if there is a better fit to the style I am looking for. how exactly do I mount more than one switch if there is only one hole? do I drill another, is this normal? what exactly is RICE(besides a delicious side dish)??? I have done many hours of reading and I guess I am just not looking in the correct areas, or forums. any suggestions?

TuxedoCartman
03-21-2012, 06:12 AM
My first suggestion is to not just read through the forums (which can come across as hostile at times, and some useful information can be long buried and hard to find), but also go read up on all the parts in the shop. Read through all the sections, and if you're confused as to what a part is used for, do a search for it in the forums. I can tell you right now that under the "Sound" section, you'll find the R.I.C.E. program, links to R.I.C.E. ports, and more info on the Petit Crouton.

You may have missed this forum post (http://forums.thecustomsabershop.com/showthread.php?10752-Basic-Saber-Build-list-of-parts). Or this one. (http://forums.thecustomsabershop.com/showthread.php?326-MHS-LED-kit-tutorial-(Resistor-variant)) Read them first. Considering the questions you're asking, as well, you may want to give some thought to using a Hasbro/ Master Replicas soundboard, instead of the Petit Crouton. It's a lot cheaper, and will give your saber sound while also giving you experience working on actually building a saber.

I may be speaking out of turn for saying this, and if I am then I apologize in advance, but it is my opinion that the Hilt pieces (styles 1-4, 7" tube with hole for a switch) that Tim offers are there mostly for beginners. They're so that you can pick a hilt, a blade-holder, and a pommel, then cram a switch, battery pack, and LED into them, and ta-da... a light up saber. Simple, straight-forward, and easy. This is the entry level of saber building. Not to say you can't use them for more advanced, incredibly awesome looking sabers, mind you; it's just that they're the easiest for beginners to use.

From there, though, things get more complicated, and adding sound to a saber is considered to be more advanced saber building. By the time you start building sabers at that difficulty level, you should have realized one important thing about the MHS system: a saber hilt is nothing more than an aluminum tube to hold the goodies that make an LED light up a plastic tube. You can make that aluminum tube any way you want: by using the 7" hilt sections, by ordering a mix of double-female tubes with ribbed sections and chokes... you can even make an entire saberstaff out of nothing but choke pieces, if that's what you want (and you can fit the materials you'll need for the features you want inside). Holes for switches and accent lights can be drilled into just about any piece, and would have to be to be able to accommodate the variety of saber designs people have in their minds. So before you can even think about installing sound in a saber, you should be able to visualize (or sketch, or render in Photoshop) not just how your saber's going to look, but also where all of the necessary parts will go. Read the measurements, use the MHS builder app, print pictures out and try to draw in where you could put your switches, speakers, and wires. Visualize not just where everything goes in the saber, but how you're going to get it all in there. If you design a saber where you'll have to install the sound card, THEN solder switch wires to it inside the hilt, that's going to be difficult if not impossible. Sometimes two-piece hilts are easier to assemble, sometimes one-piece hilts are... it all depends. Spend a lot of time looking at other people's sabers; see what they've done, read their descriptions, and try to figure out on your own why or how they did what they did. I guarantee you'll start seeing patterns, and get a better idea of what you should do yourself (and you'll also see that single-button sabers are the rarity; double buttons are the norm).

TL;DR... Yes, more than one hole is normal. You don't have to just use the "hilt pieces" as hilts; any tube shape pieces connected together will work provided there's enough room for your components. Spend time reading descriptions of parts in the store and reading people's descriptions of their own sabers/ saber builds.

(And R.I.C.E. is the graphic interface system that lets you connect a saber that has Petit Crouton 1.6 to a Windows PC to make changes to the volume, flickering effects, switch properties, etc... on the Petit Crouton soundboard. Very handy, and I'm so glad I decided to utilize it on my saber).

One more thing... this is all the opinion of a man who's made approximately ONE saber, that happened to miraculously work, and has possibly gotten too big of a head about it. Take it for the $.02 it's worth.