My First MHS Saber

[Darth Demens]

Well, I've got a couple of MR sabers around, but finally decided to go all out and try and make my own custom one.

I'm planning on doing the saber in 3 separate phases, mostly due to financial constraints.

Phase 1: Hilt (from left to right)

Blade Holder Style 4 - wet black
Hilt Style 3 - wet black
MHS Extension V Grooved - wet black, except on the peaks of the grooves
Double Ended Male Threaded Connector - wet black
MHS Extension V Grooved - wet black, except on the peaks of the grooves
Hilt Style 3 - wet black
Blade Holder Style 4 - wet black

Momentary Guarded switch on both hilts, and Red O-Rings in each of the Hilt Grooves.



Possible changes:
Change BH Style 4 for BH Style 10, depending on decision of LED vs EL.
Remove Red O-Rings, allow hilt powdercoating to leave the chrome color in the grooves of hilt.



Phase 2: Blade
I know I want Red blades, but I'm not sure whats better, the EL or the LED. Does anyone have some pictures of the blades that I can compare to see how they look differently?

Phase 3: Sound
More Research needed before I'm confident enough to try and get this working.

[LordMasoch]

check out some of the other threads around. In general EL gives a more evenly lit blade, whereas LED is brighter, but the blade "flares."

[swear000]

looks nice. Red LED will probably be best. Check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piPpiAJeaXI

I would like to do a couple mauls as well but they are much more difficult to plan. Your ideas look great tho.

[Malaki Skywalker]

whereas LED is brighter, but the blade "flares."

That is not all true, an Ultra blade and Erv' style blade are both evenly lit.

EL is old tech, it can also be damaged in dueling, its very very dim and their really isn't any sound options for it. So LED is the best set up by far, especially with the Crystal Focus

[Darth Demens]

Ok, so I ordered the parts I needed for my hilt. I think I may have failed to read enough of the tutorials in advance, because I'm not sure I ordered all the machining that I'd need.

Is there any way to hold the blade into the hilt without having a thumbscrew clamp on it? I'd like to keep the hilt as streamlined as possible, and an extraneous clamp would kind of throw that off. Maybe a plumbers clamp around the blade inside of the Blade holder to keep it from sliding out or something?

Edit:
Also, I'm looking at maybe trying to do a magnetic lock in the pommel, something that would allow me to clamp the hilts together if I want to use it as a staff, but would allow me to "break" the lightsaber (a la Maul v. Kenobi in ep. 1) and use it as two individual blades. Has anyone tried this before? I couldn't find any posts on it, but I fear my search-fu may be weak after my tutorial failures earlier.

[Darcy666]

I am yet to build my first hilt, however I have read that if one does not want anything pertruding from the hilt, it's best to use the setscrews that are available in the shop for blade retention screws. As for magnetically locking the two sabers together, I believe there really hasn't been much luck in that area. Anyone can feel free to shoot down my points if need be.

[Sairon]

Darcy are you using sound because if you are you may need to change your witches to latching because MRs don't use momentaries. also ife your are doing sound if you have a dremel, cut small cuts in the valley of the ribbed section and then put you speaker in the middle of them. lastly have you seen corbin das double edeged conector for his double saber, I think it would go good with this saber, I'll try and find the movie

edit: here it is http://tw.youtube.com/watch?v=piPpiAJeaXI if you could Tim to custom make the needed parts then you would have a very good connector!

[Phiily Manyaan]

Ok, so I ordered the parts I needed for my hilt. I think I may have failed to read enough of the tutorials in advance, because I'm not sure I ordered all the machining that I'd need.

Is there any way to hold the blade into the hilt without having a thumbscrew clamp on it? I'd like to keep the hilt as streamlined as possible, and an extraneous clamp would kind of throw that off. Maybe a plumbers clamp around the blade inside of the Blade holder to keep it from sliding out or something?

Edit:
Also, I'm looking at maybe trying to do a magnetic lock in the pommel, something that would allow me to clamp the hilts together if I want to use it as a staff, but would allow me to "break" the lightsaber (a la Maul v. Kenobi in ep. 1) and use it as two individual blades. Has anyone tried this before? I couldn't find any posts on it, but I fear my search-fu may be weak after my tutorial failures earlier.

You need a thumbscrew, there are no "clamps" involved. You can get headless screws in the TCSS store that you tighten with an allen key that you keep with you.

[annon]

this is the only magnetic coupler I've ever seen
http://www.parksabers.com/inertia.html
I've never held one in my hands, so I can't tell you how well it works. It looks cool though.

[Anavrin]

this is the only magnetic coupler I've ever seen
http://www.parksabers.com/inertia.html
I've never held one in my hands, so I can't tell you how well it works. It looks cool though.

EltonTheVentrue at the *cough* er, currently defunct NYJedi forum (the group is still good! We exist!) has a magnetic locking system. I can ping him if you'd like to know how he got his. It works very well, actually. Except how he made his to hide the magnets completely causes an amusing sound effect when they separate (though the audience can't usually hear) which has led to the occasional use of the phrase "Jedi go 'pop!'"