Long time lurker and converted MR Duellist making his first MHS with a CF3.1

[Alcfalath]

Hey all,

Im Matt from over in lovely sunny and searing hot Western Australia, in the lovely isolated coastal city of Perth.. Im a member of the 501st Legion Terror Australis Garrison, and I am also a member of the Rebel Legion, to which i am the Temple Master of our Jedi Temple here, as well as my State's Representative.. I costume as Boba Fett, RotS Anakin Skywalker (both Jedi and Sith/Vader), and Im currently building a custom Jedi costume as well, to which ill be needed my new saber for.

Anyways, I'd been hunting down getting a Crystal Focus 3 or better for a very long time and a few months back i finally managed to acquire one. As of today it is also coupled with Erv's CF Power Extender, due to what i plan on doing to the saber...

Basically, Ill be going for a full suite, minus the Accent LEDs... really i dont think i need them, plus it just seems like a little too much hard work and battery drain.. If i could incorporate them and still have a decent battery life i would (or an easy swap out battery system) then perfect, but as it stands that will be a little difficult.

So ill be building up The CF 3.1 and Power Extender with;
- a Lux 5 Kit in Blue (and maybe a green one as well to swap with)
- a secondary LED for the Clash/Flash effect
- a Vibrating Motor for the Clash/Lockup effects
- a TCSS speaker setup that ive been told is perfect
- a powerful enough battery to fit into my hilt (7.2v from what I've seen)
- a Primary On Off Switch and a Momentary for the CF auxilliary functions
- about 5 Quick Release Connectors for the various components
- 2 Corbin Blades, one Double Wrapped and one Quad Wrapped
- a Covertec attachment (ive got a clip waiting for it)
- various MHS parts, and a custom Powdercoat paintjob with them
- Recharge Port (depending on how large the battery capacity is and how long it will last) and kill switch
- a resonance chamber for the speaker to be amped up a bit
- drilled holes for both switches and screws (blade and covertec)

Thats pretty much what Im wanting in general, though the hilt design is going to be a little interesting. Ive been told (and read similar statements in many threads) that if i encorporate a Ribbed section, ill need to have a longer hilt due to nothing really fitting up there.. (thought its where the vibration motor will go) so for the CF, battery and the rest of the electronic Id be needing a nice length of standard Female Extension to cover the majority of it, so what im going for is the MPS4 with the Insert 6 as well, the Female Milled Section (with grips and hopefilly milled dividers as well), a double Male adaptor, a 3 inch female extension, a v grooved ribbed extension, and the LED Emitter number 8, as seen in the attachment below, with a bezel nut over a On/Off red switch, and for the auxilliary the Momentary Guarded Red button Switch.

I have no idea how to make the saber custom painted to what im after from the saber builder, but its a little complicated. Basically, going off the '2' pic attached (with the blade from saberbuilder.com) im after a very similar paintjob to that, but on the ribbed extension, all the black bits are flat solar black, with the silver bits being bronze, as well as a similar setup on the emitter, with the black staying as it is and the 2 small rings either side being bronze, except the wide part just behind the front of the emitter being black as well, leaving the front part (and the lip) being silver. The pommel, and the insert being flat solar black as well. The centre part I am tossing up as a chrome but im not sure on that just yet.... If anyone is able to throw some advice my way on how to make up a saber pic showing those colours that would be great




As it stands, id much rather to have Annodised/Electroplated Yellow Gold/Brass on the saber instead of the bronze powder coat, but i havent seen that option on here, so unfortunately it seems a bit too difficult so i suppose id have to miss out on that until if becomes available.

Anyways, thats enough from me for the moment, and a very long initial post... Id love to hear what you all think.. and any comments and advice would be very warmly welcomed.

Matt

[valeon]

I would like to first say welcome to the forum. You have thought this through very thoroughly, and I think it is gonna turn out great for you.

[Alcfalath]

Cheers Valeon, for the welcome and the compliments. Ive been planning this a long time and its been easier since the upgrade on the MHS builder, and the Saberbuilder too

[Phiily Manyaan]

You might be better off making the female pieces one piece. The male/male connector has a small inside diameter almost as small as the ribbed section. I found this out the hard way :/ A few of the battery packs in the store will fit inside the ribbed and your CF might (I have never seen one in person). I would go with like a 6" or 7" female piece depending on the length your going for.

[Hasid Lafre]

The id is smaller, its like a 1" id.

[Alcfalath]

The way the design needs to be is that the CF needs to be near the bottom of the saber... due to the motion sensor getting the best readings from its waving arc.. The Ribbed section will be where my 'centre of rotation' is, from/where my primary hand grips, so itll have to be further down the hilt..

The main reason for having the male/male adaptor was due to wanting the Female with Milled Grooves for the grip, as i noticed on the forums that Tim said he had some of the dividers left.. a little shorter than the proper length, but I was thinking that might make a little bit of extra character to the saber.. :P Even without the dividers, the milled grooves/slots would add some character on their own, and make lining up the grip rather easy ...

But... If its going to interfere heavily with the saber being put together, then im guessing im going to have to go with something else... :S Oh and im after it not being much longer, its rather long for me now lol considering im used to Anakin RotS Length sabers

How does this sound... taking into account there will most likely be a PVC pipe slide in the hilt for all the electronics at the bottom...speaker attached to battery housing/pack, with about an inch for resonation (im going for a really loud saber).. maybe more.. with the crystal focus board attached to the blade end of the battery pack, pretty much right under the switches, and the vibration motor up in the ribbed section, as well as the wires running up to the Lux 5... For that though im guessing custom work would be needed then? so would you all agree id most likely need a 7 inch Double Female (with custom milled grooves for the grip) that will give me the room for the battery and card, and about 2+ inches for sound resonation?

[Alcfalath]

Well while im awaiting my next pay and birthday monies (assuming ill probably get some :P) to go and order all the bits for my lightsaber, ive decided to go looking for a quick disconnect clip small enough to fit in the hilt but strong enough to withstand duelling.. Until recently i was stuck until today, when i started to look at some Molex ones when i found these..

http://www.molex.com/molex/family/in.../microfit.html

3mm Micro Molex Connectors... and they are nice and small enough to fit into a hilt easily should have them all nice and ready in time for starting the saber work.

Also, I have a question for anyone on here who know... how exactly would I be wiring a clash/flash LED to work with the CF 3.1.. i know how to do it in theory... but actually doing it with a Lux 5 setup i have no idea.. Any help would be awesome

[Alcfalath]

Ouch for Triple Posting... but im going to need some advice on this ammendment to my original scheme...




Ive had a little bit of a work around with my saber colour scheme, to what im mostly after, and im hoping to hear back from any of you to say that its possible.... Im was hoping that there would be a gold equivalent to the
Xtreme Chrome Powder Coat, but I guess since there isnt anything as reflective/shiny gold as what im after, Electroplating/Annodizing would probably have to be the way to go to get that...

So here is the question, does Tim have a Shiney Gold powdercoat paint, or an Electroplating/Annodizing Machine that is capable of making saber parts gold... I know it would be very pricey but im hell bent on this scheme now.. Hopefully someone here can through some advice up...

[Kant Lavar]

Tim's Sun Gold powdercoat is about as close as you'll get, though really it's more yellow than gold.

If you want actual mettalic gold, there's another thread where a new member painted his own saber and did an outstanding job on it. If you get in touch with him, he might be able to point you in the right direction.

Welcome aboard.

[Alcfalath]

Cheers for that.. Id actually been watching that thread waiting to see what was happening with that, and I was greatly surprised Its one way to go for sure

After my recent purchases however, I now have 2 4.1 CF to go with my 3.1.. Hopefully ill get Erv to upgrade that to a 4.1 for me. However in saying that, one of those 4.1's is actually for a saber for someone else, which I have been talked into building for them :P So its now 3 sabers Ill be building.... here is the latest progress on her saber. There will be a quartz crystal in the hilt for hers, with just a single white LED drilled into it from the flat end to illuminate it. Her blade will be a White, so im hanging out for the P4s to come back.


Ive gone into a little bit of a concept change... slightly... but nothing too dramatic, plus i also have another saber hilt design... a few actually.. though the second hilt is going to be a single handed hilt very much likely having a shoto blade that i can swap out for a full one when not dual weilding... Im still tossing up on designs, however a few really have taken my fancy. Here are some possibilities...



If i was to make a second double handed saber id be going for this...


Hopefully soon ill be updating the changes ill be making to my primary hilt, but for now lets just say its something NO ONE has done before... and Im not going to go spoil it just yet :P

Oh... finally got all the gear for the quick disconnects.. damn it got expensive.. though with all the sabers im making now, in the end it will pay off.. enough for 25 quick disconnects averaging about 5 per saber, with some extras for LED swapouts and spare batteries, and it should work out brilliantly

Final Note.. Primary Hilt will be Green... the secondary may be Blue but Im uncertain as of yet..