Well, it had to happen eventually - when my son and I were doing some light dueling with our stock 2003 MR Darth Vader the blade snapped. It looks like it broke just inside the hilt.

Although the outer plastic broke, all of the LEDs and the rest of the guts (diffuser?) are still intact. My thinking is to try to keep the existing guts (rather than changing to a single LED) so that I cab retain the on/off effect if, at least until we bust a few of the LEDs on the strip!

What do you guys think about just sliding off the old outer blade and then sliding a new polycarbonate blade over the existing stock blade guts? If this is feasible, which TCSS one should I buy? I'm guessing 1". It seems that thick-walled would offer better sturdiness, but I don't know if the stock blade guts would fit into the 1" replacement blade.

If that's not feasible, I can move toward trying to convert it to a single LED, but the Vader conversion kits are out of stock right now...

Thanks for any help! I'm brand new to fixing/converting sabers, but am trying to learn!