Cracked blade.

Alright, I may be new to sabers and very possible naive, but I figured a battle blade would stand up to drywall. Apparently not my blade though. I have three theories of why it cracked.

1) Not as indestructible as I thought.

2) Flaw/weak point in the polycarbonate that I happened to hit.

3) Since I was unable to locate Weld-On 3, is it possible the good old-fashioned super glue made the polycarbonate brittle, leading to the cracks?

Any thoughts on these or other theories so that when I either cut this blade down past the cracks (blade will be way too short for hilt) or can find the money for new blade supplies (baby on the way), I won't make the same mistake?

I thought I had read that super glue will crystalize the poly-c. I have dueld with my brother may times and never done that.

Obviously you hit it at the tip... that's a point where it will break easier. Hit it in the middle all you want and it will last for a long time.

Simply stay away from the tip. ;)

You are not Qui Gon on a Trade Federation Battleship.

Just because the blade lights up does not make it a 'real' lightsaber.

If you want to cut drywall go to Home Depot and buy a drywall knife - they don't cost that much and work better than a lightsaber.;)

If the ceiling was about an inch or two higher then it never would have been a problem.
But I never listened to my mom about playing in the house, nor my wife.

Guess if I cut it down, I shouldn't hit the ceiling anymore.

I just wasn't sure. Seen posts about tips flying off when a glue joint busted but must have missed the ones about it cracking the blade.

For BOP I and II we used thick-walled blades. We put them through ENORMOUS amounts of punishment over the rehearsals and shows, and rarely had any problems... ... ...

... BUT....

...YES. They can and do break. Under what I would like to say are "normal" circumstances, I say that Lux-style sabers (both thin-walled and thick) *ARE* totally indestructible.

However, if you "bring on the pain" and smash those guys as HARD as you can many times over, somewhat with the intentions of actually WANTING to break them... oh yeah, they'll go.

But in comparison to other items of electronic value:

* Ipods
* portable CD players/walkmen
* Cell phones
* PDAs and hand-held little computer jobbys
* even some flashlights

...sabers are extremely resilient. I also don't recommend gluing tips, I just use THICK-walled tips for THIN-walled blades, use clear tape to get them in there nicely, and the little "air gap" allows for give and take and flexion and play. I haven't broken nor cracked a blade since I started adopting that method.

Thanks Novastar. That gives me some ideas to play with for when I construct a new blade. Its funny though, wasn't doing anything hard or really abusive. just spinning it when it scraped the ceiling and blew up on me.

I forgot to highlight also what X said... sometimes the tip area can be the part most prone to cracking... AND ALSO ADD... sometimes it's like... well.. being kicked the "wrong" way...

I mean, I remember getting kicked SUPER HARD some years ago in a martial arts class while sparring. Ironically... not only did it not hurt, but there was no bruising. About ten minutes later, I kinda got "lightly brushed" by another kick, and it made my muscle spasm, freak out, and it hurt like a bleeeeeotch!!! :) Days later... yellow + blue + brown + black. lol

Sometimes... it's JUST the right display of physics that will cause your saber blade to turn itself into junk. Fortunately, (unlike most any other saber type), the Luxeon style w/ the "empty" poly-c... is a pretty easy and cheap fix/replacement. You can DIY for like $10 to $15... maybe less. :)