This is Slothsaber #1. The thin neck Obi ANH I did that set me on the path to making lightsabers. I recently finished the ANH Obi Epic Reveal saber, and realized I didn't need two of these, so this one has found a new home.

But before I let it out of the slothcave, I need to improve it. Since it was my first saber, and I didn't really know what I was doing, there's a lot of newbie mistakes in there I am "betterizing." We will replace the battery can, the battery pack, the speaker, the switch, the soundboard, and a few other things.

When I am done it will have a CFv6, hidden recharge and rice ports, pommel cap access to the SD Card, Li-Ion battery pack, better sound.

First off, the batteries. I am switching this from a quad AAA NiMH pack to either a 14650 or 14500 7.4 Li-Ion pack, depending on how deep I can get these clearance channels machined.

These clearance channels allow the wider battery pack to slide into the grenade section. There's about a piece of paper's width of metal between the inside of the channel and the outside V groove of the grenade. I had to be VERY careful here not to break the wall, but still allow enough room to get the battery into it.

The battery pack fits nice and snug, but not too tight.

In the original configuration, I had the soundboard in the grenade section, and three of the four AAA batteries in the rear can, and one in the grenade under the soundboard. This time around, I swapped this, and the pommel cap will be unscrewed to allow access to the SD card on the soundboard in the rear.

That PC1.6 is just hanging out there for layout purposes.

Since my customer for this saber is being very very patient while we work out the details, I decided to use some of the waiting time to improve the back end a bit. I couldn't just allow the pommel cap to reveal a jumble of wires, so there's now a machined inner cap that will have a Micro SD Card slot and domed thumb recess. It's just drawn on there now, but that's the plan.

The back of the cap will be machined out for the CF-LS or CFv6, and a recess machined around the slot like a dome, to let the SD card be clicked out.

Since my speaker is reversed, and located where the booster meets the back of the graflex clamp, to get the wires to come up over the speaker without impacting my seal on the resonance chamber, I have this...

half channel cut into the can, half in the gear piece.

Here I am working out the interlocking pieces that go inside the clamp, and securely hold the grenade section to the rear section. There will be a lot going on in here.

The grenade will be bolted to the aluminum blank, which has been machined to closely fit into the notch I machined in the grenade.

That blank will be machined down to fit inside the aluminum chunk attached to the booster section. These two pieces will hold the activation/aux switch, recharge port and such. I plan to make it easy for the customer to break this down for possible future addition of a bladed/nonbladed emitter setup. Trying to think ahead.

 I'll also allow slots for the recharge port and such, and activation/aux switch.

Lot of machining to do on these pieces, but I have a pretty good plan sketched out.

Did a lot of machining on the middle piece last night. That line going down the middle of the junction block is where the two halves separate...

that smallest diameter piece goes all the way into the core to press the speaker against the back so once it's all bolted together, it will be nice and snug

Next up, machining slots and spaces for recharge port, act/aux switch, wire passages, etc

This site is part of the nonentity network. Not associated with LUCASFILM LTD.™ or any LFL Ltd.™ Film or Franchise.