Padme's blaster project - ELG-3A - screenaccurate details and proportions - idealized metal and wood materials

[eethan]

starting to cut some tubes

I remember my old version when I was cutting those 5mm thick tubes with a metal handsaw... that was fun!

small tip here, I'm actually spraying a tiny bit of WD40 PTFE anti friction lube on the blade when I cut metal tubes, you can instantly feel the blade cut smoother when you spray.

then, face turning the tubes on the lathe for a clean final look:

ok, now, the small jig of the day,
since those tubes are a bit long for the lathe to work safely, I need something to hold them from the oposite end from the chuck. Since it's a large open tube, I can't use the live counterpoint of the lathe, the diameter is too large.
to cheat that, I turned a 30mm rod that will slide in the end of the tube with a center hole to use the counterpoint of the lathe:

there we go!

cheers

 

[eethan]

Hello there!

ok, threading stuff!

so, here is the base for the front egg shape part, I need to drill it to be able to thread it in M10:

I then thread the hole with hand threading tools. they are a set of 3 tools for each size, that way, you start by removing a tiny bit of material, then a bit more and then finish the treading with the last one. I'm also using cutting oil regularly and removing the tool completely from the hole to clean it several times. the result is very clean thanks to all that:

and, repeat a few times:

ok, now for the mating part, the barrel. I'm going to do it completely on the lathe to get a clean a straight thread. First, I'm turning down the diameter on a short length to have a clean exit for the threading tool at the end of the threaded part. then adding a large bevel at the start:

I used a sharpy to paint the threaded part black in order to see what I'm doing, here is the first scribing pass:

and after a few more deeper passes, the result:

I cleaned it a bit with wire wool after that and it's threading super smoothly to the other part, pretty cool

 

[joberg]

Beautifully made and crafted

 

[eethan]

thank you very much Joberg mate

no long explanation tonight, but still a cool photo of the current progress:

 

[nickytea]

This is gorgeous. Is the interest list already full? I'd love to get one.
EDIT: Whoops, just saw the bit in the middle of your post about not posting interest here. Sorry about that. Will await that thread with great interest.

 

[eethan]

This is gorgeous. Is the interest list already full? I'd love to get one.
EDIT: Whoops, just saw the bit in the middle of your post about not posting interest here. Sorry about that. Will await that thread with great interest.

Hey Nick,
thank you for your message, no worries The interest thread is not started yet. and what i'm showing so far is just a part of the whole batch that I'll do. I'm focusing on making 2 or 3 final blasters for the beginning of April and will finish the whole batch when I have a few final blasters finished, took photos and posted the project run thread At this point, I'll check for interest and make sure that I make enough blasters

 

[eethan]

Hello there,
here is a pretty big update for me at least, I have been struggling a bit for a couple days with the large threads needed for the back piece and main body. I wanted those to be threaded so the back piece could be easily removed for electronics access if someone wanted. But I had some trouble making it all work properly. It turns out I just had a small tool issue and I eventually figured it out and all is working super smoothly now! Pretty happy about that as I really wanted those nice threads for a professional look.

So, here is how I made the whole back piece, This part is a bit particular actually and I never saw that replicated properly before. I realized when I saw the blaster at an exhibit that the back part is sticking out of the body a bit and that there is a concave curvature at the base of the egg shaped piece that goes inside the body.
Here is a good photo (a bit blurry but showing the feature nicelly) I managed to snap at the exhibit:

So, first, I measure and trace the part that need to be turned down in the middle:

then I do a rough shaping aith a pointy bit:

and finally smooth and finish everything with a round tool:

after that, I do a bevel at the end. This side will be threaded and the bevel is to facilitate the penetration of the threading tool into the material. The bevel has to be at least as big as the depth of the threads.

then I do a small rout to allow the threading tool to escape at the end of the threading. This will also serve as a depth stop for the egg part, so it sits at the proper depth inside the body:

and then I can do the actual threading:

I'm super happy about that. I never though I would do parts like that in my life. I always assumed only big sellers like the custom saber shop or guys like that could do that, pretty cool stuff!

The part I had trouble with was the female threading inside the main body. threading inside a tube is not as "fun" as threading the outside of a surface. Well, after I figured out my tool issue, it went more smoothly:
as you can see, there is a larger smooth surface first, then the threading. The male part will thread and the depth stop will come against the first theads and stop at right depth

and here is how it looks assembled together:

since this now all works perfectly, I was able to thread 6 of the male parts this afternoon. I don't know what it is with those photos with duplicated run parts together but I love them

that's it for today, I hope you like it. It's nicelly moving forward and the difficult steps are checked one after the others

 

[AnubisGuard]

Pure sex.

 

[OlivierC]

Wow you really getting good at this

 

[eethan]

Hello there and thanks guys

here is some update for this weekend,

first of all, I numbered the back parts, for authenticity and to not mix up the parts between them. I'll be numbering all the big parts like that.

now, starting the main body parts, from now on I'll be working on just 2 or 3 blasters and finish them as I have a deadline for one of them and will use the others as production prototypes and take photos of them for the interest thread. then go back on finishing all the blasters one step after the other on all of them.

ok, so for the main body, this is again where this is going to look a lot different from most of the replicas we see out there. Most of them just show a straight tube with two lines in the back. However, this is not how that blaster is done, It has a clear step on the back that's a really important feature, really making its shape more dynamic in the back and i'll be making sure to really get the details and rounded angles of the steps perfectly right

First I'm turning down the diameter where needed and doing the deeper line in the front:

after that, the next steps are more "artistic", I have my plan and my references in front of me on the lathe, I practiced on the cutting tools to use and the steps to do and I work on the piece until I "feel" this is correct. first breaking a bit the angles according to the references:

and then rounding the end and sanding a bit to smooth things out, really happy on the closeness to the references:

don't be scared, things are pretty much looking identical even though I work by feel:

I hope you like it
I'll be starting on the back egg shaped piece next

 

[eethan]

here are a couple quick comparisons with the exibition photo I took and the stunt blaster from the visual dictionary. take them with a grain of salt as the angles of the photos don't match but I'm really happy with how this is turning out:

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

Am I imagining it, or wasn’t there a photo some years back that showed what I assume was a hero blaster and showing that the rear section was removable?

Great looking project.

 

[eethan]

Am I imagining it, or wasn’t there a photo some years back that showed what I assume was a hero blaster and showing that the rear section was removable?

Great looking project.

I have no knowledge of that photo! I would be grateful to see it! in any case, that's what I'm going for with removable. but it would be interesting to know how this was really made, even if it would be a bit late for this run.
thanks

 

[AnubisGuard]

This is probably outside the scope of what you're doing with this project, but it would be cool if the removable end cap allowed us to put a removable "power cell" inside the body of the blaster, a la a reveal saber like this.

 

[eethan]

This is probably outside the scope of what you're doing with this project, but it would be cool if the removable end cap allowed us to put a removable "power cell" inside the body of the blaster, a la a reveal saber like this.

thanks the reveal feature is indeed not planned so far. However, I'm doing this project making sure there is plenty of room inside, so adding the reveal feature will be extremely easy as the back part just threads to the body. so just attach the reveal inards to the back part and it will screw and unscrew in a couple seconds

The inside diameter of the body is 28.6mm. however so far there is just 6.4cm long of room inside the body. I could win up to 3cm if the front and back piece were hollowed but I'm not sure if I can do it yet. I might have to offer a static or FX ready version depending on what people prefer. since I already know that some people prefer to have some weight.

edit: forgot to say, what you did with the reveal saber is super cool, and I would love to have thatinside my blaster indeed!

 

[Vedor]

Very nice work eethan! I've always loved the look of the (hand) props from the Prequels; they're so elegant and stylized. I really hope I can afford one when they're ready! And I'm looking forward to that compass of Captain Jack [emoji14]

 

[eethan]

Very nice work eethan! I've always loved the look of the (hand) props from the Prequels; they're so elegant and stylized. I really hope I can afford one when they're ready! And I'm looking forward to that compass of Captain Jack [emoji14]

thank you very much !
I hope you can afford it too! putting a price on things that I build is the most difficult for me so far. Although for this project it kind of calculated itself as I had to buy the lathe and quite a bit of other tools. the price still depends a bit on if I manage to meet my schedule and how many I manage to build in the time I have

I'm really enjoying working on that project, but I also look forward to getting back on the Jack Sparro compass as this will be a pretty unique and beautiful piece! thank you very much for your message

 

[eethan]

Hey there,
quite a bit of progress to show today

I started working on the back egg shaped piece,

first of all, since the piece is now threaded, I made a small female threaded tube to serve as protection from the lathe chuck, this works perfectly
Of course, that's the only way I can do that since after that, the other side is going to be shaped like an egg, so, no way to do the threading after that.

on the lathe:

ok, now to shape it,
first I do a full length tapper of 5°:

after that, it's more of a sculpting thing, little by little until the shape is perfect. I forgot to take a photo of my jig, I had some templates laser cut of the egg shape, I attach those to some kind of jig I built that I then put inside the oposite drill chuch. I then have to position it properly and I use one tool to cut my material and a second tool of the same shape to follow the template a few centimeters further, pretty basic but pretty effective! here is a photo of when I was testing the jig earlier:

so now, I just do small passes, removing a bit of material each time and trying to get closer to the shape. first roughly with a pointy tool and at the end, very little by little with a round tool:

then when I'm really close, i finish with a hand file:

and then there is quite a bit of carefull sanding involved:

at any time, I can check my progress with a template of the reverse shape:

ok, so here is where we are right now:

and some better shots with a comparison to a ref:

the back piece was not fully threaded for the picture, it's actually spot on to the ref normally. Well, i'm pretty happy with the result. This should be 99% accurate to the real shape. I cut the template based on great references and then followed it on the lathe, so there isn't any guess work involved here

I hope you guys like it it's moving forward nicelly I think

 

[AnubisGuard]

the back piece was not fully threaded for the picture, it's actually spot on to the ref normally.

That was going to be my one critique. Beautifully done!

The PT's shortcomings are manifold, but crummy production design is not one of them.

 

[eethan]

That was going to be my one critique. Beautifully done!

The PT's shortcomings are manifold, but crummy production design is not one of them.

thank you
Yes, i'm sorry, I don't know why I didn't thread it fully, it's very silly of me!
Also, None of the pieces are final sanded and polished yet, this will come completely at the end and I will spend a crazy time on them making sure that there are no scratches. this will be fun all by hand!