So it's been a while since I've visited the awesome (and costly) hobby of saber building, but I thought I'd dive back into it now that I'm done with school and have gotten past the adult life's "tutorial level." I challenged myself somewhat for this build, trying to keep cost down as much as possible by implementing various items I already owned into the build. The biggest of these challenges was to get all the electronics to fit within 5" of length! Sure there were a few things I could have done better, but considering the gap in time from the last time I built a saber, I'm pretty happy with how this turned out. So, let's dive into what this thing is made of:

Saber_1.jpg Saber_2.jpg

HILT (top to bottom):
- Thin walled Trans White PolyC w/ clear 1" thin walled blade tip
- Aluminum Bladeholder I designed in CAD to slip over sink tube (machined by TCS, all holes post-machined)
- 1.25" dia. sink tube [owned]
- 1.5" heat shrink grip w/ electrical tape sections for more gripiness
- Aluminum pommel link I designed in CAD to slip over sink tube (machined by TCS, all holes post-machined)
- Bull horn from [broken] antique display [owned]
- horn is connected via wood dowel that's been sanded, drilled, varnished, then pinned into place w/ 1/8" brass pins [owned]
- 8-32 x 3/8" Black Acetal thumb screw
- 8-32 x 1/4" black button head screw

Saber_3.jpg Saber_4.jpg

ELECTRONICS:
- 8.7 deg Collimator Lens w/ holder [owned]
- SPST momentary tactile switch
- Red Orange Cree XP-E2 w/ thermal tape pad
- Heat Sink: MHS Aluminum Chassis discs styles 1 & 2 sanded to fit dia. w/ thermal paste in between
- Nano Biscotte v3 [owned]
- (2) 1N4001 diodes
- Resistor: 3.3 ohm rated for 5W
- 4 AAA battery holder w/ (4) NiMH AAA batteries rated for 1.2V & 1000 mAh
- Premium 28mm Speaker [owned]
- ABS Plastic made into discs to hold electronics in place [owned]
- Time and Effort [inherently owned]

I already hear people saying, "the resistor setting isn't as optimum as it could be, as you're not driving the LED to 1000 mA." You're not wrong, and this was an intentional design characteristic because
a) It allows for the option to drive the LED at 6V with conventional alkaline AAA's for some ridiculicious brightness and AAA's a very readily available everywhere
b) The rechargeable solution, when under-driven, offers far greater longevity. Initially, I overestimated conventional AAA's vs the Nano's/LED's current draw demands. Li-Ion packs would have been a good solution, but I was pressed for time. Plus, even at roughly 650 mA, you still get a decent brightness of LED; it still lights up a 20'x30' room easily.

This was really fun to build and in the end I almost didn't want to give it to my friend! I gave it to him all the same, and after we saw Episode VIII too, and he was stupidly happy with it!

Hope to get another chance to build again, thank you all the forum reads that made this possible!