Page 1 of 2 1 2 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 16

Thread: Kylo Ren Force FX re-do with solid aluminum tube chassis.

  1. #1

    Default Kylo Ren Force FX re-do with solid aluminum tube chassis.

    I have done 2 Kylo Ren conversions of Hasbro sabers. The initial conversions I did used the MHS Version VI 18650 Battery Holder/Chassis. The battery was removeable/replaceable. Shuttling the chassis in and out with the wire cram fu put a lot of pressure on the solder joints and wires, and I was constantly having issues.

    So, I am setting about to re-do both sabers eventually IF this re-do works. For disassembly of the Kylo Saber, I point you to Shameem's thread above.

    I found some 1" inside diameter aluminum pipe. I am going to have the front end milled down to match the TCSS conversion kit, so that it fits completely into the Saber head. The pipe will act as a blade holder, and chassis system. It will be all one piece from stem to stern. The Saber Outer will slide up over the pipe chassis, and will then use hidden set screws to secure into the top saber head and chassis. The bottom can be removed for battery swaps and changing files on the micro sd card. Because this will be a solid chassis, there will be no wire cram fu, nor when you take the saber apart to change the batteries, the wires all remain in the place I put them in the first place.

    First off: This hilt can be simply modded with TCSS conversion kit, and better in-hilt LED's, V6 Chassis, and a recharge port, and be a pretty solid saber for cosplay. I do have my other saber that is working for me right now for my Kylo Ren duties in the 501st, and I want to make this one more durable. That is why I'm doing this. Certainly, I'd probably be better off just buying one of the new Korbanth Kylo Sabers from TCSS, because its a ready to install hilt designed for durability, like all other Korbanth kits. But, its not out yet.

    It will probably take me quite awhile to finish this project, and I won't really begin to get serious until after I finish my MPP. But I have been brainstorming how to pull this chassis off.

    First off, how do I mount my main blade LED in the 1" ID tube? I will be using 1" TCSS Heatsink Modules. How do I get the wires from the side emitters into the tube? Holes. Same for switches and switch wires. I have 2 illuminated 12mm switches in this saber. They are both mounted in the upper head of the saber, near the faux toggle.

    How are you going to change batteries? Remove the lower portion of the saber, and the 26650 will swap out. I will also have a recharge port connected to the battery sled connections, so that in-hilt recharging is the normal method of charging. Where do I mount my speaker? Machining out the inside of the aluminum tube so that the speaker fits in there, and the old faux hilt electronic piece aft of the speaker will go right on the tube, its the same outside diameter.

    This method does require some machining, cutting, and drilling of the aluminum tube so that I have ways to secure my blade, secure my LED Module on main blade, and to secure the tube into the saber head. Blade retention will begin that melding of the tube chassis and the upper head assembly. I will have to do a cutout for my soundboard as well, and I don't think there is any room left for a crystal chamber, because the 26650 I'm using precludes placing the board and battery in the same location. The Board will be aft of the battery, with SD card facing aft.

    Here is a rough mock-up, brainstorm of a portion of the tube chassis. I was just seeing if the battery would fit into the tube, and still give me enough clearance for the holder, and the wires to go past it.

    Speaker does fit in the tube chassis!


    Battery does fit in the tube chassis, although it will need to be further modified to fit the holder:


    Faux electronics exposed in pommel aft of speaker is the same diameter as chassis tube! I just have to cut in a channel for my accent LED wires that I have in that part of the pommel:


    So, from what I gather today from this "brainstorming"...more like pea brain storming. I think this is possible. When I finish my MPP I aim to complete this mission! Why the 26650 battery? Kylo eats batteries for breakfast, its a 3 blade saber, and I'm making it worse. I'm using an X4 Quad Cree in main blade: dR,dR, R, W. Tri Crees: dR, dR, W in quillions. I will only wire one dR LED in side emitters, but white in both side emitters and main blade will be parallel to FOC pad. So, I'll have the ability through the board I'm using to adjust the side blade brightness, and how much red mixes into the deep red on the main blade. I can either run plain red single blade, DR,DR,R with full side emitters and FOC, or a mix of some of that all to save energy. But if I choose to have them running at power, I think I have more sufficient mAh to cope with the draw.

    If this does work, I may dismantle my other Hasbro Kylo and upgrade to neopixel strip blades with the same battery setup. So this saber is currently the crash test dummy for future project on my other Hasbro. My issue is that I must always have one Kylo Saber working at all times, because I'm a 501 Kylo, and need a working saber for troops. My goal is to make them better, brighter, and more durable. My sabers were already pretty darn good, I want to make them better. With that being said; these sabers are not really designed to do what I'm doing to them, and the better future answer will probably be the new Korbanth run. I'm off!

    Tom
    Last edited by Tom Tilmon; 08-04-2017 at 03:13 PM. Reason: fix link

    "Mistakes are our greatest teacher."

  2. #2

    Default

    Cool idea. Don't forget to shield your electronics, since your chassis will conduct electricity.

  3. #3

    Default

    Yes, t-8 is my friend. In my current configuration, its the same problem, because the hilt is all aluminum with no insulation on the inside. So it is shielded with T-8. I will be doing the same here, where wires are routed, there will be T-8. If I don't have room for t_8, like going past the battery, I'll use shrink around bundles as an extra insulator. The project has begun, and I cannot finish this soon enough. My "working" Kylo saber had 2 broken solder joints after troop yesterday. Today I'm fixing those solder joints, again. This is non-sustainable, and is a direct result of how the sabers were modded initially. Shuttling chassis in and out to swap out batteries every time is inherently stressful on the solder joints, even with wires solidified where they go into the chassis. I am hoping that this solution solves all of that, if I can get it to work out, both of my "working" Kylo sabers that I need for my 501 troops will be modified in this manner. Now, to go fix my working Kylo saber AGAIN, and hopefully I can finish the new chassis soon to end this mess.

    Tom

    "Mistakes are our greatest teacher."

  4. #4

    Default

    Here is a working mock-up of the aluminum chassis tube. The outer hilt, lower section will slide off the chassis tube, allowing or battery changes. I just have to figure out what I am doing with the red wire during separation. I think I have a solution for that, and that will be a small solution. This makes the modified BS much more solid, and easier to change batteries than the TCSS Speaker Holder VI. Plus, it keeps my wires in place, and removing the hilt never moves my wires. This way, I hope to completely eliminate wire strain, while increasing saber endurance with the 26650 battery. However, even when the 26650 battery goes dead, I can swap by removing 2 8-32 set screws that hold the lower hilt onto the saber head, slide it off, and what you see in the picture below is what you will see. It is the solid state aluminum chassis tube contained within the BS Hilt. I am not using S2 in this saber, just laid the board there to show where my board would be. The board is just sitting on top of aluminum chassis tube.



    Tom

    "Mistakes are our greatest teacher."

  5. #5

    Default

    In the chat board, a discussion came up about battery sizes, and batteries to power string blades. One of the reasons I did this tube chassis on Kylo Saber 2, is because I may eventually turn Kylo Saber 1 into a string blade saber with Prism 5.1. The 18650s just won't cut running the string blades in main/side emitters and last very long, so I needed a new battery solution. Normal in hilt LED's were eating 18650s for breakfast. Changing batteries caused wiring issues, and I needed a more solid plan. Thus, I did the aluminum tube chassis, which is my blade holder, chassis, battery holder, and board holder. It will remain solidly attached into the head of the saber, and the lower hilt slides off like you see here for battery changes. No more cram fu, no more shuttling chassis in and out. Well, knowing I needed 26650 solution for future neopixel Kylo design, I decided to go ahead and test out my idea on this saber, which will retain standard in hilt LEDs. So far, my idea seems solid, although my machining methods on the aluminum pipe, not so much....but it works. Here are some side by side comparison photos of the 18650 and 26650 batteries, and I have also included photos of them in comparison to my Black Series Kylo Hilt, and in a standard The Custom Saber Shop main body, so you can see their size, and that they will work in TCSS MHS V1 bodies. I believe that 26 stands for 26mm in diameter, as the 18650 is 18 mm in diameter. They are both the same length. Here you go:
    Side by side

    Near my Kylo Hilt, and in my new pipe chassis:

    In MHS Main Body

    Looking down the tube, you can see you do have clearance past battery for wires, plenty of clearance. Now, to engineer a sled that works for this, if there isn't already one somewhere.


    Tom
    Last edited by Tom Tilmon; 09-02-2017 at 02:18 PM. Reason: added right MHS photo

    "Mistakes are our greatest teacher."

  6. #6

    Default

    Hi Tom,

    All your threads are pretty interesting and informative.

    I recently picked up a black series kylo ren, and I am hoping to convert it. Unfortunatly the shop is out of the kits. It looks like it would be a good hilt to try a crystal reveal on.

    How do you plan on tying in the aluminum chassis to the top part?
    What is the ID of that tube? I can try and design a sled for the battery and prizm for you in tinkercad/fusion360. It would benefit me in the future.

    I want to try a 26650 now, 18650's are like appetizers to a hungry neopixel blade.

  7. #7

    Default

    The ID is One inch exactly, thus it works as a blade holder/accepts the 1" TCSS LED module. I tied it into the saber head with set screws. I'll take photos of those set screws. I have 4 and a blade retention screw. 2 are hidden beneath the plastic piece. 2 on the side, and the blade retention screw up near the main emitter. Its already tied in. It would be better if I could mill down the very top of the tube like the TCSS adapter, so that it would seat all the way in the saber. I bought a milling bit, and tried that on the drill press, and it was a disaster. So, I'm just pushing the aluminum pipe up in the saber head as far as it can go, and securing it with the 8-32 set screws I drilled and tapped for. I'll try and take better photos of how I did it. Also, I've already tested the 1" LED modules and blade in there with the blade retention screw and it works. The lower hilt secures into the upper section with 2 8-32 retention screws where the small flat head screws used to go in the side. I drilled and tapped them out for 8-32 with the lower in place. That connection is solid, and back out 2 set screws for battery changes.

    The only thing I have left to do to finish this mod is get another dR,dR, W tri cree star for a side emitter, cut out a space for the board, and wire my saber up, and its done. All the machining/engineering is done. It is ready to roll right now if I had the LED. Waiting on my next paycheck, because I have a fairly large order to make (building 3 graflexes for Christmas/TLJ/etc.) that I intend on selling to fund my hobby builds. I really want to get into more compact MHS builds and get better at the smaller switches. I am very good with soldering/wiring planning. I am very weak at machining my own stuff out, mainly because I don't have the proper tools.

    If you can figure out a sled for the 26650 for standard MHS V1 and prism, you'd probably make a mint selling that design on shapeways when all the looneys (including me) start building neopixel sabers.

    PS, lots of room for a crystal chamber in saber head. Jedi Jordan used to do a lot of those, and left the plastic piece off the saber to reveal the chamber. That won't work for me, as I have to keep the thing looking as close to "film accurate" as possible for 501st gigs. With that being said, some of the stuff I have on my sabers is already frowned upon, accent LED's, EL Wire....hahahaha.

    Tom
    Last edited by Tom Tilmon; 09-02-2017 at 06:36 PM.

    "Mistakes are our greatest teacher."

  8. #8

    Default

    Sounds like you just made it work with the set screws. I never thought about using it as a blade holder too. This is now coming together in my head. In theory, those milling bits seems like a great idea, in practice, not so much. Dremel and files is better. Even a dremel can go from awesome to disaster with one false move. Beware of the kickback.

    Yes the screen accurate guys get a bit picky. I can understand why.

    In my mind the Hasbro Black KR is the furthest saber yet from screen accurate. The paint is too bright, and the handle seems too thick. But it is a beast, it will be heavy once you have all the chassis and battery in there. You'll need to pass it around and see the reaction faces.

    I liked that EL wire idea so much, I bought some for myself, but the transformer makes a high pitched squeel that is bothersome.

  9. #9

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Whosle View Post

    I liked that EL wire idea so much, I bought some for myself, but the transformer makes a high pitched squeel that is bothersome.
    Ha! I'm deaf from playing bagpipes, can't hear it. Here are some pictures, yes just set screws holding it in.

    Blade Retention

    Side view of 8-32 set screw. The one that is in the old flat head hole holds the lower hilt on then it is in place. So there are 2 on each side. One secures the tube chassis, the other the lower hilt.

    Looking down the tube chassis you can see my set screw coming through that is for blade retention.

    Thing with enhanced red 1" blade in the tube chassis:

    totality:


    So, that is basically my plan. Look, these things are beasts, I'm a big guy, scale-wise they work for me. I can wrap my hands around them. I have re-painted them, and weathered them. They look good, when they're together. The 1" modules fit nice in there and my side emitters. Of course the side emitters needed dremel work to get to 1". I am ready to re-assemble. I just need my next paycheck to order parts. Hope this helps you.

    Tom

    "Mistakes are our greatest teacher."

  10. #10

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •