I don't think we're cherry-picking information, most of us are in agreement... I think there's just some who are in denial.
Dave is currently speaking to people involved in the prop, we can't brush that aside.
In my over decade witnessing/lurking of TheRPF, I've noticed that people put personal bias over research. I.e. "The prop was immaculate and symmetrical" as truth rather than an "Asymmetrical cobbled together piece of junk".
I remember a small percentage of people hated the idea of the v2 grenade section being uneven and blamed it on lighting but eventually embraced it
. I mean we still see the "Lighting and shadows" excuse being used to deny information that is now otherwise mainstream.
People cemented the Master Replicas v2 so much in their head that when it came out just how different it was from the original, there was some debate.
In regards to the nipple; I agree with Dave, the nipple was more than likely to hold the bearing in place and cover it neatly. The nipple supposedly spins with the blade.
I also think the nipple was held down but not secured to the emitter. I.e. the emitter screws simply sat above the nipple step to stop the nipple from coming out when it spun.
If that's true, when the emitter broke and spun, that would explain why Alec Guinness was claimed to have held the emitter. Not to slow it down, but the stop it moving as it probably rattled like crazy.
There also seems to be some confusion. The lightsaber ignite scenes for the obi wan saber didn't have a person come in and put a blade into it.
The entire hilt was swapped out from the hero to the fx, blade attached.
So the there was absolutely no collar/nipple transition as Dave had theorised correctly.