Happy B-Day to me!!
all these goodies and only about $50 of it came out of my pocket - it's good when a plan comes together.
BWA-HA-HA!!!!
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Happy B-Day to me!!
all these goodies and only about $50 of it came out of my pocket - it's good when a plan comes together.
BWA-HA-HA!!!!
Attachment 17097
View on OneDrive
Started painting:
Pieces were first soaked in metal etch.
Primered and baked at 250F for an hour.
Three coats of paint and two coats of clear - again baked at 250F for an hour after each coat.
Because of the pieces used, I could feel a bit of play in the blade, so I printed up a spacer to fix that.
Attachment 17098
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Put the pieces together and wired it up for a test:
https://youtu.be/5J-l2vilTwk
No smoke and we have sound / lights - I'll call that a pass!
Finished with the paint. A little more gloss than I would like, but it will work.
Used one clocking washer and did maybe 10 minutes of sanding to get everything all lined up.
Attachment 17112
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Now that it's together, the grip feels a bit small, would probably work better for a kids saber. I think I'll order another main body, moving the cut-outs for the grips down .25" and moving the switch up .25". Then I'll use this one to make a new, smaller saber for my daughter to play with - I already have a plan on which pieces to get.
Next up is chassis assembly and installing the electronics.
Though I purchased everything pre-wired, I wanted to shorten the wires to make assembly a bit cleaner/easier. I didn't have enough JST pins to redo all the connectors and I was too lazy to de-solder/cut/solder all the pre-wired connections, so I just cut and spliced the existing wiring.
Attachment 17143
I had made a chassis out of 3mm rod and 3D printed chassis parts, but the V4 Nano didn't fit very well, since I was modifying parts anyways, I decided to make a single piece chassis that holds a 18650 battery, the Nano board and a 28mm speaker. The new piece fits perfectly inside the hilt, held in place by the pommel, yet sized so that the pommel can be installed/removed without spinning the chassis inside the hilt (and twisting the wires).
Attachment 17144Attachment 17146
Here is the chassis installed in the hilt and wires pulled and ready for connecting.
Attachment 17145
and here it is, all wired up and assembled. I opted to not use the crystal chamber as it made the hilt too long, it was ok for two handed use, but too bulky when using one hand.
Attachment 17148
I also printed up a wall mount for display:
Attachment 17147
I really like the hilt's color and design, looks sithy. Is it finished?
Thx - I thought it came out pretty well for the first one.Quote:
Originally Posted by Seth Skywalker
For now it is done, though I may change the main body for the hilt. Along with the grip feeling too small (because of where I had the switch holes drilled), I'm not sure I like the rubber strips. They actually give a bit too much grip when twirling - and I foresee issues with them coming off when I don't want them to.
I may also keep this one the way it is and use it for display only - then build a new one for sparring.
The rubber grips look awesome in my opinion.