Another Canadian Jedi

[Physics1313]

So i have been looking around in the forums here and have to say that your lightsabers are insanely cool. I have picked up on a lot that goes around here and am ready to join the community. I have read the noob guides and hope to be making my first saber soon. I have a few questions though, as all newbies should, and so here they are;

Is the flash saber builder accurate? Like if it fits together in that it will fit together in real life?

Once you puth them together can you still switch out and reuse MHS parts?

Why are chokes discouraged for first time sabersmiths?

I am looking forward to making a saber in the near future :D

[JediMasterDak]

Saberbuilder gives an idea of how your saber will look. Chokes are not discouraged, but many think for a first saber you should go as simple and easy as possible. Looking forward to seeing your saber!!! :D:D

[Jedi-Loreen]

Welcome.

Looking at your questions, it seems that you still need to do a lot more reading.

The Saber Builder would be kind of pointless if the parts didn't fit together in real life, don't you think?

You can easily reconfigure the MHS parts to your liking, they just screw together, so you can take them apart and put them together in different ways. Though you'll need to keep that in mind, when doing the electronics, if you don't want to redo them, like if you turn the main hilt piece around so that the switch hole is on the other end.

[$tarkiller]

Welcome! It looks to me like you HAVE done alot of reading. I can understand your question about the saberbuiler. Just becase it's there dosent mean it's accurate. If you ask me, alot of the peice on it look too fat for their length. But the answer is yes. You can change out parts an reuse them.

[Thaxos]

So i have been looking around in the forums here and have to say that your lightsabers are insanely cool. I have picked up on a lot that goes around here and am ready to join the community. I have read the noob guides and hope to be making my first saber soon. I have a few questions though, as all newbies should, and so here they are;

Is the flash saber builder accurate? Like if it fits together in that it will fit together in real life?

Once you puth them together can you still switch out and reuse MHS parts?

Why are chokes discouraged for first time sabersmiths?

I am looking forward to making a saber in the near future :D
Welcome! Glad to see another Canadian! Still disappointed there's no one else anywhere near me. :(

The flash saber builder is accurate for making sure parts will connect, long as you use the thread guides... But it just doesn't do the parts justice.

MHS parts are amazing like that, you can rearrange them all you want... Also makes you change your mind on the order of parts in the hilt a couple times too hehehe...

Chokes present a space issue, they have a smaller internal diameter and so for planning out your electronics, you need to be careful. You can still go ahead and use one, just be sure to plan out the internal electronics carefully. ;)
But you sound like you've done plenty of research and should be fine. Looking forward to seeing your sabers.

[cardcollector]

Hey I noticed in a recent post that you ressurected a thread.

What that means is a conversation has died off (i.e. 6 months with no new posts) and is not necessary to post.

You'll get fussed at if you keep it up.;)

[Obi-Dar Ke-Gnomie]

Welcome! Richmond Hill, you say? Cool. I'm not far away from you. I'm north of Barrie.

Do lots of reading. Just about any question you could have has been asked and answered somewhere already. People like it if you make an attempt to look for answers before you ask questions that have been asked before.

Check out my post about the Fan Expo in Toronto next month. It's in the Misc. Topics folder. Click the links I put up. They keep adding to the guest list. Should be cool.

[Madcow]

Greetings,
Always room for another Canadian!

Cheers,
MC

[lectricpharaoh]

So i have been looking around in the forums here and have to say that your lightsabers are insanely cool. I have picked up on a lot that goes around here and am ready to join the community. I have read the noob guides and hope to be making my first saber soon. I have a few questions though, as all newbies should, and so here they are;

Is the flash saber builder accurate? Like if it fits together in that it will fit together in real life?More or less, yes. It's a little finicky to get some of the buttons and stuff to align properly (plus some of these aren't available in the builder), but for the basic hilt parts, it's fine. You do need to keep an eye on the length of your piece, though; it's easy to think it looks small enough to fit in your pocket, when in reality it's over a foot long. You also need to keep in mind the length of your main section (handle section plus any adjacent extenders), as this is where the majority of your electronics will lie. This is related to your question about chokes; as they have a smaller inner (and outer, but inner is what matters here) diameter, it's very difficult to put much inside.

Another caveat regarding the builder is that it doesn't seem to check availability of parts, so keep this in mind. If some MHS piece is critical to the look of your build, you'll want to make sure Tim has some in stock before you get your heart set on it. To my knowledge, he machines all of the MHS parts himself, so it might be a while, especially if the part is in low demand (as it will then be lower priority of things he needs to make). There's a thread around about estimated times when he'll have new stock of certain pieces; look around a bit and read it.

Once you puth them together can you still switch out and reuse MHS parts?Generally, yes you can. If you've put a lot of work into the sabre, cramming lots of electronics in there, and/or adding stuff to the exterior, you might not want to, as it will undo a lot of your hard work. Also, if you plan to reuse the parts later, you will want to avoid anything that can bond things together, such as glue, painting over joints, and stuff like that.

Why are chokes discouraged for first time sabersmiths?They're not so much discouraged as just unnecessary. The idea for first-timers is to keep it simple. Remember also that because of the narrower inside diameter, your usable length for electronics and such may be less than you think it is. Chokes do not decrease the usable length, but they can give the illusion of giving you more than you've got. They also add to the expense, and for someone just getting into the hobby, they probably will want to keep their expenses as low as possible until they decide how they like the hobby.

I am looking forward to making a saber in the near future :DHey, that's not a question! Nonetheless, welcome to the forums, fellow Canadian. :)

You might want to do what I and some others are doing: work in PVC for your first sabre. This will let you make a cheap hilt; you can then focus more on the electronics. You can then either move the electronics over once you go to MHS parts, or use your recently-gleaned knowhow to solder new electronics for it.

[Misael]

Thank you very much for all of your sound advice 'Pharaoh. They have been very useful. I feel more empowered to build by first lightsaber.

[Darth_DevilGuy]

Welcome to the community

the best advice I can give newbies is to design a saber you like around the MHS, using whatever parts, then aquire the parts as they come in.

Patience is a virtue, these things are pretty expensive, so you want to do it right the first time, don't rush and you'll be happier in the end.

Currently I have 4 sabers in varying stages of completion, I'm just waiting on parts to show back up in the store, I'm content to wait rather than half-ass my work.

[Thaxos]

... then aquire the parts as they come in.

Speaking from experience, try to wait until everything is in stock. If you're like me, you'll end up paying $20 or more for shipping, and if you're making lots of small orders, it will add up rather quickly! Don't worry, it may take a couple weeks, but eventually, all the parts will be in stock.

[Darth_DevilGuy]

Speaking from experience, try to wait until everything is in stock. If you're like me, you'll end up paying $20 or more for shipping, and if you're making lots of small orders, it will add up rather quickly! Don't worry, it may take a couple weeks, but eventually, all the parts will be in stock.

that's true but it can also screw you over, for instance, I held off ordering a sledholder 18 because there's another part that I know is coming that I wanted to use on the same saber, of course, now the sledholder is out of stock, and that other part will probably show up while I'm waiting meanwhile the style 1 short choke went away too, now I'm two parts short, combining shipping is nice, but if you like the rarer parts it may never happen.

[jtong77]

I'm Canadian too!

[Kal El Rah]

Welcome, welcome. read alot and enjoy your experience here.:cool:

[$tarkiller]

Do you have in mind what you'd like todo for your first saber?