Textured chrome tape and Gold Tube?

**Jonitus** · 03-19-2007, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by gundamaniac

Holy...crap.

That is a CRAPLOAD of time! A week of straight sanding...holy crap.

Hopefully for a smaller piece, it'll take less time..........even then it'll take a long time with your estimate.

Don't let the time "I" took to mean that's what it will take you. I have OCD like a mofo...a virtual Monk himself...so I tend to do things over and over and over again.

You could probably get that beautiful of a finish in a couple evenings worth of work, provided you had the paper, the water (with a drop or two of soap), rinsed everything regularly and used consistent pressure on the paper. You can do it.

**gundamaniac** · 03-19-2007, 11:01 AM

Haha, thanks for the encouragement. As soon as I have received all my parts, it's time to get cranking on sanding the portion of the tube I want brass.

**gundamaniac** · 04-02-2007, 09:48 PM

Hm. So tonight I decided to give this thing a go. I used a Dremel with 120 grit paper drums on medium speed; high ate through the layers too quickly and low made the drum skip across the metal...two mistakes I learned the hard way and which left marks on the saber piece. After getting down to the brass layer with the drums, I got to work with 220 grit paper, 320, 400, 800, 1000, then 2000. In about 3 and a half hours from the time I picked up the Dremel to the time I closed up shop 'cuz there wasn't enough daylight to work, I had the brass down to a satisfactory finish. It's not mirror-polished, but pretty damn near it- light brushstroke-like lines can be seen if you tilt the tube at just the right angle, and, as I said, I accidentally scarred the tube a bit when I was learning my way around sanding with a Dremel.

In short, even a saber-noob like me can do this! And I'm one step closer to finally actually finishing a lightsaber project I started

**supertrogdor** · 04-03-2007, 07:17 AM

If you don't mind sharing a progress pic, let us see what you have done, most of us like to see works in progress

**gundamaniac** · 04-03-2007, 07:23 AM

I'll have a pic up by tonight if I can get a chance to snap a picture. If not, it'll definitely be up tomorrow morning; last night I tried to take a picture but camera flash + shiny metal surface don't play well together.

**Dregan** · 04-03-2007, 12:05 PM

So, here's my thought as to how to cheat on this process like a mofo.

If you've read any of my previous posts, you'll know that I am absolutely enamored of my drill press. You could also do this with a lathe or a regular power drill.

Get a chuck large enough to fit your workpiece, or use an inverted chuck (holds the piece from the inside, rather than the outside - I have no clue where to buy one, but you could make one easily, though) from there, you spin your piece on the highest speed setting, and apply the sandpaper and finishing compund in a static motion, letting the drill provide all the motion. If this works, you'll get very even brush strokes, and by varying the pressure and the grit, you could put a mirror finish on a piece.

**gundamaniac** · 04-04-2007, 12:14 AM

Yep. If I had a lathe or some such machinery, I'd stick in the tube and sand/polish it down as you described. But I'm not doing it that way because I don't trust my drill (it's rather old) or the bits to stand up to the pressure I'd be putting on 6-12 inches away from the rotating motor. As such, I'm stuck to doing this by hand =/

And here are pictures:

I essentially took a 1.25" sink tube and sanded part of it. I only need 6 inches of it brass for my handle; the rest will be cut off. In the first picture is a portion of the tube I tested the Dremel sanding drum on and which I didn't sand down with paper. The second picture is of a portion of the tube I sanded down by hand after using the drum, and the third picture is a detail shot of where I stopped sanding. Note the imperfections; I'll be going back with 800 to 2000 grit paper again to try and rid myself of them.

Ryma Mara · 04-04-2007, 01:28 AM

well ya could do something like my brother did.

He made a pice from a section of eletrical conduet, discarder section of polyC blade, long bolt, and a smaller bolt to hold it togeather with a couple nuts on the longer bolt to keep it from spinning around the eletricalC and section of blade.

what we do is we stick it in a drill or somesort then we clamp it down in the bladeholder like one normally would with a setscrew, then we go to town under a sink and some wetsand, sand paper.