Keeping the tip on

[Novastar]

CERTAINLY not for "a living", but... I suppose I could say that I never make, buy, build nor repair/modify a saber that is meant to "be looked at", or as Cameron from Ferris Bueller says "all he does is sit and stare at it and rubs it with a diaper"...

Arkai! You're ALL kinds of cool for trying the heatshrink on the tips... wow, it looks great since I imagine it's just like the clear tape I use: near IMPOSSIBLE to detect unless you're in extreme close-up, the saber is still... or you're looking for it. Neophyl and I were talking about getting some, but... AWESOME!! That made my night, heheh

All these b-day parties are enough to make my tips INSANE, heheheheh. I'll have to take a hint and hope my tips trouble me no more...

[gundamaniac]

Wow, that heatshrink is so clean. I've tried the packing tape solution, and my only complaint with it is how messy the tape looks on the hemi-sphere tip portion of the blade. That heatshrink just fits and works. I need to get my hands on some of that stuff....

[ArkaiHalon]

The heatshrink is an idea I got from Xwingband. He mentioned it in passing many moons ago. it works GREAT, conforms perfectly, and as Nova points out is almost invisible when it's lit up.

[Matt Thorn]

So, where do you get the heatshrink?

[Goodman]

Seconded on the request for where to find the heatshrink. I've looked locally, but no one has anything that large, let alone clear.

Thanks in advance --this looks like a great solution for heavy duelists!

[Jedi-Loreen]

My local electronics store carries it, but only in a 3 or 4 ft section and it's kind of expensive for that size. I never got any, because I'd only need a few inches for my two battle blades, but I did look for it, to see if they carried it.

Mine isn't a chain store, and they aren't online though.

[ArkaiHalon]

It's location is a closely guarded Halon family secret. Perhaps we can convince Tim to stock it in the store.

[gundamaniac]

Well I just got myself some heatshrink and applied it twice...I removed my first application because I wasn't satisfied and the second time around I pretty much duplicated Arkai's heatshrink setup. It's not quite invisible; it looks like you have a bit of a rubber cap on the end, but I was expecting that. It lights up nicely though, and it certainly looks much cleaner than packaging tape. I figure no point taking pictures because they'll just be a green version of Arkai's pics.

I guess we'll see how this stuff holds up after a couple sessions with Novastar...

I wonder though, what would happen if the entire blade was covered in this stuff. Would the rubbery heatshrink rip and stuff and ruin the look of the blade?...would it absorb shock from hits thanks to it being sort of soft? You definitely wouldn't have the "rubber-cap-on-the-tip" look if you cover the entirety of the blade in the stuff...but I wonder what the disadvantages would be...

[Jedi-Loreen]

It's probably going to dent, rip, get cut, and generally look crappy in a short period of time, if you used it on the whole blade that you fight with.

[gundamaniac]

That's pretty much what I expected would happen. As is I'm not too sure about how it'll perform on the blade tip...I guess we'll see...