D's Vintage Graflex Luke ANH with custom chassis and NB

[dgregory]

Starting my build thread for a Vintage Graflex Luke ANH. Got a 3-cell in excellent condition and dismantled it. So far I've just done a little work on the chassis and the crystal chamber. I may replace chassis disks with the acrylic ones from the store before the build is complete. Right now I've got PVC disks that I made from end caps.

Vintage Graflex 3-cell
Nano Biscotte
3.7 V 18500 LiIon pack
2 W bass speaker
Speaker holder V4
TCSS Graflex blade holder
mini-tactile switch
custom crystal chamber
TCSS grip strips
Bubble strip (still hunting for this)
Custom blade plug using the Graflex parts

The Graflex 3-cell unaltered


Disassembled parts, a little corrosion but nothing that can't be cleaned off easily


For the glass eye, I'm going to have a blade retention screw version and a show version. The show version will include the original glass eye (sanded to fit over the blade holder) and a bit of speaker mesh from an old laptop. It'll light up with the saber blade and should look great.



more to follow

[dgregory]

Started on the crystal chamber as well. I used parts from an old hard drive and laptop fan motor. The posts are screw mounts from the inside of a laptop. The ring was the outer portion of the fan motor's electromagnet. The coils from that magnet form the top of the crystal chamber.




Test lit in the hilt with a 5mm superbright blue led



I had to place the crystal chamber at the bottom of the clamp instead of the top. Removing the clamp will allow access to the SD card. And the recharge port will be accessible by removing the base of the hilt.

[Machinimax]

That crystal chamber is looking sweet! Question for you. I recently obtained a vintage Graflex myself. How did you remove the pin that holds the bunny ears in place?

[dgregory]

That crystal chamber is looking sweet! Question for you. I recently obtained a vintage Graflex myself. How did you remove the pin that holds the bunny ears in place?

I tapped it out from the bottom with a finishing nail of a similar diameter. Be careful and go slow, lots of tiny taps. Also, be careful securing the graflex. I had mine upside down and lightly grabbed by a vice with a towel on either side. You need both hands for the tapping. Just drive the nail through toward the emitter end. I tapped mine about 2/3 the way through then grabbed the pin and pulled it out with pliers.

[dgregory]

Finally had a chance to do an update. I've got the chassis assembled with the help of the new NB Graflex discs from Tim. Had to shave a little divot in each disc because of the slide switch which is still installed.



I also redid the crystal chamber. I like the radiator version much more. I also wanted two crystals instead of one. I wanted thin radiator fins so I used some sheet aluminum. You can barely seem them when you look straight through and they light up well at an angle.



All I have to do now is wire it up. Here's the wiring diagram for the NB, recharge port, and two LEDs in the crystal chamber.

[Darth Ryo]

Excellent, looking forward the progress on that one ^^

[dgregory]

Another update:

I tested the circuit last night and the diagram above works perfectly. I'm starting on the chassis assembly and wiring now.

Here are all my parts:


The partially completed chassis. I need to alter the back end a bit to remove a chassis disc that I don't need. It's just taking up space.


More to follow. I'm hoping to finish the wiring this weekend.

I'm still worried about the sound venting. I don't want visible sound holes in the base, but I can't imagine that hiding them under the D-ring works very well. It doesn't seem like it would vent very effectively like that. I saw Sloth's trick of drilling out the D-ring mounting screw. I might try that. I was also thinking about drilling some diagonal holes just under the bottom end of the grips. I think I could hide them under the grips pretty well.

[Ty_Bomber]

If you do an ESB graflex, you could drill holes in the screws that secure the t-track grips. That would help as well.

[dgregory]

I finished the wiring on the chassis. Once I got near the end I decided t shorten the whole thing by about a 1/4 inch. I had extra room and wanted to pull the speaker away from the base a little more.

Here's the finished chassis all wired up.


The crystal chamber is visible between the bottom piece and the clamp. The recharge port is within the base and accessible when it's removed. The only thing I'm not happy with is the brightness of the 10 mm LED (larger crystal). It needed a weird size resistor (27 Ohm 1/8 Watt) so I had to put on the closest thing I had, which had a little more resistance (1/4 Watt). It's not as bright as the 5 mm LED above it.


Removing the clamp provides SD card access.


I guess I need to alter the bottom of the red button so it'll hit the tactile switch. It has that concave hood on it still. I think that's hitting the sides of the tactile switch and preventing the center from triggering the button. I'm not sure how other folks have solved this problem. I'll probably install a tiny screw into the bottom of the red button. That way I can dial it in.

For the bunny ears, I removed the original pin and kept the small tube it was in. I threaded both ends of the tube for 4-40 screws so I can mount it.

[GreaSyde]

A little dab of hot glue under the graflex button does the trick. As far as the bunny ears go, I used a roll pin to secure it. Its removable and it doesn't leave an ugly screw head. The sound holes under the kohbold aren't really visible if done right.

Your hilt looks great.