ANH Obi-Wan Lightsaber measurements guide

[Sabs]

The grenade neck has been updated. Thanks to a youtube video I saw that there were actually two holes in the side for pins that hold the detonator pin in place. That was pretty hard to see from pictures. Also that those holes are not threaded.

Again, ANY help in this project would be much appreciated. Even if it's just a length or a width or a diameter.

Thanks!

Sabs

 

[mugatu]

Good work on this.
One thing to keep in mind is that because of the era in which many of these pieces were designed and manufactured, many single items were rushed in one or more of those areas as well as due to necessity, often being produced by different manufacturing houses. We had the same thing going on in WWII here in America with four separare manufacturers producing the M1911-A1 pistol. There are vast differences in build quality between the four houses and between individual houses by year.
I mention this most specifically regarding the grenade as there might be some sections with great variation not to mention the MOD was also continuously tweaking each grenade design as the war progressed and as word from the front came back. With the Hales grenades, each new model was not a close but different variation on the previous model but usually had an entirely different effect that was desired, thus there are an incredible number of model designs as well as variations in shape, delivery type, launch type, propellant/explosive used, etc.
I say none of this to dissuade you as this is a great project, but just as a notice that you may get various measurements from different members and they could all be correct.

 

[Sabs]

Good work on this.
One thing to keep in mind is that because of the era in which many of these pieces were designed and manufactured, many single items were rushed in one or more of those areas as well as due to necessity, often being produced by different manufacturing houses. We had the same thing going on in WWII here in America with four separare manufacturers producing the M1911-A1 pistol. There are vast differences in build quality between the four houses and between individual houses by year.
I mention this most specifically regarding the grenade as there might be some sections with great variation not to mention the MOD was also continuously tweaking each grenade design as the war progressed and as word from the front came back. With the Hales grenades, each new model was not a close but different variation on the previous model but usually had an entirely different effect that was desired, thus there are an incredible number of model designs as well as variations in shape, delivery type, launch type, propellant/explosive used, etc.
I say none of this to dissuade you as this is a great project, but just as a notice that you may get various measurements from different members and they could all be correct.

Yes I know. This grenade was only used in 1915 and then they moved onto the MK.2 because this was too hard to make. But if there is variations that’s also a great reason to do this, to find the minimum and maximum of each part. And even how much corrosion has taken away from a fresh and still painted parts I saw some people have.

As of yet the support for this project has been nearly only encouraging words but no contstructive measurements. But even if this takes a very long time it will eventually be finished.

 

[Sabs]

I've found the data sheet for the TO-99 motorola transistors and have uploaded it (page 18 of 22 in the pdf), so I don't have to redo the technical drawings for it, but I did model it

 

[Tan Djarka]

His replicas are already being reverse engineered by a Chinese company.

This puzzles me. Why would they do that? I wouldn't think there's a big enough market to make something like that even remotely worthwhile.

 

[teecrooz]

It’s an FX saber maker. Some really obvious tells have been copied.

 

[Sabs]

This puzzles me. Why would they do that? I wouldn't think there's a big enough market to make something like that even remotely worthwhile.

They sold it cheaper, but according to the Graflex Bank website, it's been resolved (unless it's a different issue). I think there are a lot of people not on this forum that are dueling with these replicas not just displaying them, and that's the larger market for the Chinese.

 

[teecrooz]

There are more issues, not just the one that was on the graflex.

 

[Sabs]

oh so the same company was copying the obi wan and vader sabers too?

 

[Anakin Starkiller]

Hey Joe! To be honest, all of them. This whole project is guess work from images. My ultimate wish would be for a very patient person to print out all the drawings I’ve posted, and correct the numbers in red ink after comparing measurements to the real parts. Then scan the pages and send them to me so I can update the files and post them here.

I know it’s a lot to ask of one person which is why if even a few parts are corrected over time by the whole community, it would be great. Also then we could see the tolerances of parts if many ppl corrected things independently.

So in short, anything you want to measure would help!

Thanks,
Sabs

Do you still need someone to do this? Or has Joe got you covered?

 

[Sabs]

Do you still need someone to do this? Or has Joe got you covered?

I haven’t heard from joe, but the more measurements the better! Then I can add tolerances and can see how much each part varies!

Best bet would be to print out the pages and try your best to duplicate each number on the page.

I made the file in millimeters but since all the parts are English and American there’s a good chance the parts will have rounder numbers in inches.

Thanks for your help!

 

[teecrooz]

The British Parts: grenade, balance pipe, and booster were all made before Britain switched to the metric system.

 

[Sabs]

As I suspected. The question is which thread type did they use, because the British have a few to choose from.

 

[Ridire Firean]

Hey Sabs ! The British were probably using the B.S.W. (British Standard Whitworth), but the grenade parts do line up with S.A.E. guages, and S.A.E. was around back then as well.

The Ti's were probably all inch measurements too since they were from Dallas Texas. Though the only solid fractional measurement on the stupid thing is that the Bubble Strip is 1/2" in width. Then there's the 2.5mm spacing on the circuit board, but nothing else measures out to a solid metric measurement. Texans, they do it their own dam' way. GO FIGURE!

The A.S. knobs are equally strange! I don't think a single measurement was used to create them. I'd bet they were hand spun, milled, modelled onto, and then cast from that original part.

Now, in stark contrast, our hallowed Grand Master, Oscar Steiner, was a man of measurement. Everything on a GRAFLEX lands on a solid fraction. Thank the Maker!

And just to echo what others have already stated, most of the major original Obi-Wan Lightsaber parts were made from items that were created using inches as their unit of measure. I think it's sad that you're doing all this work in the metric system, it just doesn't feel correct. For all the time and effort you've put in to the drawings of this project, they really should be in inches. I think it would be all the more impressive if the drawings you are recreating were accurate to their creators' system of measure. The accuracy would therefore be the intent of the creator, rather than the inaccurate result of the manufacturer. For instance, if you measure a cylindrical part at 16+ places, you might get 16+ different measurements if you're using 1000ths of an inch, but if you were using fractions of an inch you might get half or even fewer different measurements. Not to say that you couldn't take all those 1000ths/in measurements to get the average and then try and figure out what the intended fractional size was supposed to be, but it wouldn't be right to say that an object was 95/128" when it was designed to have been 3/4". Even if you said it was 19.05mm, it would still be wrong. Now if you wanted to say it was 3/4" +/- 0.0025"(or whatever the average variance seems to be), that'd be spectacular!

Anywho, the soapbox I created there seems to measure out at 3' L x 2' H x 2' W, but I made it out of wood 2x4's sooo....

It'd be really neat to see all of the different parts in a single drawing! Kind of like an assembler's guide/exploded view, with each part in order of its place on the lightsaber.

Good Luck with the rest of the project!

p.s. you have the drawing names for the Balance Pipes misspelled as "Balence".

 

[Sabs]

Thanks for the suggestion. I can of course convert everything to inches with a click of a button and provide the drawings in both. Not possible to write them as fractions I’m afraid. Once I get some real number from ppl I will put it out.

Good catch on the spelling. Thanks!

 

[mugatu]

Here you go inches:

 

[mugatu]

Here you go mm:

 

[Sabs]

Woo! Thanks Mugatu, I’ll update it tonight!

Sabs

 

[mugatu]

Woo! Thanks Mugatu, I’ll update it tonight!

Sabs

No problem. I tried to cut down on variation as much as possible by attempting to only use the most “still complete” points to measure. Still, for some odd reason it was way more difficult than it should have been to take photos with one hand and hold a calipers with the other. Haha

Let me know if you have any issues figuring out what I was measuring.

 

[Sabs]

Here you go inches:

These are great, I'm rounding them to the nearest fraction as Ridire Firean suggested. Many of them are coming out to near perfect fractions as it is.

But can I ask for four more measurements?

Inside front (threading) depth
inside back (threading) depth
Length of last knuckle edge to edge
length of first knuckle to edge.


If you use the back of your calipers you can get depth. Can you tell me what these measurements on the real one are? Best practice for taking depth measurements is to extend the calipers more than needed and then bottom the back edge out on the higher surface.

Thanks again for being the first one to help!

Sabs