Clash-Flash w/Crystal Focus WORKING!

[Eandori]

Hey there Saber-smiths,

I'm still fairly new to these boards, and time limited so I apologize in advance if there's lots of other threads on this subject with working sabers. I didn't see any when I glanced around though. I wanted to share the findings of my work with Erv' Plecter on making a Clash Flash saber.

First off, I gotta say. Erv' is one awesome guy. After only a few short mails he took some time out of his day to chat with me on Skype about this idea. I'm an Engineer doing prototype design for Intel on both hardware and software so we are able to talk shop on his board. We settled on an idea to use one of the blink LED outputs as the logic driver, and I would wire up a small transistor circuit to drive the 2 white Luxeon LED's based on those outputs. Erv' had to customize his firmware a bit and work out some bugs, then I purchased one of his boards and he sent it to me with the custom firmware.

Quick note, I purchased my saber hilt-tube, blade, tip, switches, and many other parts from the Custom Saber Shop. Gotta make sure to give credit to the owner of these killer forums!

This is a rough drawing of how I have the optics set up in my current saber. It's functional, but does not get much light up the blade as expected. I'm working now to figure out a better mounting option. The main problem is not having room to place an optic lens on top of the white Luxeon LED's because it will block light from the main Luxeon LED.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Optic_V2.JPG
In the next few weeks I'll be testing around with adding aluminum foil to try and reflect more light up the blade, and I'll also try shaving some material off the surface of rounded LED's to see if I can get more light to exit on a certain angle.

As you might expect, the clash-flash works but it's not nearly as bright as I'm going for YET. I will get there, I'm positive of that. It's just a matter of time until I work out a cheap and effective solution. It's very hard to see the current clash-flash with the blade inserted on video. But when I remove the blade you can see the clash-flash pretty well in the empty emitter tube. In real life, you can definitely see the clash-flash very easily. My current goal though... is to have the entire saber flash nearly twice as bright as a full on main Luxeon K2 LED.

Here is a picture of my current finished prototype saber:
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/EdwinClashFlash.jpg
I'm working on getting some video's ready right now. I'll post them on YouTube hopefully soon.

Here is a picture of my designs for the next hilt, to be custom machined later:
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/EdwinCustomHilt.jpg

Here is the web-based machine shop who I'm planning on going with to have my next saber hilt made. You can download their software, enter your design and get instant quotes!
http://www.emachineshop.com/

I absolutely LOVE the Crystal Focus v2.1 board, and Novastar's killer sound files for it. Big props goes out to those guys so far on their work.

Here's a picture of me with a few of my Master Replicas, what got me started in all this crazyness.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/EdwinTracy.JPG
So... what do you guys think? Like it so far? Already been done? Excited to see how it goes? Want to see it in action (video)?

[xwingband]

I think a more powerful flash will become easier when the tri-rebels that just showed up can be fully used. Heck, I think a white flash would probably negate the need for the twice as bright idea.

also... if you machined a saber. Use a reflector. that be heck of a lot better at reflecting side mounted luxeons.

Doesn't eMachineshop charge you out the wazoo!

Last thought... that saber has the control box from hell! It's huge. :shock:

[Eandori]

Getting 3 luxeon LED's to fit side by side is not hard... it's the optic to focus all 3 up the blade that's hard. Heck, I could make a quick PCB/heatsink to mount the 3 LED's. But making a clear plastic or glass optic that correctly focuses the light from all 3 up the blade is not in my reach for my tool set.

I definitely had the idea of a reflector as well, but where does it sit? It cannot sit on top of the lens for the main blade luxeon. Because that would effect the main colored light of the saber.

Yeah, custom machining is expensive. That's the exact reason I built up a prototype to prove the concept works and to gain more learning before I blow a big wad of cash on version 2.

Since I was going cheap on this saber, I'm using AA Nicads I had laying around. Since I'm using those for power, I need 6 of them. Since I need 6, I have less room in the hilt. Also, since my optic and heat sink is a little bigger, I have less room in the hilt. That effectively gave me no room for the electronic board. So I shopped around home depot for a quick and cheap solution.

Again... this is a prototype saber to prove the electronics work and to give me some saber building experience. So don't look at it as a final version, that's why I listed my designs for the actual custom hilt later.

[Marsupial]

I'd like to see it in action, but I agree with the triple-luxeon idea.

Maybe not one triple-led star, but maybe the Acerocket triple-optics setup.



Anyway, if you can put videos on youtube, I'd be happy to have a demonstration.

[Novastar]

Great stuff, Edwin! As mentioned, Erv and I have been discussing many ideas as well, and that's the beauty of this sort of technology... there is ALWAYS room for more improvements, differing options and so forth.

I, for one, believe that have the "flash" option going inside the tube... is not the best idea. Having it burst the light OUTSIDE toward the holder and onlookers... now THAT would be most ideal.

A lot of people would say "that would blind you"... well... I did it for the LED blasters of BOP II with literally SIX LUXEON III LEDs on the sides and no one went blind.

So, I think making some kind of "half moon" shape reflector setup (or "donut" reflector) for a super bright LED or xenon flash that shoots AWAY from the saber hilt... now THAT would be a Force to be reckoned with. ;)

[xwingband]

I meant a reflector for the optics... they make them. I bet they'd direct more of the light up the tube as standard colimnators don't do jack for any LEDs not under them.

After trying my single Rebels I'm really going to wait for them to be used to their potential in the RGB or tri setups. They are so small it's not a problem to put optics on them... they just need to be made.

Sort of a tangentially related idea but someday I wanted to use my Hasbro Maul board to have a crystal chamber. I'd keep the Hasbro's strobe feature and use it to light the crystal chamber. On clash you'd get a nice visible strobe. :)

[Novastar]

Again, I think flashing MORE light up the tube is pretty silly, unless it's going to be 4x (or better yet 10x) the light of the Luxeon setup.

If you think about it, what I'm saying makes sense. We've all worked so hard to get a giant amount of light up the tube, and we (usually) try to max out the brightness given the battery setup... so... if we now try a paltry "flash"... at best, it will (to our EYES) change the color from let's say a red blade to white. I seriously doubt it will flash brightly this way, unless of course somehow the flash is 10x the entire brightness of the Luxeon setup in the first place. Let alone a LUX TRIAD!!! :)

So, I think the best bet is to allow the flash to do its job on its OWN... and fire out almost exactly like a camera flash--directed into the open, possibly at one or two angles--NOT into the tube.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Mainly because I've tested some of this myself, although not as extensively as Eandori!

[Eandori]

Well, flashing lights outside the saber definitely has merit. My kneejerk reaction though is along the lines what you already mentioned. Would that be pretty hard on people's eyes? Also, a very small point source light seems misplaced on the outside hilt near the base of the blade. In movies, when two sabers are clashing isn't the flash where the two blades meet?

My perspective was if I can't get the white flash where the blades meet, I could flash the entire blade. So no matter where the blade was struck, it would "work." In use, I really like what I'm seeing so far. I just want it brighter.

About making the flash super bright and battery life... keep in mind that it's very easy to store up charge somewhere and dump it through many LED's at once. To throw numbers at it, if your K2 is running 1.5amps already I could easily design up a circuit where the OVERALL current is only slightly higher, around 2amps overall. Even if 4 LED's are each getting 1 amp during the burst. The total current "during" a flash would be 5.5 amps, but then go back down to 1.5 amps after the flash. Essentially, the use of large capacitors will achieve this easily and getting a blade 10x brighter IS POSSIBLE. It's more an issue of where the heck to do you mount the other 10 LED's?

For now though, I'm going to stick with 2 and see how good I can make it work with just 2. I'm currently using 2 bi-polar NPN transistors to source the current for my 2 flash LED's. Erv recommended a high power FET that I could use but I have to mail order that and just have not gotten around to it yet.

For the amount of time a flash lasts, not much heat ends up coming out of the flash LED's. So heat sinking ends up not being as much of an issue as I was worried it would. Right now I have nearly zero heat sinking going on for 2 white Luxeon LED's that are each getting around 500mA of current for a short burst. You simply cannot swing fast enough to make back to back hits which dissipate enough heat to cause an issue. At least with the short flash duration Erv' programmed in.

Xwingband, you said..

I meant a reflector for the optics... they make them. I bet they'd direct more of the light up the tube as standard colimnators don't do jack for any LEDs not under them.
Can you provide a link or something to those optics? Anything you can suggest that would help this effort is very appreciated. :)

[xwingband]

Sure...

Half way down:
http://www.quickar.com/lenses.php?session=dxGjWF5Q

I got some that are different from the pro-light dealer in England:
http://www.led-bulbs.com/eShop/10Browsepro.asp?Category=Prolightoptic

I also have this bookmarked because I saw they were much smaller:http://www.cpfmarketplace.com/mp/showthread.php?t=154195

If you look around enough I bet you could find a retailer that fits you. The reflectors are more popular with flashlight people. (They like things like the orange peel ones because it smooths the spot)

EDIT: Also, how do you deal with eMachineshop's CAD program? I'm a CAD monkey and I can't figure out/stand their program.

[Eandori]

EDIT: Also, how do you deal with eMachineshop's CAD program? I'm a CAD monkey and I can't figure out/stand their program.
Actually I have not used it yet. I have downloaded the software and it's been in my plan to tinker with it and eventually get my custom hilt all set using their software. I've been so focused on either spending time with the wife or working on the stuff I have not, I haven't had the time to try their software yet.

I've never used CAD before, but I have read many specification documents for machined parts. So I know what to expect. Wish me luck!

[Eandori]

Hey Xwingband,

I checked out those pages. Thanks for linking them. I don't however see optics meant for several luxeon LED's at once. What I see is optics that seem to be intended for a single luxeon LED. You could alway grind down the base of the optic so 2-3 could be squeezed in there... but then the alignment of the optic is off. I'm sure they were designed such that the light source is in the MIDDLE of the optic. Move it off to one side and the emission angle will be different.

At least, I believe that to be the case.

So what you really need is an optic that was designed from the ground up to be intended for multiple LED's.

About the reflective optic, that's a cool find. I actually did a similar thing on my saber in the pictures above. I used the poor-mans method though, I glued aluminum foil around the outside of my 5 degree optic lense. It actually worked pretty well. I got more light out the top of the optic instead of bleeding out the sides. You can kinda tell in the image above looking down into the saber. But maybe I will disassemble the saber soon to give a better angle on my tri-lux prototype optic.

[xwingband]

Okay, cool. I was just thinking you were wasting a lot of it if you used the standard optics. I didn't mean anything about multi-LED optics... just that a reflector optic on the primary LED would get you more of the flash up the blade.

[Eandori]

Yeah, I just use a standard optic 5 degree lens on the main luxeon LED. (as you can see in the illustration on the top post of this thread).

For awhile, I was considering placing the flash LED's behind that optic near the main green Luxeon LED. You can see what I'm referring to in the image below. Early testing showed that will not work, because light coming into the back of the optic lense from that angle reflects and is not redirected out the top. The method I used for testing was shining a laser pointer into the backside of the optic to see how much light comes out the top. Nearly none of it did.

This was my first idea for mounting point for flash LED's.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Optic_V1.JPG

I'll try to get the videos of the saber clash-flash up soon so you guys can see it.

[Eandori]

Ok, here's a quick video of the clash flash working. it's hard to see on video with the blade inserted but you can see it pretty clearly with in video when the blade is removed.

http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Flash.wmv

I'll keep working to improve the output of the white flash and if you guys like i will keep posting results.

[Hasid Lafre]

That control box is bloody huge.

Also why dident you just do a regular trilux type setup and have it setup so that only one led would flash brighter instead of 2?

[Eandori]

That control box is bloody huge.

Also why dident you just do a regular trilux type setup and have it setup so that only one led would flash brighter instead of 2?
What standard tri-lux setup? Does anybody have an optic for 3 luxeons? The only optics I have been able to find are designed for a single luxeon LED. It's my understanding that is the whole issue with Tri-Lux. No optic lenses or reflectors exist yet.

Again (I'm retyping the same stuff as I did in other replies above) This saber was a prototype for proof of concept of the circuitry and so I could get some actual experience building a saber. Perhaps I should have titled the thread NOT A FINISHED SABER, BUT CLASH FLASH WORKS. :)

Thanks for the replies guys.

[Hasid Lafre]

The ones that ace rocket found. I forget where he found them at.

[Marsupial]

its not 1 optics for 3 luxeon, but rather 1 holder for 3 luxeon and 3 optics that all fit in a small footprint.

Unless there's stuff I am not aware of.

[Eandori]

I think I found what you guys are referring to: http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2388&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=30

Yeah, looks like 3 side by side LED/Optics. So it's overall wider, and the main LED is no longer on the center axis of the blade. That might have the effect (I'm assuming) of making the main LED not light up the blade as well.

I may end up going to something like that eventually, but first I really want to get all of this working with less expensive parts and more easily obtained parts.

[xwingband]

For RGB it's fine since all are equally off the axis. Yes for a clash type deal you are trying it wouldn't work all too well, but probably better than what you have going I'd guess.

It's true that the machining is more expensive, but the parts aren't too hard. Ace is using those small Hex optics. I've only found them out of Germany, but if they're what I need I get them.

I just got my Rebel RGB setup... after I reflow solder them I'll test and report somewhere on how well they work. If a reflector can be modded (or kept stock I see no reason to not use them for this and the potential for everything in general would be enormous.

[Novastar]

Remember everyone... Eandori is going for proof-of-concept here--not quite on "finished and all bugs are worked out, perfection is here"!

Personally, I'm glad he's at least DOING something about a new idea.

I *will* say that I still think having the flash LED/xenon/whatever setup aiming AWAY from the hilt sideways like a camera flash will be the most effective in the long run. Since the blade is already lit so brightly.

To help Edwin on his thought about wanting it to be more "movie-like" where the blades flash where collision occur... why not machine an emitter to hold the flash setup w/ optic reflector and have the flash aim in LINE with the blade... but not IN the blade... sort of a "cone" of flash aiming toward where the blade tip points, but an arc AROUND the emitter?

[erv]

about the control box, whatever : Size matter not... :twisted:

his saber is a prototype before he makes the custom machined saber (there is text, you know, not only pics, this forum is not a comic strip). Sorry about that, just making an echo of Novastar, I am really scared when I discover how much time some people are taking to write nice and accurate explanations and how little time others will spend to read it (I have a problem with lazyness)

Eandoori, I'm so glad you're posting there ! I've been really enojying our conversation and exchange, and I'm happy this is ending into something concrete !
Rather than the trilux, I'll soon have a test to the tri-rebel solution, and I think I'll make a bunch of sabers with the flash outside, so that everyone is working and testing on something different !
Again : congrats !

Erv'

[Novastar]

Beautiful, Erv! I'm looking forward to seeing something more on the outside of the hilt, since I believe it will make for a brighter flash.

The only reason I know it will work was simply by messing around with some simple xenon flashers while next to a lit saber. It looks great! :)

Granted, those had pretty "giant" lenses/optics/reflectors... well, giant in the perspective that they would not fit in the hilt well... which is why I think housing it on the top of some kind of emitter would be good.

Since the emitter is SUPPOSED to (usually) have a large OD, and the choke point is supposed to be below it... it could work out better than one might imagine.

Although... I guess that means no rubber emitters for me in that kind of saber!! :D

[Eandori]

Thanks for the support Novastar, Erv',

Novastar, I'm trying to understand what you wrote here:

To help Edwin on his thought about wanting it to be more "movie-like" where the blades flash where collision occur... why not machine an emitter to hold the flash setup w/ optic reflector and have the flash aim in LINE with the blade... but not IN the blade... sort of a "cone" of flash aiming toward where the blade tip points, but an arc AROUND the emitter?
Are you describing a conical form of light that would travel up the outside of the saber? So when two sabers are touching, the light shines on the surface of the other saber?

If I totally missed it, do you have a picture describing what you were talking about?

I'm intrigued to see what you and Erv' are planning for flash emitters on the outside. I can definitely see the potential of that idea, I'm just not sure how to make it work. For now, I'll let you guys focus on that, and I'll keep working on the inner-blade based flash. At some point, I will either be really pleased with it, or I will just post my results and why it didn't work and move on.

Either way, that's part of the development process. Sometimes when something does not work, it's not a failure. You successfully discovered another way it won't work! As for right now, I have a lot of hope that inner blade flash could look really sweet :)

[Novastar]

They always told Edison that after 1000 tries he should give up.

A lot of good it did them trying to break HIS will! :)

Here's a photo that might help the design come to full fruition. It was supposed to be something I wanted for Ns5, but since THAT idea seems totally unreachable on my own... I've been sharing more and more ideas with Erv... might as well do so here as well! :)

http://thecuttingedge.s5.com/ns5driver.com/emitter8_NOVA_altered_flash.jpg

Forgive me, I don't know how to make the image smaller for viewing purposes. Does anyone?

Anyhow, the wiring can be fashioned to run up a custom-machined emitter, into the bulb setup with some reflectors that are akin to a disposable camera. I know it is possible, the question is... does anyone feel like doing it.

I would--only I think I might kill myself with the high voltage transformer on a camera flash (which is entirely possible, btw). SO... MISE EN GARDE! Be careful people.

[Eandori]

Ok, I see what you were describing now. Yeah that would work and it would be very bright to the eyes. I wonder if it would just appear like a glowing blade attached to a flashing hilt though? As in, perhaps observers on the outside would end up wondering why your hands keep flashing?

You have this big bright laser sword-blade and it just seems to flow naturally that the big bright blade would be the part that flashes. That's my expectation anyways. Perhaps seeing it work in real life would really bring the impact of the effect out.

It would be pretty easy to test actually, I could in fact test that really easy. Instead of having luxeon flash LED's wired up on the inside of my saber, I could just hook up a few on the outside and solder them onto the wires I already have. I could hold them down temporarily with zip ties just for the quick test to see how it looks in practice.

I would need to buy more white Luxeon LED's though. The ones i have now are glued into my current optic.


Forgive me, I don't know how to make the image smaller for viewing purposes. Does anyone?
Microsoft paint (which comes on all windows PC's) can easily resize an image for you. Sometimes they bury the executable icon though. So here's how you can find it.
-Click start
-click RUN
-type in mspaint.exe
-now open the image you want to resize
-hold both CTRL+W to open the resizing option window (or click Image-->Stretch/Skew)
-Enter the new size of your image in a percent difference from the current image. For example if you enter 100% your image size will not change. If you enter 80% then your image will shrink until it's 80% of it's original size. If you enter 150% it will grow until it's 1.5 times as big as it started.

Cheers,

[LAN-ED-TUL]

i use a free program called PIXresizer. google the name youl find it.

[Novastar]

Sorry... I know how to actually resize an image--I meant resize it for viewing purposes (scale) and then allow others to click on it for "full" view. No matter.

Back to the ideas... Eandori, that would be a cool test! Let me know what you come up with--I'm trying to get some folks together to attempt something too, but with everything else I'm doing... may be a while.

I think the effect will be what you want--and it will CERTAINLY look good on film, as a camera flash looks pretty neat (as far as I've seen) when on video.

Only question would be--is it better to use LEDs or a xenon flash?

I say: Xenon Flash. uh... + optic solution.

Problem: High-Voltage transformer. But hey, if it's protected well, no reason why it can't be as safe as a disposable camera... :)

[Eandori]

Hey Novastar,

Got some video's made today just for you. I opened my saber up and removed my weak little poor mans optic module. With the optic removed from the saber you can directly see the white Luxeon LED's flash as the saber is hit. That should give you a good idea of what to expect with those same LED's mounted on the outside of the saber.

Note: Those two white luxeon LED's are only running around 350 mA right now. They can get MUCH brighter.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Flash_Outside_Hilt.wmv

In this next video, I wanted to try to get more of the light redirected. So I grabbed some clay, and some aluminum foil to make a very quick and cheap reflector surface. It actually worked pretty well and at least doubled the amount of light I'm getting up the blade. It's still far far below what I'm working towards though.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Flash_improved_optic.wmv

In this final video, I removed the SD Flash memory card from the Crystal Focus board and set the value (LEDCurrent) equal to 1 (a value of 46 is 1 amp, 70 is 1.5 amps.) So the blade was very dim, but it's perfect for showing the potential of what Clash Flash with no flash-focus-lense can look like. This is the only setup where you can see the clash flash in the blade on video. I should definately note, to the naked eye this is closer to what it looks like in person. I'm not sure why the camera cannot capture it closer to real life.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Flash_dim_blade.wmv

I'll have to buy more parts for testing before I can go much further then this. The next step will be to try out some different luxeon flash LED's, a high power FET so I can run around 1 amp through both LED's, and some sort of lense to focus the white light. I can pretty much easily state those steps will make the white flash AT LEAST 10x brighter then it is now inside the blade.

[Novastar]

It does look REALLY promising for the desired effect you want in the blade... I would love to see that kind of thing on the OUTside though, hehehh.

I believe it would actually get you more closely what you'd be looking for, which is the "movie flash" where the light effect literally bursts all about the actors "fighting", covers the blade props, and yes indeed, does generally emanate right at the point where the blades cross.

Also... I'm still undecided on which would be better--xenon flash or LED... I mean... one thing is for sure... given a few more years of LED technology... it *WILL* be better than a xenon flash. :)

[Eandori]

It does look REALLY promising for the desired effect you want in the blade... I would love to see that kind of thing on the OUTside though, hehehh.
Sorry, I should have been more clear. One of the reasons I took the video with the optic removed was so you could see what it would look like to have a clash flash with the white LED on the outside. I Figured it would be worth doing like that because it's the same LED's at the same current rating that you saw doing clash-flash inside the blade. A better comparison due to similar light source etc.

Yeah, no need to sell me on the idea of clash flash on the outside. I really do see what you are going for and I fully agree with you it would have a very cool effect. :)

The unfortunate truth is, neither method is really what happens in the movie. So saber smiths may end up picking the one they like best and just using that. Kinda like the whole EL vs LED thing (which I'm very much on the LED side). I can totally see why you would prefer the outer-flash for stage performance. All that white light flashing on the actors and stage like a camera flash would not need to come from the perfect spot. If it was timed at impact correctly, and it was bright enough to light things around the dueling Jedi, and if the source of light was at least CLOSE to the blade, it would work well.

For now, I'll focus on inner blade flash. After I feel I have made lots of headway on that effort (or if somebody else takes a shot at it and really nails it) I'll move to option 2 with ya :)

For Xenon flash, it really is not super hard to build up a huge voltage and dump it through a flash unit. Whether it be LED or Xenon. That part is not the restrictor, I'm sure of it. You're correct to state there is a voltage danger though. It depends on how much flash you are going for of course... most people would get shocked and be fine. But people with pacemakers, or unstable conditions might be in danger from a shock like that. I would easily say 99% of people that would take an accidental shock like that would be totally fine. But even losing 1 person is too much. So I fully agree with you that we should call out that danger and make sure people are well aware of it.

For right now, Xenon flash will most certainly give you a bigger outer flash. I'm sure of that. But what I'm wondering about is the area needed to mount a Xenon Flash+reflector into your blade hilt. Those white Luxeon LED's are small and I could easily see hiding 12 of them around the outside of your hilt. But mounting 3-6 Xenon Flash units would be hard. I would also be far more worried about Xenon flash units getting damage during a duel.

[Novastar]

Agreed. All good points--I'm glad we're sort of "fleching" out the details here.

I guess a question would be... if (for example):
3 flash LEDs = 1 flash xenon (brightness)...

...then I suppose LEDs WOULD be a better choice, since they are safer, more compact, and generally take less power drain.

At first, I was thinking solely about a 1 to 1 ratio, whereas the point would be... if you can fit 5 LEDs in the place that would take 2 xenons... what the heck is the point of the xenons if they're somewhat equivalent?

Then again... I don't know about that. It's possible it might take 10 flash LEDs to equal the relative brightness of 1 xenon lamp. I just don't know.

If I was an electronics wizard, I'd be trying things left and right... but alas--I'm just a dude with ideas and no ability to follow through without paying designers (in the realm of electronics).

Maybe I should stick to UTILIZING the products! :D heheheh

[Eandori]

No way, keep doing what you are doing! Creativity and necessity are the mother/father of invention! Teamwork!

I bet we could look up specifications for overall lumen output for Xenon. I know we can find it for Luxeon LED's. That should be a pretty solid comparison, all you need past overal lumens of light is what frequency (color) and emission angle.

[Eandori]

Got a couple of videos up on YouTube. Here's one showing/discussing the saber itself. I had to clip this down a lot to get it inside the 10 min YouTube limit.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PT1h1FE2ax0&mode=user&search=

Here's a funny video of my wife joining me in an epic battle.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1gDO8sF6qw

[Jay-gon Jinn]

Yeah, I just use a standard optic 5 degree lens on the main luxeon LED. (as you can see in the illustration on the top post of this thread).

For awhile, I was considering placing the flash LED's behind that optic near the main green Luxeon LED. You can see what I'm referring to in the image below. Early testing showed that will not work, because light coming into the back of the optic lense from that angle reflects and is not redirected out the top. The method I used for testing was shining a laser pointer into the backside of the optic to see how much light comes out the top. Nearly none of it did.

This was my first idea for mounting point for flash LED's.
http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Tri-Lux_Clash_Optic_V1.JPG

I'll try to get the videos of the saber clash-flash up soon so you guys can see it.
I would think you could get this design to work if you used a reflector instead of the 5 deg lens. You could drill two holes in the reflector's side large enough to put the dome of the clash-flash leds into the reflector and probably get more light up the blade. Might be worth a try, at least. I like where you're going with this, and it's great to see someone actually trying out new things instead of just talking about it.

[Eandori]

I would think you could get this design to work if you used a reflector instead of the 5 deg lens. You could drill two holes in the reflector's side large enough to put the dome of the clash-flash leds into the reflector and probably get more light up the blade. Might be worth a try, at least.
That's a darn good idea! I must try that!

THANKS!

[Jay-gon Jinn]

Glad I could help! I want to see how this turns out, I think it's a great idea!

[Jedi-Loreen]

EL technology was good for it's day, but you could only too so much with it.

I love the fact that LED technology for sabers is still developing, changing, improving. Especially when people are experimenting and trying new drivers, set ups, hilt pieces and LEDs themselves. It's inspiring. :D

[goldsaberwarrior]

I would much rather use LEDs EL. nothing agains EL LED is just easier to me use than EL would be. Looked at the inerds of an EL a friend used to have and it looked complicated to me. Thats why I'll mostly build only LED sabers because I can get more of what I want out of them. hehehe lol :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

[pockets]

I would much rather use LEDs EL. nothing agains EL LED is just easier to me use than EL would be. Looked at the inerds of an EL a friend used to have and it looked complicated to me. Thats why I'll mostly build only LED sabers because I can get more of what I want out of them. hehehe lol :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

complicated.. a bit, especially if u add sound. very fragile. when soldering the EL wire theres 2 wires thinner than a hair.. after i soldered and isolated everything, i filled my mono plug(where the wires are soldered) with hot glue around the 3rd or 4th time i had to resolder. they held for longer that time, but still ended up breaking. its inevitable.

[Eandori]

Stay on target.... :)

The threads about clash flash development guys. Let's not de-rail the effort!

[Marsupial]

I don't know if you could make a trial of it with your current setup, but I wonder how it would look like with not the white flash LEDs at the base of the blade nor on the outside of the hilt, but kind of in the blade holder, near the tip of the blade.

Parts of the flash would seam to come from outside the blade, but it would also flash inside it, making (possibly) a better Flash effect...

http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r253/darthKodius/design/flash-on-tip.jpg

maybe with the leds not enclosed completely or other variants. Hard to tell without trying. If you can try something like that, I'd be curious to see.

[Eandori]

Hey Marsupial, My initial thought is that the light from the flash LED's would bounce off the outside of the tube and get mostly dispersed on top of the flash LED. Here's a test you can do, this is actually similar to what I did for testing other theories...

Get a laser pointer, and shine it directly at your polycarbonate blade with the saber turned off. Does the laser light bounce off the blade? Does it pass into the blade and light up the fiber optic paper?

I'm guessing it will mostly bounce off the blade. The light that ends up passing into the saber will probably only be visible when you are looking directly at that spot. So if it was hidden deep into the hilt, you wouldn't see it. The way I had my Luxeon Flash LED's mounted, at least some of the light coming off the bottom of those flash LED's will bounce off the perpendicular flat surface of the main optic lense. So I get a little light reflecting up the blade.

When I tried the first idea of two white luxeon LED's mounted behind the optic, I tested that with a laser pen. Just like I'm describing to you. What I found is that laser light shining into the backside of the optic just reflected back out and nearly none of it came out the top of the optic like I hoped it would.

A laser pen is a very effective tool for testing how light reflects and refracts!

[Eandori]

Hey Jay-Gon Jinn, is this image I made below basically what you were talking about? Having the flash LED's protruding into a reflective plated optic instead of a plastic lense?

http://home.comcast.net/~eandori/Luxeon_LED_Flash_mount_Ver4.JPG

I really really like this idea, I think it has a ton of potential!!!

[Jay-gon Jinn]

That's exactly what I was thinking!

[Eandori]

Just a quick update on this...

My next planned steps are to buy a 12 degree reflective optic that Xwingband pointed me to. Then mount a few luxeon led's for clash flash into the optic just like Jay-gon Jinn described. Finally I will need to figure out a good mounting/heat sinking setup to put those into. This should give me far more light reflecting up the blade.

Next I will purchase some 0v off, 3v on, 2 amp FET based transistors for the clash flash driver circuit. I'm currently using 3904 bi polar NPN transistors. I used those because I had them on hand, but they only give me around 350 mA each, so far below the 1-2 amps I'm looking for with the clash flash. This will make my flash MUCH brighter.

Those two changes should be a huge difference. I have a baby coming in 5 weeks (our first) so I'm a bit fund/time constrained. But I'll get to that as fast as I can.

THEN....

I'll start working on a few prototype builds of outer hilt flash like Novastar was suggesting. He's pretty amped up on that idea and fun to brainstorm with. So I'll try to flush out that idea with him next.

Cheers,

[Novastar]

Whoa, that sounds great! :)

I'll message you in a bit... as you know--I was plagued with computer issues...

[Corbin_Das]

Neat setup, Eandori!

I tried a similar reflector tube setup a few years ago and never got it to work all that well. I was basically using a Thor Labs laser colimating tube. It was OK, but I still like the lens results better.
Still, using the tube allows for a thinner neck area, if you wanted, so that's cool. The best comprimise I've been able to think of would be a lens assembly at the Luxeon with the colimating tube over that. Maybe together you could get the colimation along with the thin neck. Just a thought.


Corbin

[Novastar]

BOP III... being on my mind (and into some SWEET rehearsals thus far)... is hoping for the updates from Eandori... but I know he's busy with a new child! Congrats!!!!

Hope we hear more about the "flash". I know he'll be working hard to make it a real possibility for saber... uh... saber-URs.

Saber-urs? Saber people. Saber fighters. LED lighters. LED junkies. LED Saber martial movie likin' artists. I should stop now... :)

[Eandori]

Yeah, sorry for the slow updates. The new baby is really slowing down the effort. I end up busting out the moto tool a lot for that project and all that loud noise get's me yelled at. I'll be back on the project pretty soon. Sorry for the delay.

Last time I went out to fry's I picked up some new hardware to experiment with. A replacement Xenon flashlight bulb that comes already inside an aluminum reflector. I want to try mounting the blade luxeons in the side of that reflector, and have the flash Xenon at the base.

I still need to purchase a new order of white Luxeons for the outer flash hilt. The first version of that is going to be fugly, but functional.

[DACOTA]

Its coming along great,from prototype to solid design. :D
Wouldnt it be awsome if tim sold an otic like that?
This is some cool new stuff.

[ArkaiHalon]

and BTW, congratulations on becoming a Daddy

[Eandori]

Thanks guys! a new baby is really quite a job, but she's adorable. She makes these "cooing" sounds like a little bird. Very cute.

Here is a quick video I made of her arrival (no worries, it's PG :) )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgFURjC4jLs

[Eandori]

Ok, here's a quick video of my version 2 prototype. Made some much needed changes so the heat sinking is good enough for Lux V at 1 amp, built a higher capacity battery, got rid of the ugly control box, improved the evenness of the blade even more then proto1.

Now, I can start working on the next version of clash flash optics. A new inner blade optic and a new outer hilt optic.

Here's the new video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6mkGtJDIpU

Cheers,

[Novastar]

Bump.

I'm interested what other people's thinking is on this.

[Eandori]

I'm in a bit of a low spot for developing new features for sabers now. Our first baby was born 4 months ago, and I have moved 620 miles from Sacramento CA, to Hillsboro OR. As of right now, I'm in a temporary living location until our renters move out of our home in Hillsboro and we can move back in (around 3 weeks). So as of right now... I don't have access to my tools and we are busy with an infant.

BUT NEVERTHELESS.... I will be back on Clash Flash soon!

I have 2 methods that I wish to implement...
1. Outer-hilt clash flash: This was Novastar's desired implementation. A bunch of luxeon LED's wired up to the outside of the hilt and set to flash brightly when the blade is impacted. It would for sure be brighter then the inner blade... but all the light would be coming from the hilt.

2. Inner-blade clash flash: This is along the lines of my first attempt. Getting the blade to flash white when the saber is struck. All the *magic* will be in the optics. That much I am sure of. The electronics side of it was very easy to implement. It's all about getting the blade to flash a VERY BRIGHT color in addition to having a decently bright blade to begin with.

[Tom Starkiller]

With the outer "Clash flash", why not set it up to flash on ignition and retraction of the saber, giving the "flare" effect of episodes II and III?

Just a thought.

[Novastar]

Exactly.

Actually, this was one of the ideas that I had for the Ns5 board initially... for the "flash" to have programmability. This way, you could pretty much "contour" the flash to your liking. Things like:

* Flash on poweron
* Flash on poweroff
* Flash "flicker" on lockup
* Flash on clash (duh)

With Erv's board, you could even have a certain flash feature for "Flash on Force" or flash on blaster, etc.

[Sethski]

That vid with it in the blade looks great Eandori - makes me think of Vader and Obi-Wan in ANH, I love it!

[Eandori]

Thanks! I'm itching to get back on this project. I've gotten de-railed by so much stuff.

[Novastar]

I hear ya, Edwin. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens with this thing too!

[DACOTA]

Great, your going to improve your clash flash. I cant wait to see it finished, I know most of us will probably copy your idea for our sabers, that is if you dont mind.;)

[Eandori]

Mind? I would be honored :)

[DACOTA]

Great, cause I'd be honored to copy a geniuses idea.;):D

Oh and I just read about how the flash leds are wired, I wonder if erv would make another board to work with the clash flash. How exactly is it wired, I know you said it is wired from the extra contacts on the board that are used for blinking leds, but i dont know a whole lot about additional circuits.:oops: Could you maybe show a diagram when you have time? Please?

[Eandori]

For the first version of clash flash I used a 3904 NPN Bi Polar transistor for each of the white luxeon LED's. The base of those two transistors were tied together then to a single "Blink LED" lead on the CF board. I had a base resistor, and a collector resistor on each of them.

Erv' made a special version of CF board for me where LED-4 was a "digital clash flash output" It was at 0v normally and went to 3.3v for around 200mSeconds when a clash was detected. When that logic output went high, that turned on the two bi-polar transistors which sent around 500mA of current through each of the white LED's. Basically I used a simple pair of transistors to amplify the logic output of Erv's board for a clash flash.

Erv' did some cool work, making the duration of the clash flash adjustable even.

This is all history though, because I believe he built that ability into the 3.0 boards by default. All that's left is wiring up an "amplifier" circuit to get the 500+ mA needed to power those white LED's. I think Erv' has also created a small satellite amplifier board for just that purpose, but I have not tested one yet. Until I get one of those, I'll just use small transistors for that purpose.

The HARD PART is still the optic though... My first version did not do a very good job of getting the light up the blade. It was brighter at the hilt, and nearly nothing past like 10 inches. If I had the blade current very low you could see it better. So for the next attempt I need a better optic. I'll probably go from solid clear lenses to larger reflectors where I can jam the white LED's in the side. That will make the main blade LED dimmer... but I might get much more flash LED up the blade as a tradeoff.

I need to work out some new online file storage, then when I get that going I'll post some pictures online of the circuit needed for clash flash. Then others can jump into this too and start making their own versions. Two minds are better then one :)

[DACOTA]

Yeah, your talking about his power extender right? That would probably work. And the reflector sounds like it will work out well. Just like the ones in a small maglite.

Thank you for the enlightenment.;):D