Simple Lightsaber

Intro: Simple Lightsaber

I've always wanted a custom lightsaber but haven't had the money. this is a relatively cheap way to make an awesome super bright extremely durable lightsaber.

STEP 1: Some of the Parts

It takes 3 leds end to end to make 1 inch. so if you have a 36 inch blade like the one I'm making you'll need about 110 leds give or take a few.
all the parts I use will be in the steps so just see what I'm using and you should be able to find it.

STEP 2: The Blade

the leds need to be wired series to make an even led chain I used a piece of scrap wood to help bend the leds. IT IS VERY IMPORTANT THAT THE LEDS ARE BENT THE EXACT SAME WAY OR IT WON'T LIGHT UP. once all the leds are bent and stringed together you need to add wire so that the current can be distributed evenly. When you have that done you can cut a small strip of packing foam. I got the foam at home depot it's not very expensive. the other film is from a painters tarp you use that to diffuse the leds and make it look like one solid light.

STEP 3: The Handle

I got too into the moment and forgot to take pictures of the building of it. For the main layer of the lightsaber that's going to hold the blade is 1 inch thin wall tubing that I got off an old bike frame. The second layer is 1 1/4 drain pipe. Really you can decorate the outside of the saber however you want I'm not going to go into detail on how I did it because it may not be the same as you. The button is larger than the pipe so a small spacer must be added. The wiring is pretty straight forward just plugging in the wires from the blade to the button and same with the battery. My blade fits extremely tight in the handle so a little epoxy and it should be secure. I made the tip on my lathe, I used nylon but I don't have a step by step process for making it. Lightsaber tips are relatively cheap if you can't make your own.

STEP 4: Optional Step

if you want to add another coolness factor to the saber you could add a crystal. I made the crystal holder from four 1" washers, threaded rod, 4 nylon spacers that go over the threaded rod, brass nuts for the threaded rod, and two steel spacers to hold the crystal. I Tig welded the two spacers on but epoxy would work just fine. I then cut a slot for the wires from the blade to feed through. slots were then cut into the saber to show the crystal. I used a piece of quarts for the crystal but any clear stone can be used.

STEP 5: Finished Saber

I also built a blue one using the same steps.

Comments

[jgagnon1691411]

i cant find the battery holders

[ryanman1717]

Is the blade removable?

[kw94920]

Is this age appropriate for a 6 year old boy. I am his grandmother and don't want either of us to get in trouble "with bosses" Thanks

[-Selfmade-]

Its just LEDs and low voltage, if you can find someone to assemble it for him, it should be ok :)

[ggadget]

How did you attach the tubing to the handle?

[ardrhi]

Is there a particular reason why you used discrete LEDs and not an LED ribbon? That might have saved you some effort and the concern that the LEDs be faced correctly. The LEDs might not be spaced as close together as yours are, but you could use two staggered lengths, or one length doubled back on itself and offset slightly. There's hundreds of types of LED strip lighting out there that could be used. Just one quick search showed one like this: https://www.amazon.com/Sunsbell-Lights-Powered-Wat...

It has RGB LEDs that can be externally controlled to show any color you want, and even display some lighting effects.

[thatguyer]

I've made a few saber blades this way, and there are some useful details that you should mention. First, the LEDs are actually wired in parallel, not in series. Sometimes this can cause a problem when you don't have a current-limiting resistor on each one, but I found that if you buy all the LEDs together they are pretty well matched. Second, it is really, really important to get them all oriented the same way (all the anodes on one side, all the cathodes on the other side). Once you bend the leads it is hard to see which one is longer, so what I did is first put a little mark on the cathode side of all the LEDs with sharpie. Third, you didn't mention how you're powering the blade. The blue LEDs usually pull 20-30mA each at around 3.2V-3.4V. With 110 of them, that's 2-3 amps! I've found that the limiting factor on brightness is the internal resistance of the battery. You can switch to a high-drain 3.7V LiPo battery (like the ones for remote control vehicles) to boost the power. Although the voltage on a LiPo is a little high (especially when fully-charged), there is enough voltage drop along the LED string that it ends up being OK.

Finally, if you want to take this design to the next level, you can wire the LEDs into separate segments and light them up in sequence using a microcontroller. Most microcontrollers cannot provide that kind of power directly through a ping, though, so you need to use a transistor (use a MOSFET) to switch the power.

[tealtutu]

this is so cool

[Leonardo7]

I like the exposed crystal. It's a nice touch.

[ohoilett]

This looks awesome. Good stuff.

[PatrickG34]

The first step towards tackling the sith lords :)