New thoughts on the Obi ANH 'Reflector'

[Howard]

I went with photobucket as Imageshack's still being silly.

I'll get a decent comp pic up later, once the kids leave me alone for a while...

 

[Howard]

Here's a comp.


By howardsw

 

[vaderdarth]

Now that is interesting indeed! I think you've got it.

 

[russrep]

Nice 1 mate! Get it to me and we can get these done!!
Russ

 

[Brinn 71]

:confused

I think that's it! Can't wait to see what Andres thinks of this! thumbsup

Makes sense to use that piece, doesn't it?

 

[Howard]

Thanks for the confident reactions, guys!

Russ, it's going to need 'tweaking' here and there (not too much work considering what Andres has drawn up so far) - but basically I think this is correct.

 

[Chingon]

Wow! This news is both exciting and sad at the same time. Exciting to hear that the part may have been positively ID'd. Sad because my real booster didnt come with that part.:cry

 

[Serafino]

I like this idea (obviously it is very appealing and has brilliant “logic-cachet” ), and I can see how it *might* explain what we see (IF it can be shown that various reflections are working to create unexpected appearances), but the real test is applying the geometry of the booster to what we see and seeing if it melds.

Right now I don’t see how it can–for one thing the hole on the booster is 3/4 the size of the OD of the flat area, which is way larger than any conventional interpretation of the ‘cloak’ screen cap. But if no one else gets to doing an overlay I’ll have a go at it tonight.

 

[Serafino]

I’m just working this up in 3D, and 2 things I will say for it (even though I’m still very skeptical):

1. It puts the hole at the bottom pretty much exactly where it belongs (although the booster hole would have had to be cut away unless the grenade neck was modified).

2. To work you only have to take of about .03-.04" off a threaded area, not too hard to do even by hand (and chop off the back end and modify it to fit the grenade of course).

Cloak comp:

Other comps:

 

[russrep]

Good work guys remember some one prob saw this part when building the saber and thought, "if I just put this on the lathe turn that bit skimm that bit that will fit in the emitter" sorted that will do!! :rolleyes

Russ

 

[TV8]

As a customer only, I just want to say, many thanks for putting in this effort and applying yourselves at this level of detail. I wish I could add something useful to the debate...

 

[Darth Lars]

The size of the hole is not even close. As much as I would want it to be made from something cool, I'm sticking with the belief that it was something simple.

 

[ssdesigner]

I know I run the risk of sounding cheesy or cliche, but it needs to be said... We are very fortunate to have all of you guys here that are putting the necessary research into these parts, so that we can benefit from your volunteer work. The RPF is extremely lucky to have such a dedicated and talented group, thanks again you guys. BIG thumbs up!! :thumbsup

-Ss

 

[Serafino]

Thanks guys.

So continuing my workings-out of Howard's idea, which I still don't buy

Probably prompted by additional thoughts from Howard, I started thinking about what modifications might have been made to this piece.

What if someone got the idea to make the 'cone' of the booster end right at the top of the grenade neck? You'd end up being able to turn down the large ring to fit just inside the emitter, and there sorta-kinda just might be room for that in the reference, it would look like this (dark grey for remains of booster, light grey for cut away parts, red lines for cuts):

The front view hole looks better this way, but I don't think it's a match even now:

 

[lonepigeon]

I thought about this before, but it doesn't look anything like the cloak pic.
Mouth of the cone is way too big.
It looks pretty good compared to the shot of Obi-Wan holding it though (explains the black blobs).

Maybe.

Edit - The cut down version Serafino just posted looks better, but like he said it's still way off.

Cloak comp:

 

[franz bolo]

The only problem is the fact that it's to large to fit in the BP without cutting down the threading and you have to cut off the ring of holes.

If they had the booster with the Flash Hider, I could see how they could cut it off pretty easy but with just the nut, that would take longer.

The Bearing has a taper on the outside lip and that doesn't seem apparent on the screencap. It could have been filled with glue or something to even it's appearance out.

FB

 

[Serafino]

FB I have that outside chamfer on my 3D model FWIW, it just disappears basically. But it does make the OD of the 'flat face' smaller than the ID of the balance pipe.

 

[franz bolo]

FB I have that outside chamfer on my 3D model FWIW, it just disappears basically. But it does make the OD of the 'flat face' smaller than the ID of the balance pipe.

Do you think they would have gone through the trouble to grind down the threads and cut the end off?

FB

 

[Serafino]

Do you think they would have gone through the trouble to grind down the threads and cut the end off?

FB

I'm not an advocate, I'm just an explorer. I hate to speculate about stuff like this--who knows what the culture was at that time and place? Were they rushed or plodding, did the guy have a creative spark going and the time to execute his ideas, or was he just rushing to put the stuff together. Was he following orders? Did someone pick 5 parts and say "put those together, use this up in here", and he had to make it work? I have no idea.

Given a reason to do it, I don't think a competent craftsman would have any trouble doing the mods, and quickly. But then we're told most prop people aren't competent craftsmen so again, what was the situation? We'll probably never know.

I mean, maybe the guy who built the Obi saber got fired for being too slow in the end!

For me all that really matters in the end is what matches the reference. In that regard I still think Chris' theory has the edge, and even the 'washer' idea has possibilities--braze/solder a mess like that together and you could get something that would photograph very like what we see given the crappy resolution.

 

[Dewy]

This thread is very interesting. Not knowing what the piece in questions looks like intact I can't say for sure, but is it possible that originally the builder of our holy grail was trying to use this piece of the booster as the emitter itself?

I'm guessing since it fits inside the BP that maybe it would've looked unbalanced so he just shoved the BALANCE pipe over it and voila! Let's look at the parts used, the "gear" and the grenade are obviously both from weapons, the clamp was probably at this point already used on another lightsaber so it made sense to try and use it again. Going with my little theory between the clamp, the grenade, and the booster you could build the lightsaber minus the pommel (including using that booster part as a first draft of an emitter). What I'm saying is at this point you could've gotten all the parts from 2 bins, a weapons bin, and the graflex bin we know they loved so much.

Add a few finishing touches (BP and pommel) and we got ourselves a laser sword!