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Lightsabers & Blasters Anyone have any idea what to use for grips on a lightsaber?

Discussion in 'Costuming and Props' started by DarkAnd23, Aug 12, 2002.

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  1. Azeem

    Azeem TFN Staff, Manager Emeritus star 4 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

    Registered:
    Apr 12, 1999
  2. G-4P0

    G-4P0 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Jun 21, 2000
    I've used both Blast-Tech (aka Yoda's House) and EDC grips and they are both excellent replica grips for Luke/Vader sabers - and would work just as well on customs. They come with a 3M industrial adhesive tape on the back of them - which works great.
     
  3. Master_Byrd

    Master_Byrd Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Jul 23, 2002
    I pulled a black leather tennis racket grip off of my dad's tennis racket that had been sitting in the garage for as long as I've been alive. Free is always the best.
     
  4. Doright

    Doright Jedi Knight star 5

    Registered:
    Jun 10, 1999
    They do make sticky grip tape too. I tried it once. It was a bit too sticky at first but after a while it works great.

     
  5. BroodMcEto

    BroodMcEto Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Jan 14, 2002
  6. darth_hair

    darth_hair Jedi Master star 5

    Registered:
    May 8, 2001
    a friend of mine has a sabber with the wiper blade type grip . it looks cool but , after about 5 minuets of sparring they started falling off . the double sided tape that was used on her grips was good stuff . i would suggest rivetts .
     
  7. JediDragon

    JediDragon Jedi Master star 5

    Registered:
    Mar 11, 2002
    I think hers would have stayed on better with a better adhesive too, wouldn't they?
     
  8. Jarsis_Stole

    Jarsis_Stole Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    May 26, 2002
    It's also rumoured that the original lightsabers had wiper blades as grips, either MG or British Mini vechile wipers.
     
  9. Darth_Koronus

    Darth_Koronus Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Aug 27, 2002
    Try using a doorbell for the on/off switch.
     
  10. RuffStuff

    RuffStuff Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Sep 8, 2002
    We use rubber car mat for all kind of grips.
    There are loads of different patterns, you just cut a piece to fit, use superglue to join the edges and slide it on.
    make sure you roughen the edges to be glued with a little sandpaper before gluing, push the two sides firmly together and you should be ok.
    You can even cut holes in the pattern which gives a nice finish and you don't have to use a rectangle, one experiment used a diamond shape which looked good too.
     
  11. RuffStuff

    RuffStuff Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Sep 8, 2002
    We use rubber car mat for all kind of grips. There are loads of different patterns, you just cut a piece to fit, use superglue to join the edges and slide it on.
    Make sure you roughen the edges to be glued with a little sandpaper before gluing, push the two sides firmly together and you should be ok.
    You can even cut holes in the pattern which gives a nice finish and you don't have to use a rectangle, one experiment used a diamond shape which looked good too.
    We used ribbed matt to make interesting door handle grips, and on the control yoke for the shuttle set we have just started.
     
  12. Qui-Gon Tim

    Qui-Gon Tim Memphis, TN FanForce Chapter Rep star 5

    Registered:
    Apr 1, 2000
    I just found this site. Check it out.

    http://members.aol.com/EDCstudios/edcsw.htm

    They sell the parts you might be looking for.
     
  13. PadawanNick

    PadawanNick Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Jun 6, 2001
    Bicycle stunt pegs work great too. You can get a box of 2 for $10 at most places that sell bikes (I got mine at Toys 'R Us). They've got some great, machined grips on them and you can find them in chrome, black and sometimes other colors.

    The top saber in this picture is mainly a Sears garden tool. The second one down uses a chrome bike peg.

    [image=http://www.jushhome.com/HiddenPhantom/sabers2.jpg]

    Have fun.
     
  14. DARTHLARS

    DARTHLARS Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 12, 2002
    I am using pieces of plastic pipe, looking in the style of Yoda's saber. First, I coated the pieces with black acrylic paint. Then I added a tiny amount of latex to the paint for the second layer. The third layer contains even more latex.
    The latex in the paint smoothened out any brushmarks, but I had to redo a few pieces because of some dust particles in the latex paint which get amplified.
     
  15. Stephan2312

    Stephan2312 Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    Sep 6, 2002
    I use rubber carrier straps for my grips:

    see my pictures here

    Stephan
     
  16. Sister_Sola

    Sister_Sola Manager Emeritus star 4 VIP - Former Mod/RSA

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    Nov 19, 2002
  17. SpastikMonkii

    SpastikMonkii Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    May 29, 2005
    Jedi Girl of Corellia and Shara, you guys said you used leather strips for saber grips. I'm planning to do that, but had a few questions. 1. Where did you guys get the leather? I assume it was just scraps and hopefully didn't cost too much. And B. how did you actually attach the leather to the hilt? Glue? Rivet? Thanks!
     
  18. Woofer

    Woofer Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 27, 2001
    Now that this has been unlocked...

    Ignore that post about about EDC Studios. Stay AWAY!

    Unless you like to give money away and not getting anything back.

    On topic what I used on my latest custom sabre is electrical cord! The flat kind with the groove in the middle. I added a thin brass rod from a hobby shop into the groove to make it less obvious and capped the ends with small rubber thingies I bought surplus.

    Its a good height, provides a decent grip and unlike other rubber materials does not make your hands dirty.
     
  19. setra

    setra Jedi Youngling star 2

    Registered:
    May 12, 2005
    mud flaps cut into strips worked perfectly on mine
     
  20. Plo_Strax-Avix

    Plo_Strax-Avix Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    May 29, 2005
    Quote Jarsis_Stole:
    It's also rumoured that the original lightsabers had wiper blades as grips, either MG or British Mini vechile wipers.

    Using windshield wiper blade is a common misconception when making sabers, like how I found out the really hard way...

    The original wiper blades used(if you don't already know) were taken from trucks or even tanks built in the 50s/60s/70s, and their wiper blades were nowhere near as sophisticated as today's wiper blades. Those were simpler times, and their wiper blades were basically just T shaped rigid rubber strips, without any fancy bits found on today's high-tech, multi-faceted, super-duper rubber or teflon wiper blades.

    Modern wiper blades are slim, flexible and extremely thin, and are totally not suitable as lightsaber grips.
     
  21. The_awesome_jedi

    The_awesome_jedi Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    May 25, 2005
    Oh, really? They work just fine for me... Anyway, O-rings work nice and so do the grips from conversion kits. I found a piece of something or other and glued it to my saber and it came out great...That somethingorother stuff is cheap if not free and looks good, especially if you know how to spruce up stuff. I think the easiest thing I've ever used is a soup can that I cut and wrapped around a handle. I glued it on and then put O-rings in the grooves. Sadly I sold this lightsaber to one of my friends fir some haloween party he was going to (WHat he doesn't kow is that I've made 3 more since then. Heheheheh...)
     
  22. anyte

    anyte Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    May 30, 2005
    My friend Brian has made a few lightsabers. On one he used just two different kinds of piping, on one he actually used the outside rubber part of an old flashlight (I'm guessing it was a big metal one with a rubber grip that slipped off). It's just a matter of looking at what you have around or can get cheaply and going "okay, that would work..."
     
  23. Woofer

    Woofer Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 27, 2001
    The original grips were not wiper blades.

    That was conjecture being stated as fact.

    The actual item used was in fact T-track used in cabinets. The stuff to keep sliding doors in the right groove. Its stil not certain if they were metal or plastic, but plastic seems to be the leading guess since apparently some were painted.

    The T-track used has not been found. Its British and from the 70's. There are some that a very similar but not the exact profile.

    Any website that says they used wiper blades probably still lists a motorcylce grip being used as part of Obi-Wan's lightsabre.
     
  24. The_awesome_jedi

    The_awesome_jedi Jedi Youngling star 1

    Registered:
    May 25, 2005
    And where exactly did you get this startling new information?
     
  25. Jedi_Master_Ace

    Jedi_Master_Ace Jedi Youngling

    Registered:
    Jun 10, 2005
    Probably from here: http://www.partsofsw.com/esbsksab.htm
     
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