The Ultimate Guide to Lightsabers eBook

[SethS]

The effort you've put into this book so far is amazing and appreciated by the whole community! I think everyone understands that this is a volunteer effort and you cannot possibly update it with every little detail uncovered in a random thread in this forum or elsewhere.

But I assumed that's what this thread is for - to collect the little updates or corrections meanwhile.
I mean to me in this particular scene it is so clearly that the screws are black and only partially covered with snow that I didn't think it is necessary to start a separate discussion thread about it.

Anyway, I've posted all the frames from the scene. If anyone sees a mistake in my interpretation, please point it out, show where the silver screws are. So far, unfortunately, it kind of went sideways and people started posting unrelated images in what shapes as another round of general silver vs black screws.

I think the pic you posted is definitely snow on black screws-- but at the same time, Chaim's images (which I have put in the book and sorta didn't think to go and re-examine) also show silver screws. I think both things can be true.

 

[Sym-Cha]

Clearly, with other photos posted by Sym-Cha, screws were also missing. Two or even more possible sabers, then?

What I meant by missing screws is ... the grips had not been falling off due to the cold yet, so the repairs with notches and x-screws was still to come in the future ... so it's one and the same saber at least on location in Bergen Norway.

Chaïm

 

[thd9791]

+1 for appreciation for the .pdf and not changing things unless there's huge consensus or photo proof. Seth is right, looks like there are either two sabers or paint rubbing off over time.

 

[Mohndo]

Amazing history!! So rad LIGHTSABERS 4 LIFE TEAM GREEN.. Excellent work

 

[v312]

Looking through Sym-Cha's pictures and then some older discussion threads what's more interesting to me than the black/silver screws is that
the D-ring seems to change shape quite a lot. I can see at least 4 distinct shapes:

1. Tri-ring:

2. "Crooked Tri-ring"

and maybe even here ??

3. Normal D-ring:

4. "Wide" D-ring (like the one in the Wampa cave scene)

 

[BlueSaber]

What are people picking for their lightsaber replicas? black or silver screws? Triangular or round D ring?

 

[BlueSaber]

I’d call that an optical illusion caused by light reflecting off of black screws.

Now that we know the on-location screws were also black (and the “silver” look an optical illusion caused by snow), I think we can safely assume that the screws were consistently black during the entire production.

Think logically about it. The screws and notches were a production necessity, NOT a stylistic design choice. Therefore, they would have wanted to keep their solution for holding the grips on as discrete and unobtrusive as possible. Thus, black screws to blend in with the black grips. We weren’t supposed to ever see them onscreen.

Dear god, for the last week I've randomly been obsessing about the screw color. Thank god I found this info was recently put out there.

 

[v312]

The "triangular ring" is most likely just a Wampa cave type of D-ring that they cut too wide for the kobold clip and then had to squeeze it more , so the shape became like that. I've seen some higher resolution picture of Luke in the red suit where the ring didn't look so perfectly triangular( like on the lower resolution that I've posted earlier).

 

[boxfullofcats]

Everything I get a new phone I have to come back here and re-download the pdf. Just want to say thanks for doing this! Constantly use this for a variety of things.

 

[BlueSaber]

A little confused..is the consensus that they were black screws or silver screws painted black?

IF the screws in the ranch saber were original, would they originally black screws or painted black?

 

[BTTUK]

A little confused..is the consensus that they were black screws or silver screws painted black?

IF the screws in the ranch saber were original, would they originally black screws or painted black?

Probably never know for certain, however i'd stick my neck out and say that it's more likely that they were silver screws that were then painted black to hide them when they were used in the grips

 

[thd9791]

Looking through Sym-Cha's pictures and then some older discussion threads what's more interesting to me than the black/silver screws is that
the D-ring seems to change shape quite a lot. I can see at least 4 distinct shapes:

1. Tri-ring:
View attachment 1452536

2. "Crooked Tri-ring"
View attachment 1452537
and maybe even here ??
View attachment 1452538

3. Normal D-ring:
View attachment 1452539

4. "Wide" D-ring (like the one in the Wampa cave scene)
View attachment 1452540

Nice work. The second I believe to be the Skywalker Ranch Saber lower piece. I hadn't seen the tri-ring in anything other than that one shot, thank you!

 

[v312]

I think that it is possible that 1) gradually became 2) after some torture during filming. But the nicely shaped D-ring as seen mostly on Dagobah and Bespin is probably a different one. The same clamp can be seen in all locations while the ring shape changes, so it is probably the same flash with modifications that was used as a hero most of the time.

Here are the higher resolution pictures featuring the tri-ring that I've found, plus a couple of screencaps where I think it can be seen in the movie

 

[APOLLO IND]

These are most of my pictures of Luke's ESB ... some show clearly silver screws others less so ... :

View attachment 1451717

View attachment 1451718

View attachment 1451719

View attachment 1451720

View attachment 1451721

View attachment 1451722

These next two pictures have no screws at all in the grips ... so were taken before the repair with x-screws :

View attachment 1451723

View attachment 1451724

View attachment 1451726

View attachment 1451727

Again no screws at all :

View attachment 1451729

View attachment 1451730

Chaïm

Seth my friend, your work is greatly appreciated, and not overlooked. Sometimes beauty is in the eye of the beholder and not everyone will agree on what is seen, especially in images where it's up for interpretation. Though I do understand wanting to state things and portray them as accurately as possible in your work. You do a great job at wording things in your book already though, so I wouldn't worry as much about a definitive answer, as much as letting the reader know the plausible options. Like if you say: "the common consensus on screw color isn't definitive"....etc. Some things are better left up for interpretation if it can't be agreed on, at least in my opinion as a faithful builder and reader.

Okay now for my screw input ... In my opinion, it seems in the majority of these, (not all) the screws are clearly black with some of them reflecting some light. Though with an immense amount of handling I'm positive some of the paint (ink?) wore off as well. So I think it's a plausible line of thinking to think that they are mostly black, simply for the fact that they wanted them to be discreet, with the possibility of some of them being silver. These prop makers probably weren't counting on a bunch of guys to frame by frame these images to check, so there's already a few observable continuity errors .

Also another idea I had where the snow is sticking...perhaps a little bit of that whitish color is also where they kind of butchered the grip a little bit where the screw goes in. For those of you that have cut T-track, that black plastic turns white when under stress of any kind.

As far as the d-rings I honestly never noticed as much on the ESB! That's pretty cool. Might try and collect a few vintage ones that are close

Thanks for reading, sorry it's been awhile since I've been on so I'm trying to catch up haha.

 

[PoopaPapaPalps]

I think that it is possible that 1) gradually became 2) after some torture during filming. But the nicely shaped D-ring as seen mostly on Dagobah and Bespin is probably a different one. The same clamp can be seen in all locations while the ring shape changes, so it is probably the same flash with modifications that was used as a hero most of the time.

Here are the higher resolution pictures featuring the tri-ring that I've found, plus a couple of screencaps where I think it can be seen in the movie

I know this isn't the right place to post these thoughts or discuss this, but the D-ring here in these photos all look like the one on the Hero Ranch and to that on the MOM Vader hilt; a d-ring squashed out to fit over/into a Kobold clip. The tri-ring on the RotJ hero pinches a lot closer at the clip and at the break and the sides going to a point are much straighter and narrower than what I'm seeing here. The D-rings here look like they're pulled apart wide and then pinched together again. The break between the straight side probably is wider than on current replicas today, leading to the size differences we see between these, the V3, and on the V2, the last of which is more oblong than the V3.

 

[MercedesSLR]

I know this is a long stretch but has anyone ever taken a stab at the "Trials of Tatooine" lightsaber? I know it's super obscure like the holiday special one but to my knowledge, it's the last saber before the Disney buy-out.

 

[kevin926]

I thought some where around here was the decided fate of the first Graflex saber. Can someone point me to that discussion. If memory serves correctly, it was taken apart and never seen again, or is this folklore ??

 

[BTTUK]

I thought some where around here was the decided fate of the first Graflex saber. Can someone point me to that discussion. If memory serves correctly, it was taken apart and never seen again, or is this folklore ??

It's ultimate fate is still not known unfortunately.

It was thought by many that it was taken back to where it came, but with the info now known about the rivets, the Elstree prototype style Graflex showing up etc, I personally think it was either taken by someone and may show up or, more likely, ended up in the bin

 

[Jack Bautista]

This is awesome! God bless you guys for doing this

 

[Halliwax]

There are some good theories and rumors out there..

what we know for sure is after ANH, Lucas gifted lukes belt to a crew member

the belt didn’t have the graflex on it when he did..

One possibly it is was already given to someone else or

someone stole it from the set before it went into the archives

it was used as a graflex in Esb (I doubt it because we don’t see any graflex with rivets between the grips)

Lucas kept it for himself (he has a fairly large collection we have never seen, including 1 complete 3po and R2 we have never seen since filming..)

And..

there is a new team of members in the archives opening boxes that having seen the light of day in 40 years.. they are cataloging everything..

who knows they may just find something