I think there are a few reasons why the lights we had changed. Like Seth said stuff kept falling off so they decided to screw/rivet the tracks on giving it a different appearance.
But in ESB we also got a clamp card instead of bubbles and a extra red button
Which I personally believe is just a artist taking claim to their new version.
Just like TFA, they wanted something accurate to ESB which they did sort’a. The artist also shaved the knurling off the glass eye, giving it his own personal touch
As of recent we have learned roger Christian didn’t like the grips having screws:rivets in ESB.. so he didn’t like the artists new vision
As of canon story wise, why the lightsaber changes we may have that explained real soon...
It the book “heir to the Jedi” which takes place right after ANH. Luke goes on a little adventure, he wants to take his graflex apart but afraid he won’t be able to put it back together because he’s not strong enough with the force.
He ends up finding a alien who sees his Lightsaber and brings him to a shrine where there is something like it. If my memory serves me correct this second Lightsaber is a Crossguard version
Luke then starts to play with the cross guard taking it apart and examining it. He may have even aligned the crystals.. I’m sorry the book was so horrible I lost total interest.
So I wouldn’t put it past me if we do get a book or canon explanation to why the graflex looks different from ANH to ESB.. and it would be like upgrading it. We know he’s always tinkering in uncle Owens garage so it wouldn’t be out of the blue for him to do so
And as for the graflex in TFA looking different from ESB. That’s easy, some things broke and needed to be replaced
We have also learned that after the Jedi purge lightsabers were illegal and many people collected them. I could see them still collecting them come 30 years after RoTJ. And I can also see this small illegal Lightsaber community having some kind of grand master tinkerer who repairs them
Maybe the fall from cloud city damaged the graflex, and a collector fixed it himself with restoring the grips, and installing a new glass eye
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk