Rusty's from-scratch Luke's ROTJ

[rusty_shackleford]

*edit* this is my first build, please be gentle

ok, ive been lurking on the board and the shop long enough, i decided to make a thread of my progress over the past 4 weeks.

Since I have the equipment and recently been trained in our tool room at work, i decided to put my skills to the test and make a saber based off Luke's ROTJ.

I've looked at pictures from this forum, build a saber with the MHS builder, seen other's replica pictures, and of course seen the slothfurnace build (WAY beyond my skill). There were some liberties taken in the design such as certain diameters, lengths, and other minor details but in the end, i'd like it to be as good of a representation as i can make.

I'm doing this by modeling and drawing all components in solidworks and machining from solid aluminum barstock, and programming our CNC bed mill with solidcam. I've already gotten most of the hilt complete so I'll start with the first steps, the lathe. these are all phone pics, i have some on the camera at work ill add later.

(These are all made from SOLID 2" aluminum barstock)

Ribbed for her pleasure:
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Then the pommel:
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Then the blade holder:
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All pieces at my desk, lathe work only:
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The blade holder was originally going to be 2 piece, I later scrapped for 1 piece design but did not take pictures of the 2nd lathe work.

Next post is mill work. (not much)

[rusty_shackleford]

After I was satisfied with the lathe work i began putting some finishing touches on them with the mill:

Programmed the CNC bed mill to make the grooves in the pommel:
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I took design cues from the TCSS blade holder cuz its jut plain awesome:

(insert in-progress pic later)

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did a test fit:
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It was here that I realized the 2 body sections between the grip and the pommel are too long. I shortened 1 by an inch. no pics of that, sorry.

Here is the switch box:
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[rusty_shackleford]

After the test fit was done and one of the body sections shortened, i painted the parts.

I began by taping off the top and bottom of the blade holder. I then sand-blasted the blade holder and ribbed grip. After that the parts were cleaned and degreased then primed with a self-etching primer specifically for bare aluminum.

Black sections done in a flat black (i thought it looked better than glossy ala slothfurnace), and the copper done in rustoleum metallic copper. Everything got 2 coats.

I then chucked the whole assembly up in the lathe and sanded the ribs of the grip and the one "blade" of the blade holder.

I thought it all came out pretty good.

I don't have any in-progress pics of the painting process, sorry.

Blade holder attached with set-screw:
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(shortened 1")

And that's where I am at for now. I have ordered some of the electronics and have a wiring diagram coming up soon (on work computer).

Let me know what you think so far!

[Arryck Corso]

Beautiful work on the lathe. You should be very proud of this! Can't wait to see it lit up.

[Lord Dottore Matto]

Okay...this is coming from a person who may know a scoche about ROTJ and Obi sabers, lol. I think you are doing a beautiful job, but you are mixing Obi and Luke (that emitter is 100% Obi). It is very long for an ROTJ as well. All of those things said, I know you mentioned that you were "basing it" off of the ROTJ, so if that is indeed the case, great job.

[Noyl Wendor]

Isn't it "ribbed" for "your" pleasure?
Any how, from a guy who can only turn on a lathe :)
That looks awesome, great work.

[rusty_shackleford]

Okay...this is coming from a person who may know a scoche about ROTJ and Obi sabers, lol. I think you are doing a beautiful job, but you are mixing Obi and Luke (that emitter is 100% Obi). It is very long for an ROTJ as well. All of those things said, I know you mentioned that you were "basing it" off of the ROTJ, so if that is indeed the case, great job.

AH, thank you for pointing that out! I originally started with the TCSS builder and ultimately fell in love with the design of the emitter (blade holder i called it?). I know the angles and holes arent supposed to be there but when i modeled the saber in solidworks and did an actual rendering, i couldn't throw them away to match the actual ROTJ.

The whole assembly is about 11.5", how much shorter do you think it should be? When i pieced the part together on the builder, it was nearly 13".

[Lord Dottore Matto]

~10.5" would be about right. That said man, you need ot build it the way YOU like it. ;) You are doing a great job.

[rusty_shackleford]

Did a little bit of work today.

got a green luxeon rebel on a 10mm coolbase PCB

Got an 11mm 7* lens

made a custom heatsink:
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soldered and mounted:
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A custom lens holder.
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getting test fitted:
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the lens holder has an OD of just under 3/4" so it should fit in a thin walled blade, but if i wanted to go with a thick, i could just open the inside.

i will finish mounting once i lay some thermal grease between the heatsink and the blade holder.

*edit* fixed links

[Kevin Starwaster]

the lens holder has an OD of just under 3/4" so it should fit in a thin walled blade, but if i wanted to go with a thick, i could just open the inside.

i will finish mounting once i lay some thermal grease between the heatsink and the blade holder.

*edit* fixed links

Or add something as a spacer, like a length of thin wall or equivalent. Or something flanged.

[rusty_shackleford]

Ok, it's been a while since I've been busy at work but i was able to order some more components and get together a wiring diagram.

My goal is to have a 3 way switch: 1-ON with AC power, 2-OFF with option to charge, and 3-ON with battery power:
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After this, i wired it up and packed it all in the housing:
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It's very TIGHT but I'm going to fill this with hotmelt to keep everything in place.

It's alive!
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close up of accent LEDs:
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Now I just need to shorten all my wires, order a blade, batteries, AC port, and other misc items, and I'll have it all together.

[rusty_shackleford]

I've been busy lately but i finally got around to getting the wiring all sorted out:

made a battery pack from 4 AAA nimh batteries:
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soldered wires to AC/charging port:
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Added charging port to base of hilt:
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[Ari-Jaq Xulden]

Very impressive for a first build. A tweak I would recommend for future builds would be tap the recharge port flush without the nut. Also, I would get rid of that electric tape around that battery pack. That is somewhat of a hazard. Heat shrink is best suited for that task. Great job though. Not to many first time builders you see with your natural abilities. I will be watching for what you come with next.

[DemonBunnyman]

Very nice !!

[rusty_shackleford]

Thanks for the encouraging words. It never even crossed my mind to thread the charging port into the base. Definitely gonna do that next time, might give inducton charging a try next time.....

This entire assembly has a good weight to it. I can balance the entire thing on my finger as far down the blade as possible for a near perfect balance. I might set it up and take a pic.

well, onto the final results!

In this picture, i didn't have the set screw tightened for the blade so it looks like its sagging. Also going to get some of that clear cellophane from Michaels and hopefully even out the blade
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charging port
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one thing that bugged me was the cheapo LEDs I got on amazon. The red one went out after I fully encapsulated the control box with epoxy. It would have required destroying the box on the mill, possibly that whole section.
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Another thing that bugs me is that switch cover. its held in with a screw so i may fabricate a new one in the future, but it has a nice quality feel to it.

I know the original ROTJ blade holder didn't look like this, but it looked too cool on the TCSS site so i improvised a little.
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I have a few ideas for a display stand that i might be making in the future, I'll post whatever i make. I'm not sure what to do for my next saber, maybe a double ended, i dunno. I will keep an eye out for some more elaborate design ideas. Since I have full use of our CNC bed mill, I might try to get tricky in the future.

[Lord Dottore Matto]

Very nice!

[patolcott]

Very nicely done sir

[Darth Ryo]

+1, good job ;)