An argument for DAY BLADES

[The Sweatshop]

I would like to spark a healthy discussion with those who particularly like FX saber builds, and also those who prize accuracy above all else.

I do know that a lot of the differences between clear, trans white, and colored day blades has a lot to do with personal preference. But I hope to convert as many over to team day blade as possible, if only to serve my own selfish desires of showing a demand for them so that more options are available from saber parts manufacturers.

-

Let’s start with the name and intended benefit of using a colored day blade. Duh, You can see the color of the blade during the day, or under bright lights. Why would I want to have my blade white when out during conventions or just out in the yard slapping sabers around the front yard? I wouldn’t in pretty much every case and I will continue to point out why IMO it’s not desirable.

Now let’s go with the benefit of white blades. They are believed to show the rgb lights better. I will try and find the YouTube video. Awhile back I had seen the difference between neopixel blade in a white vs colored blade, and guess what! The color still shines through. And reads whatever color your have it set to.

I’ll post more tomorrow but it’s past late and I’d like to throw it on the site to see what people start saying. Anyways here are some pictures to make you think if without powered if the saber would benefit from a white blade

 

[Psab keel]

I still use In Hilt LEDs and Nylon 6/6 blades. Neopixel is cool and all but I don't need 50 colors, and 50 sound fonts for a single saber. With that kind of variety there's no reason to own more than one lightsaber prop, imo.

 

[The Sweatshop]

I still use In Hilt LEDs and Nylon 6/6 blades.

I saw your post pre edit so I’ll ask my initial question. Why do you still use in hilt LEDs and Nylon 6/6 blades, is it what you prefer or what you currently have? Also I’m not familiar with Nylon 6/6 blades, at least in those terms. Do they come in colors and if so, do you have colored ones?

Post edit statement: I’m glad you specifically brought this up because I wanted to touch on this in my initial post but I got sleepy, anyways.

Neopixel is cool and all but I don't need 50 colors, and 50 sound fonts for a single saber. With that kind of variety there's no reason to own more than one lightsaber prop, imo.

MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY, mostly. Personally I love the functionality of the current soundboards and neopixel tech and want it to continue to advance. But I also don’t want multiple colors or sound fonts not related to the character on a specific characters saber. The furthest I’d go is putting Old Ben colors and sound fonts on an Ep.3 Obiwan Hilt. It’s sacrilegious to implement every Sith and Jedi combination just because “you can”. This all leads into my overly strong opinion on the day blade topic. I’ll use Vader’s saber as example, if the blade is in hilt, regardless if it’s on a shelf or in my hands, that means it’s on display, on display for my eyes or anyone else’s, and I can’t see any reason why the blade ignited or not should ever be white.

I’m stealing images from google to compare. Which ones look better in your opinion?

I think it’s funny that Disneyland Darth Vader uses day blades but they don’t sell a hilt with them.

 

[Psab keel]

I'm all for day blades. When I was making lightsabers as a kid I would roll up construction paper into tubes and I didn't choose white for the blade portion. It was blue or green like Luke's lightsabers.

Neopixel is cool and all, but for the above mentioned reasons I never got into it. I was one of the early adopters of the LED tech (Luxeon Star LED's) back in 2003 when I built my first blade with one. I'd been experimenting with small LED's as far back as 2001 before the Luxeons came on the market so when they did I was primed to get a few. My blade design was eventually perfected by Corbin Das' blade film a year or so later. That's a whole story unto itself.

I much prefer the in Hilt LED's because I know that tech well and I prefer the simpler designed soundboards. I want realism but I don't need a lot of frills. Fewer features means fewer things to worry about breaking/ fixing. Plus I like not having to worry about replacing an expensive neopixel blade when I can put one of my own together for a fraction of the cost. I also abandoned polycarbonate for blade tubing about 12 years ago too. Polycarbonate is a good material, but even the translucent white blades with blade film in them is too transparent for my tastes. Hyperdyne Labs first used Nylon 6/6 tubing for his Hyperblade sabers which was a string blade of LED's and another member of TCSSS forums (X-Wingband) did some experiments with the same tubing but for use with Luxeon tech and his blade looked great. I think the opacity of the Nylon 6/6 diffuses the light better because you can't see through it. You just add clear blade film inside and it lights up very evenly, glowing from the edge of the tubing. The polycarbonate still looks like a light in a tube to me, despite adding diffusion.

Keep in mind now, Nylon 6/6 is extruded too. NOT the brittle cast Nylon. Nylon 6/6. It's opaque, milky white, and it's just as durable as polycarbonate for dueling. I beat the living tar out of one of the tubes to test it's durability. Not only does it have great impact resistance, but it has great tensile strength which means it will bend before it breaks. The other advantage over polycarbonate is that it has a matte finish so that it doesn't reflect the ambient lights in the room. Even the transluscent white polycarbonate has a shiny surface which will reflect other light. Plus the Nylon 6/6 doesn't scuff the way polycarbonate does because it has excellent abrasion resistance, so no unsightly blemishes on your blade after being used. If you duel with your polycarbonate blades you'll get scuff marks all over it which ruins the look.

The disadvantages to the Nylon 6/6 is that the tubes might have a very sight curvature to them depending on how they're stored. It's minor but they aren't 100% straight all the time. They don't look like a katana or anything, but the curvature can happen sometime. They also break down in direct sunlight if overexposed to it for prolonged periods. Though you'd have to have it on display in the sun every day for a while for this to happen, and it's not so much of a concern for me because I store my sabers in cases and use them in the dark. They also have a tendency to yellow too, but this doesn't effect the color of the LED when the blade is lit up. I suppose it might if your blade yellows considerably, but on average it has no ill effects on the overall look. You can remove some of that yellowing with cleaners too.

One of these days when I get back into installing sabers I'll make a video. Below is the video that inspired me to trying the Nylon 6/6 for the blades.

 

[GreyGuard38]

I've read that the Neopixel blades are not as durable for dueling, if that's something you want to do a lot of. If you get the fancy day blades shown in the first post, I strongly recommend NOT dueling with them, due to the points- those would be very hazardous even if just playing around with someone else.

 

[The Sweatshop]

I'm all for day blades. When I was making lightsabers as a kid I would roll up construction paper into tubes and I didn't choose white for the blade portion. It was blue or green like Luke's lightsabers.

Neopixel is cool and all, but for the above mentioned reasons I never got into it. I was one of the early adopters of the LED tech (Luxeon Star LED's) back in 2003 when I built my first blade with one. I'd been experimenting with small LED's as far back as 2001 before the Luxeons came on the market so when they did I was primed to get a few. My blade design was eventually perfected by Corbin Das' blade film a year or so later. That's a whole story unto itself.

I much prefer the in Hilt LED's because I know that tech well and I prefer the simpler designed soundboards. I want realism but I don't need a lot of frills. Fewer features means fewer things to worry about breaking/ fixing. Plus I like not having to worry about replacing an expensive neopixel blade when I can put one of my own together for a fraction of the cost. I also abandoned polycarbonate for blade tubing about 12 years ago too. Polycarbonate is a good material, but even the translucent white blades with blade film in them is too transparent for my tastes. Hyperdyne Labs first used Nylon 6/6 tubing for his Hyperblade sabers which was a string blade of LED's and another member of TCSSS forums (X-Wingband) did some experiments with the same tubing but for use with Luxeon tech and his blade looked great. I think the opacity of the Nylon 6/6 diffuses the light better because you can't see through it. You just add clear blade film inside and it lights up very evenly, glowing from the edge of the tubing. The polycarbonate still looks like a light in a tube to me, despite adding diffusion.

Keep in mind now, Nylon 6/6 is extruded too. NOT the brittle cast Nylon. Nylon 6/6. It's opaque, milky white, and it's just as durable as polycarbonate for dueling. I beat the living tar out of one of the tubes to test it's durability. Not only does it have great impact resistance, but it has great tensile strength which means it will bend before it breaks. The other advantage over polycarbonate is that it has a matte finish so that it doesn't reflect the ambient lights in the room. Even the transluscent white polycarbonate has a shiny surface which will reflect other light. Plus the Nylon 6/6 doesn't scuff the way polycarbonate does because it has excellent abrasion resistance, so no unsightly blemishes on your blade after being used. If you duel with your polycarbonate blades you'll get scuff marks all over it which ruins the look.

The disadvantages to the Nylon 6/6 is that the tubes might have a very sight curvature to them depending on how they're stored. It's minor but they aren't 100% straight all the time. They don't look like a katana or anything, but the curvature can happen sometime. They also break down in direct sunlight if overexposed to it for prolonged periods. Though you'd have to have it on display in the sun every day for a while for this to happen, and it's not so much of a concern for me because I store my sabers in cases and use them in the dark. They also have a tendency to yellow too, but this doesn't effect the color of the LED when the blade is lit up. I suppose it might if your blade yellows considerably, but on average it has no ill effects on the overall look. You can remove some of that yellowing with cleaners too.

One of these days when I get back into installing sabers I'll make a video. Below is the video that inspired me to trying the Nylon 6/6 for the blades.

Without having ever had a nylon blade in hand, do you think extra steps could be taken to achieve nylon look on polycarbonate? I already sand the insides of my blades to aid in diffusion, but I never thought of sanding the outside to get a matte finish, I may need to experiment. One neopixel feature that had me forever on that team was the ignition animation, It’s too real to me, I love it. I couldn’t look at in hilt leds the same anymore, felt too much like a flashlight, lost a bit of magic in a sense, though I do dislike it a lot if the neopixels aren’t densely arranged, like most official licensed sabers skimp out on the density and you can pretty much see individual leds.

I've read that the Neopixel blades are not as durable for dueling, if that's something you want to do a lot of. If you get the fancy day blades shown in the first post, I strongly recommend NOT dueling with them, due to the points- those would be very hazardous even if just playing around with someone else.

Yeah I do know about durability aspect, but as far as points, I prefer the bullet tips offer by The Custom Saber Shop

On a side note, I do respect the Saber Legions rules for blades for heavy dueling. I don’t remember off hand if day blades are allowed, but I do know they have to have in hilt LEDs, thick walled blades and round mirrored tips. I would like to have a dueling hilt in this configuration for sport, not like my display/cosplay hilts.

 

[13doctorwho]

Everyone has there opinion, of course. Personally I think day blades make it look too much like a toy. The other reason is if you have the ignition effect it looks better in a polycarbonate blade. Again, just my opinion.

 

[Psab keel]

The major advantage to the neopixel, without question, is the scrolling effect which simply can't be replicated with the in-hilt LED sabers as of yet. Though there is a maker out there who has been experimenting with a flexible plastic that can unroll with the use of a small motor to achieve this feature and he did it a few years before Disney released footage of their version. For our purposes though, the in-hilt LED's as they are currently don't have the scroll effect and neopixel wins on that front, hands down.

You can sand the outside of a polycarbonate blade to eliminate the gloss finish and give it a satin or matte finish. The issue is that if you duel with it, it will scuff, leaving unsightly marks behind which may show up as splotch marks when illuminated. I know from experience as I dueled with my polycarbonate blades extensively years ago. The Nylon 6/6 doesn't have this problem. While I didn't break the polycarbonate blades under normal use, I did do stress tests and under extreme duress it will crack or shatter, though that was an extreme case. Then again this is the same material used for police riot shields and bullet proof glass so that's to be expected. It just doesn't shatter like glass, which is helpful for our needs.

I've never been a fan of the thick walled blades. I know some people swear by them, but they don't illuminate as brightly as the thin walled and in my experience they have more of a tendency to crack than the thin walled blades because they're more rigid. The thin wall can take a fair amount of abuse and retains the flexibility that the thick walled blades don't. Just like a properly made sword is tempered to allow it to flex, that acts as a shock absorber, otherwise the blade would be brittle and shatter on impact. The other pet peeve I have is that so many people have this tendency to overtly abuse their blades to show off their durability when you can have a great sparring session without it turning to a pissing match to break the other guy's blade. It's ridiculous and wasteful and I don't understand what's the appeal. I did the abuse test once or twice with scrap material to have firsthand knowledge of what was possible, but there are way too many videos out there of people taking their expensive lightsabers and smashing them against trees and then acting surprised when they break. Yeah idiot, of course it will break.

Real sword fights are more than just smashing two sharp edges together which is something a real swordsman wouldn't do unless left with no other choice, and most of their blows are parried, if the blades even make contact at all, with the flat. While the duels in the films are carefully choreographed, they too perpetuate some of the same tropes that have plagued Hollywood since the invention of motion pictures and reinforce a total misunderstanding of historical sword fights and Western martial combat. I digress. Ultimately if you're not looking to break your in hilt LED blades I think a thin wall blade will suffice for most uses. Thick walled are a good option if that's your thing, but I think it's overkill personally and unless you're the type that doesn't know your own strength, smashing them as hard as you can isn't dueling, it's just abuse. I can't think of any other type of prop that gets this kind of mistreatment.

We spend so much time, money, and energy on these props that we love so much and what do we do with them? Let's see if we can break 'em! Yeah, real smart. The simple answer is that everything can be broken if put under enough strain. Everything. Nothing is indestructible.

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

Blades are like shoes, some you wear for durability, some you wear for performance, and some you wear to look good. And often if you want the best of any of those category, it is going to cost you. There is a time for day blades, a time for LED blades, and time for thick walled hollow blades. It all depends on what your needs are.

Definitely there is a place for day blades. And I think that place in when you know you are going to be cosplaying in bright areas and especially when you expect a lot of photos to be taken.

You could also argue that in that situation the hilt you are using does not even need to be electronic. It could be a staic hilt that can secure a blade. You could go the day blade option or you could do something more like the A New Hope filming style of reflective blade, that way if you do get photographed with a flash, the blade would look more real than any electronic blade would look under those circumstances.

It's a funny topic when you think about it. When this board started thriving about 24 years ago, the main focus on lightsabers was a static hilt. If you wanted a blade, the solution was a colored acrylic rod. Hasbro had come out with their extendable toy saber which didn't look very real but the motion activated sounds and clash was new for us. A year or so later, the EL tech came out and people started trying to implement that into custom hilts but they were lights and no sounds unless you count the high pitch whine they made. A couple years later most fans got their first real taste of electronic lightsabers when MR came out with their FX lightsabers that had the scrolling LED blades and sound effects. A lot has happened with lightsaber blade tech in the last few years.

 

[The Sweatshop]

Everyone has there opinion, of course. Personally I think day blades make it look too much like a toy. The other reason is if you have the ignition effect it looks better in a polycarbonate blade. Again, just my opinion.

I respect your opinion, but I’m gonna ask for a fundamental explanation of why “it looks like a toy”. I don’t disagree necessarily, but my opinion is the toys look better in practice. I believe we do mental gymnastics to think that a white polycarbonate blade “doesn’t exist”. I think we’ve mentally green screened it out. I’m sure we all agree a blade igniting from nothing would be ideal, but until then the whole point of the thread is to establish my opinion that a colored blade looks better than a white one solely because I white blade is not any more “invisible” to a colored one and white is essentially the least common color.

 

[The Sweatshop]

The major advantage to the neopixel, without question, is the scrolling effect which simply can't be replicated with the in-hilt LED sabers as of yet. Though there is a maker out there who has been experimenting with a flexible plastic that can unroll with the use of a small motor to achieve this feature and he did it a few years before Disney released footage of their version. For our purposes though, the in-hilt LED's as they are currently don't have the scroll effect and neopixel wins on that front, hands down.

You can sand the outside of a polycarbonate blade to eliminate the gloss finish and give it a satin or matte finish. The issue is that if you duel with it, it will scuff, leaving unsightly marks behind which may show up as splotch marks when illuminated. I know from experience as I dueled with my polycarbonate blades extensively years ago. The Nylon 6/6 doesn't have this problem. While I didn't break the polycarbonate blades under normal use, I did do stress tests and under extreme duress it will crack or shatter, though that was an extreme case. Then again this is the same material used for police riot shields and bullet proof glass so that's to be expected. It just doesn't shatter like glass, which is helpful for our needs.

I've never been a fan of the thick walled blades. I know some people swear by them, but they don't illuminate as brightly as the thin walled and in my experience they have more of a tendency to crack than the thin walled blades because they're more rigid. The thin wall can take a fair amount of abuse and retains the flexibility that the thick walled blades don't. Just like a properly made sword is tempered to allow it to flex, that acts as a shock absorber, otherwise the blade would be brittle and shatter on impact. The other pet peeve I have is that so many people have this tendency to overtly abuse their blades to show off their durability when you can have a great sparring session without it turning to a pissing match to break the other guy's blade. It's ridiculous and wasteful and I don't understand what's the appeal. I did the abuse test once or twice with scrap material to have firsthand knowledge of what was possible, but there are way too many videos out there of people taking their expensive lightsabers and smashing them against trees and then acting surprised when they break. Yeah idiot, of course it will break.

Real sword fights are more than just smashing two sharp edges together which is something a real swordsman wouldn't do unless left with no other choice, and most of their blows are parried, if the blades even make contact at all, with the flat. While the duels in the films are carefully choreographed, they too perpetuate some of the same tropes that have plagued Hollywood since the invention of motion pictures and reinforce a total misunderstanding of historical sword fights and Western martial combat. I digress. Ultimately if you're not looking to break your in hilt LED blades I think a thin wall blade will suffice for most uses. Thick walled are a good option if that's your thing, but I think it's overkill personally and unless you're the type that doesn't know your own strength, smashing them as hard as you can isn't dueling, it's just abuse. I can't think of any other type of prop that gets this kind of mistreatment.

We spend so much time, money, and energy on these props that we love so much and what do we do with them? Let's see if we can break 'em! Yeah, real smart. The simple answer is that everything can be broken if put under enough strain. Everything. Nothing is indestructible.

Agreed with the thin wall perspective. As far as saber legion has their rules on thick walled blades, I’d respect it. As far as collecting, it’s only visual aesthetic and light dueling for me.

Side note, I don’t know if we established if nylon 6/6 blades come in colors, if they do, you’ve sold me on them. I guess the only thing that might matter to me would be is wall dimensions, seeing that a lot of manufacturers have already invested in poly blade dimensions for pixel connector holders and tips and such.

 

[The Sweatshop]

Blades are like shoes, some you wear for durability, some you wear for performance, and some you wear to look good. And often if you want the best of any of those category, it is going to cost you. There is a time for day blades, a time for LED blades, and time for thick walled hollow blades. It all depends on what your needs are.

Definitely there is a place for day blades. And I think that place in when you know you are going to be cosplaying in bright areas and especially when you expect a lot of photos to be taken.

You could also argue that in that situation the hilt you are using does not even need to be electronic. It could be a staic hilt that can secure a blade. You could go the day blade option or you could do something more like the A New Hope filming style of reflective blade, that way if you do get photographed with a flash, the blade would look more real than any electronic blade would look under those circumstances.

It's a funny topic when you think about it. When this board started thriving about 24 years ago, the main focus on lightsabers was a static hilt. If you wanted a blade, the solution was a colored acrylic rod. Hasbro had come out with their extendable toy saber which didn't look very real but the motion activated sounds and clash was new for us. A year or so later, the EL tech came out and people started trying to implement that into custom hilts but they were lights and no sounds unless you count the high pitch whine they made. A couple years later most fans got their first real taste of electronic lightsabers when MR came out with their FX lightsabers that had the scrolling LED blades and sound effects. A lot has happened with lightsaber blade tech in the last few years.

For me there are only two categories of blades, LED or thick walled hollow blades, and both should be day blades! I just made a realization based on your post, white is not the absence of color. A white blade IS a day blade but usually an inaccurate one based on the character hilt it resides. One may argue that all blades should be black, absent of color until ignited, but I think most would agree, especially the last couple years that a black blade isn’t an absence of a blade either.

 

[Psab keel]

The Nylon 6/6 only comes in white. They have different wall thicknesses but the 1/16 wall (standard thin wall) is compatible with most blade tips from TCSS. There were a lot of people hating on the Nylon option when it was first introduced so it never took off the way the transparent white Polycarbonate did, but it's clearly my preference. Lol

Different blade options don't come up in discussion often because the Polycarbonate is the industry standard so I just thought you might be interested in a lesser known option to try. I'd be curious to see what you think of it. You need diffusion film like the clear polypropylene gift wrap, or you could do like I do and use clear lighting gel rolled up. Otherwise the Nylon looks sort of lumpy when illuminated without film. It's just a result of the extrusion process.

You can get the Nylon 6/6 at McMasterCarr.

 

[Rexermus]

I've always wondered why somebody hasn't made a neopixel dayblade for the ultimate convention lightsaber experience. idk if it's possible but if coloured diffusion sleeves were added to a dayblade with a neopixel strip core I'd imagine setting it to max brightness pure white would give a very interesting result

 

[Psab keel]

The effect I always wondered about is if it's possible to create a white core and a colored corona around that. My fishing line blades from back in 2003 kind of emulated this but became bulbous at the tip. The Corbin film really perfected the look of my blade design, but I have yet to see a cored effect with a white or at least lighter color at the center with a more vibrant color surrounding it.

As for day blades? I'm sure there's got to be some solution that would use natural sunlight which would be able to emulate a glowing blade. Surely if we can figure out how to illuminate blades at night there's got to be a way to do it in the daytime.

 

[pengbuzz]

Blades are like shoes, some you wear for durability, some you wear for performance, and some you wear to look good. And often if you want the best of any of those category, it is going to cost you. There is a time for day blades, a time for LED blades, and time for thick walled hollow blades. It all depends on what your needs are.

Gives new meaning to the term sharp dressed man.

 

[BRRogers]

For Luke’s green ; a photonic green blade with a diffuser core and cyan mix neopixel is SO bright it’s hard to want anything else.

I am (also) very curious how a traditional ‘day blade’ would look with a full white string core though… very curious if it would have the “White core” effect and have never seen it.

On dayblades or edgeglow blades- I have to agree that they will *always* look better than clear or opaque white tubes in daylight…. Because let’s be honest the ignition is cool but only when the room is dark anyway.

I guarantee that the park characters’ sabers use colored blades so that they still look somewhat “in character” even if it’s a full-sun kind of day

Lastly: the full undiluted brightness in the glow that comes from neopixel is what makes it desirable. One can still ‘play duel’ with them and I’d say they’re way more robust (if built right) than the licensed toys or Disney blades even. If you have a Kylo Ren style unstable blade… neopixel programming is an absolute no-brainer.

And… tbh some of the new soundboards (like Verso) are as easy to wire and program as the originals but still include scrolling ignition and retraction as well as “smooth swing”.

But as said, If trying to duel hard an in-hilt LED is about the only thing that won’t suffer vibration damage of full contact

 

[Rexermus]

I am (also) very curious how a traditional ‘day blade’ would look with a full white string core though… very curious if it would have the “White core” effect and have never seen it.

THAT'S WHAT I'M SAYING! Someone has to at least try to experiment with it. If not then it would allow for better lighting effects under harsh lighting/day light with a matching RGB color at the least

 

[BRRogers]

There are RGBW strings now too that are supported: so full W and RGB would surely be quite bright (battery withstanding)

Just haven’t seen anybody with the time and initiative *do* it. (I don’t have the money or the time lol)

 

[Psab keel]

Before high powered LEDs came to the market in 2003 I experimented with a colored tube with a side glow fiber optic cable in the center to try and emulate the white core. I just didn't have a bright enough light source at the time. I noticed that a blue light bulb I had around that same time emanated blue light but the filament itself glowed bright white.

Having a colored Polycarbonate tube with a string blade inside would likely create a similar effect.