Re-inventing Lukes ANH Lightsaber- And Vaders too??!?!

[SFPROPS]

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lonepigeon wrote:<HR></TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS=$row_color>I think it's inconclusive and just looks bad, so I'm not doing anything about it on mine.
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I'm right there with you. Even if it is on there in the picture, I usually don't make my stuff 100% screen accurate. I'm more in the "as accurate as you can get without making it look bad" camp. I think it has the mylar tape, but my long in the making Obi ANH won't feature the tape unless I decide to wrap the whole clamp in mylar.

 

[Betamin]

I just got off the phone with Mark Hamill, and asked him "Six grips or seven on your saber?" He answered with a long list of expletives and slammed down the phone.

I'll try back later. I must have caught him during dinner or something.......

 

[arkangel]

I'm in the "as accurate as possible without making it look bad" camp too. Transistors and washers are a definite improvement, but I will definitely pass on partially mylaring the clamp. Even on my graflex with the band of mylar tape, you can see some of the Graflex letters showing through the tape. If the obi did have mylar tape which was then damaged from the desert heat and later pulled off, it could account for dirt sticking to the left over residue from the tape, but I'm afraid I don't subscribe to that level of accuracy. I like to pick mine up without getting my hands sticky.

The graflex comment was to keep on topic with the thread.

 

[PHArchivist]

at Betamin! I thought about jokingly saying "Well, hell--why don't we just cal Mark and ask him!

Chris--on DVs ANH having seven... Maybe, huh? WHY did they put seven on his ROTJ?

On the OB1 ANH--not to be a wet blanket, but can the mods extract those posts and deposit them into another thread? It's hard enough following the posts/theories/details on just one saber...

 

[lonepigeon]

DS- "...the spacing is approxomately 7.5mm to 8mm ..."

That's what it should be with 6 grips, but no gap in the Chronicles pics is that wide. The small gap is 4.5-5m and the larger gap on the lever side is at least 6.5mm.
Neither is direct at the camera, but that doesn't account for a 2.5-3mm difference. I also think we can see too much of the side grips in those photos.

Look at photos of the ESB Vader. The gaps between grips are very wide compared to the ANH photos.

Why put six grips on one and seven grips on the other in the same movie?

As much as I hate to say it (since I just converted mine) it looks like 7 grips on the Vader ANH too.

 

[jediscout]

You're an evil man, aren't you?

 

[THX1138]

Yes... look how wide the gaps between the grips are on Lukes "ESB" saber compared to his "ANH" saber!

I watched the beginning of "ESB" yesterday, and the "Wampa Cave Saber" without a doubt only has 6 grips!

I've always believed Vaders "ANH" saber had 7 grips on it!

- Jim

 

[DARTH SABER]

Lonepigeon, I scaled both the photo of my converted MPP and the one in the chronicles and I measured the gaps on both of them..They both match...Not only that but when I postioned my converted MPP (with the 6 grips) in the same way as the one in the Chronicles, the grips were exact. And also I took the Photo of mine ond overlaid it on top of the Chronicles pic...Once again an exact match..
The Luke ANH saber was a different story...I kinda thought it looked like seven grips but then it didnt and I wasnt sure...But on the Vader ANH Im 100% positive there are 6 grips.
The Vader has 6 grips...

 

[lonepigeon]

There's no way to get an exact match with Chronicles- the grips aren't evenly spaced. Read my above measurements they are correct.

I can get one side to match, but not both. Probably only because of the one wide gap on the lever side makes it look like the 6 grip spacing.

You can also compare the two sabers side by side in Chronicles- if the spacing was that different it would be obvious, but the grip spacing looks the same on both. You're saying the gaps on the Vader are half again as wide as Luke's (7.5-8mm compared to 5.5mm)- they're not that different.

You're saying these two sabers have different grip spacing? ...
<img src=http://mywebpages.comcast.net/lonepigeon/anhgrip_compare.jpg>

Sorry, I don't buy it.
(Vader on left, Luke on right)

Edit- I can't believe I'm on this side of the debate now.

 

[darthwilliam87]

hmmm looking at the chronical shots, i just cant belive there is are seven grips, when i hold my saber (w/blasttech grips) up to the cronical shots all the placement is correct exept the gaps on mine are larger. so i scaled the chronical pic, and it looks like the vader grips are a bit larger than my blast-tech grips.
now the fact that they compare with the luke saber, not quite sure about that but, i think the grips on the outside of that photo dont exactly match, or at least thats how it looks to me. the outer grips on the luke saber look more towards the center than the ones on the vader, which would leave more room for an extra grip on the other side on the luke saber

 

[DARTH SABER]

OK...I have an old Heiland Vader saber that I use as my stunt saber (basically to play with and throw around)....I just took the grips off and tried positioning them to accomodate 7 grips, when I compare it to the Chronicles pic, it is totally off...Chris, try putting 7 grips on a Heiland or MPP replica and you'll see that it doesnt match the Chronicles pic at all...
I can see how there was so much confusion about the Luke saber because the top shell moves and the midband moves and the bottom shell moves so you really have to take all of that into consideration, but with an MPP the only thing that moves is the midband, and seeing how the only 2 known pics of the original saber have it in one position doesnt make it all that hard to figure out its 6 grips..

And yes, the grips from the original saber do seem to be a tad larger especially the vanes.

Heres a pic of my MPP Vader saber with 6 grips(left)... and the Chronicles pic(right)...The blue lines show the matching in scale of the endcaps and the red lines show the space between the grips...as you can see the endcaps metch up in size but the vanes on the grips dont, leading me to believe that Blastechs grips are a tad smaller.

 

[lonepigeon]

I can get mine to match that photo too, but flip it over and it's off. Granted there's a wider gap on the other side.

Look at it this way- for years we thought we could match a Graflex up to the Chronicles pic and you can - like you just did. Take a six grip Graflex and you can position it just like you did your Heiland to match the Chronicles Luke saber photo. We never had a flip side of the Luke saber to compare.

When I align my MPP saber to that side I get the same result you did, looks about the same as Chronicles. Now turn it around and try to match the other photo. You get a view that results in three visible grips and two gaps, instead of the four clearly seen grips in Chronicles. Therein lies my problem.

BTW- the grip vanes aren't larger. The top vane in your photo is angled away from the camera. The top vane in the Chronicles pic is more in profile and hence appears taller.

I know it's not the "smoking gun" proof we had for the Graflex. I will try 7 grips on my ANH Vader and see what happens (they're falling off anyway).

 

[tlrgsxr]

Here's an idea...

If there's a close up pic of Vader's saber end, with a good shot of the grip gap, maybe one could count the knurled teeth from the end of one grip to the next. Then count and measure the same teeth on a real flash. With this measurement one should be able to determine the grip spacing, assuming the grips were put on pretty straight. One could do the same to determine the grip width. I realize a pic that close up might be hard to come by though.

 

[DARTH SABER]

I just tried something and Lonepigeon seems to be right...7 grips again....first I drew horizontal lines from the edges of the grips alllllll the way to the shroud area and used the port holes and control box as landmarks for positioning the grip positions ...then I cut strips of masking tape in the exact width of the grips..Then I placed them on my MPP in accordance with the landmarks near the emitter, and Ill be damned if it isnt seven grips....As soon as I placed the 5th strip of masking tape on the MPP I knew Chris was right....

 

[DARTH SABER]

Sorry to bump this thread up, but I just didnt want this thread dropping off with out at least getting considered for the archives.......

 

[gavidoc]

bump

 

[dme3o]

SO what do we have as a consensus?

Carlo

 

[yodaman]

*Archive update*