el wire

I have a question about soldering the el wire to the mono plug. In the tutorial it says that you only solder one end to the plug. Does the other end get attached to it in any way?

thanks

No - soldering is to be done on one end of the wire only. Soldering both ends would most like result in you short circuiting the inverter. I actually insulate the free end with shrink tubing or electrical tape just to make sure it does not accidentally make contact with a conductive material.

"I'm no Jedi, I'm just a guy with a lightsaber and a few questions."

so i solder one end to the mono plug and just wrap the other end in electrical tape and tuck it into the sheildng of the plug.



thanks
-andy

How do I know how many Qty. of the blue blade to get? I want to make a 48" lightsaber.

Thanks

Are you sure you want to go that long? I've made a 40 inch blade, and it kinda waves in the wind[:)] Way too long, so I revisited and went down to 36 inches. The "standard" length - the movie length is 1 meter - 40 inches. Anyway, you need to weave the wire up and down 5 times, so a 36 inch for instance, takes 15 feet.
good luck!

Born of Sith, seduced by the light side.
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I was wondering about how bad an EL blade looks if it only is wrapped or bent 1 time or 2. Does it need the 15 feet of wire for a 36 inch blade? I was wondering because I am getting ready to order EL wire and wanted to know what looks the best. Thanks.

If you want it to look the best then order what is suggested in the tutorials.

Tim
The Custom Saber Shop

I have tried putting in less wire than suggested. Yeah, I'm cheap. You loose brightness. On the other hand, if you put more than suggested, you need a bigger inverter - the kind that won't fit into any hilt. Go with the tutorials - they have been written after much trial and error I bet.

Born of Sith, seduced by the light side.
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How do you weave the wire? Do you wrap it around itself, braid it, or just coil it up and put it in the polye? I was wondering because another expensive site claims they are the only ones to make a 360 degree blade with not black spots on the EL blades. It confused the heck out of me and I was just wondering how you wrap the coil. Thanks for the help. I can't wait until after the holidays are over and I get my disbursement check to cover my "personal expenses!"

Thanks for the help[:D]

Sorry about the last post. I just saw my question answered a few topics down. Sorry!

I have ordered the 3/4 inch polyc tubing but it looks small to me can you make a blade using a 1" tubing?

You'll need more wire, and as said before, a larger inverter that wouldn't fit in the hilt.

Those who see the light at the end of the tunnel, need to stop staring at the sun.

well I have 20 feet of el wire that would not be enough to get a good brightness?, or would it be better to make a led saber using the 1" tubing?, has anyone made a 1" el blade before?, if so any help would be appreciated.

20 feet isn't enough to even get another strand in the tube if you're doing a 40" EL blade. If you shorten the blade it would be possible. Say 7 strands at 33" (MR blade length) you'd have 9" left over to use for connections. I'm not sure how well that would fit, but I think 9 (you must have an odd number) at almost double of a 3/4" blade would be too much. 3 more feet isn't that much more but I'd run it at 12V for sure to make it a decent brightness.

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well what if I was able to get a 1" tube with a higher thickness so that I still use the same size polyethelene tubeing for the diffuser?, does anyone have any ideas where I can find something like that because I checked on www.usplastics.com and they don't have the right size, my father brought home a piece of polycarbonate from his job that was the perfect ID and OD but it was only like two feet long, it is used for mailing stuff he said and that he could only get it in that size which makes me wonder if other places sell different sizes.

Yes, there are places where you can get tons of different sizes of PolyC, but it's disrespectful to ask about them when Tim sells a perfetly good one.

Getting a higher thickness really wouldn't help that much anyway. The diffuser is what marks the limits of the blade. A 3/4" diffuser looks the same whether you have a thicker CLEAR tube on it or not. If you must insist on getting other PolyC contact someone off board or do some more searching.

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If you use a 1"od 1/2"id blade..man will that be heavy. I think have seen that size somewhere before. Allot of the time a 3/4"od 1/2"id polyc will fit inside of a 1"od 3/4"id polyc which would give you what you want..but it will still be pretty heavy.

Tim
The Custom Saber Shop

thanks for the info I saw the size polyc tube you offer I just thought if maybe it was thicker in the wall then you could still use the same size difuser for it and not worry about using mor el wire, but, really? this will make it a little heavy?

Here's one for you to chew on, Strydur. Seven strands of your EL wire will fit snugly inside the mono plug housing, yes? How about soldering seven one-way strands and having them all lead out just the one way? I'm working on something unique here... Also, any idea what seven EL wires (around 33/36" long, all) would do to the power draw on the inverter and/or battery?

What is life but the passage to death?

I have done seperate strands before..what a pain to solder. The inveter should power 7 fine as long as you dont make a 48" blade or something lol


Tim
The Custom Saber Shop

so the kit to make an EL blade comes with 17' of EL wire. would it be pretty much the same to use 10 ft. of 5mm wire instead?

the 5 mm wire is probably too thick to work. it wouldn't crimp enough or leave room for enough strands to look good. I've used it before in other projects, and it just isn't that much brighter than the 2.5.

The 5mm just has a thicker outer covering. It does not bend as well and you would be lucky to get 2 strands where 5 strands of the 2.5 would fit.

Tim
The Custom Saber Shop

i used 5mm in my first blade because i misunderstood jedi loreen's tutorial. it sucks. you can get one strand in, no more. you can get another strand in, but it will only go in about 10 inches. stick with 2.5mm, you will end up with a much brighter blade.

i am a nerd, if you don't like it, i will cut you with my lightsaber

thanks for the input guys. I guess this means I'll be using the 2.5 wire.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by jezzail

thanks for the input guys. I guess this means I'll be using the 2.5 wire.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Hopefully wire bought from Tim. [;)] All that 5mm talk makes it seem like you were thinking of buying elsewhere.[V]

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guess he could try it in a 1 inch blade and make the reducer for the mono jack plug. lol

You dont know the POWER, of the dark side...

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by suit_man

i used 5mm in my first blade because i misunderstood jedi loreen's tutorial. it sucks. you can get one strand in, no more. you can get another strand in, but it will only go in about 10 inches. stick with 2.5mm, you will end up with a much brighter blade.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

<font size="3"><font color="purple">You misunderstood my tutorial? Did I write something confusing in it about the diameter of the EL wire?</font id="purple"></font id="size3"> [V]

In order to see the Light, you must sometimes risk the Dark.

hey, jedi loreen, nice to see you posting again, havent heard from you in awhile. things ok on your end?

You dont know the POWER, of the dark side...