How to make a real lightsaber. A new hope: how to create a lightsaber? How to make Obi-Wan's lightsaber

They have been trying to create a lightsaber for more than a dozen years. So far, all we have is a plastic toy that turns on with the right sound, glows in the dark and breaks after a couple of hits. But the inventive idea does not stand still, and there are already really working prototypes, and something can even be ordered on the Internet.

Have an idea lightsaber there are several obvious flaws. For example, the fact that the beam of light cannot be stopped, so the sword will cut not only the ceiling above the Jedi's head, but also the roof, planes flying past and celestial bodies. However, the laser pointer is the most obvious way to create a lightsaber, and some inventors have gone that route, postponing the problem of (infinite) beam length until later.

1. Pointer

So far, the most dangerous laser pointer with a Jedi handle was created by enthusiast Anthony Drake. A guy a little over 20 runs a Youtube channel, where he shows his crazy inventions in a good way. First of all, he is interested in lasers. So, inspired by the seventh film in the series, Drake presented his prototype of the sword.

Drake's device has a power of 7 watts, while under US law, lasers with a power of more than 0.005 watts are prohibited from selling. Therefore, the guy makes them himself, for example, from parts of an ordinary computer. To create the sword, he used a Nichia GaN laser diode, "overclocking" it to 7 watts. A coated lens was used to focus the beam. The device is powered by two unprotected lithium-ion batteries connected in series.

With such a sword, you can cut electrical tape, burn a paper cup, set fire to paper or wood, which Drake demonstrates in his videos. I must say that the laser pointer is rather a step back for the inventor. A few months earlier, he had constructed a 40-watt "laser shotgun". At the same time, according to the video blogger, a prototype laser gun with a power of 10-30 thousand watts is being tested in the US Navy.

If Drake's laser sword, apparently, still exists in a single copy, then you can order a 2-watt laser pointer right now. The Spyder III Arctic model, of course, cuts and burns paper more slowly, but its handle is so authentic that Lucasfilms even considered suing the manufacturer. And a pointer costs almost as much as an exact toy replica of a lightsaber.

2. Lighter

Another inventor and vlogger named Allen radically solved the problem of the infinite length of the lightblade. Instead of concentrating a beam of light, he made a blade using an ignited stream of combustible mixture.

Such a sword does not cut, but only burns, but that's why it looks no less cool. True, the blade turned out to be somewhat thinner than the usual Jedi blades, and to add authenticity to the invention, Allen screwed a miniature speaker to it, which emits a characteristic sound when fuel is supplied. The flame is maintained with butane using methanol and acetone as fuel. Judging by the slightly frightened face of the inventor, the technology is not yet very stable, so we wish him good luck in further tests.

3. Razor

When it became known about the beginning of JJ Abrams' work on the next series of the franchise, a team of seasoned startups decided to give the world a truly useful laser blade. As you know, the main problem of a good half of humanity in the 21st century is irritation after shaving. And in response to this challenge, the Kickstarter crowdfunding platform began to raise money to create a laser razor.

According to the authors of the project, $160,000 was needed to develop the technology and create a working prototype. They promised that a laser razor would shave not only black, but also colorless hairs (for this, biologists discovered a special substance in the hair and tuned the radiation to it). As a result, thanks to photoshop shots, confident speech and white coats, more than $4 million was raised for the project.

All that startupers could do in a few months from the start of the project was a new video with incomprehensible graphics and not so confident voices. Then Kickstarter froze fundraising, starting the process of returning money to those who were not afraid of the theoretical possibility of cutting the cheek with a laser in the morning before work.

4. Table knife

The most stable blade, which does not need recharging or refueling, is practically eternal and, most importantly, certified by Lucas and Disney, the Star Wars blade costs only a thousand rubles. And in the kit, in addition to the sword, which cuts the steak faster than the current industrial lasers, you will also get a fork with a spoon. Everything with Jedi handles is natural. For a complete set, you can take sticks in the form of two Luke swords for the same price.

Why a lightsaber is impossible

But seriously, the possibility of creating a lightsaber is seriously complicated by several theoretical problems at once. First, the already mentioned light. As user Sergey Bunevich notes on The Question, “Light, like other electromagnetic radiation, propagates through space in a straight line at a constant speed, which in a vacuum is about 300,000 km/s (the speed of light in matter can be less). In addition, in the absence of a medium that scatters light, the beam cannot be seen.<...>Thus, if we neglect the curvature of space-time, such a "light blade" simply cannot look like a column of light of a certain length.

Secondly, plasma. If we assume that “lightsaber” is just a beautiful term and the sword has the same relation to light as the mortar to mines (link to the post about mortars in LiveJournal), then most likely it should function as follows: a plasma arc is created , which is stretched by a magnetic field and held in a certain shape. The same field should reflect blaster shots, which are probably also plasma clots.

A similar technology for working with plasma already exists. With its help, for example, they cut metal in factories. But the length of the arc in such installations does not exceed a few centimeters. You can try to stretch the arc, but it will be extremely unstable, it will constantly deviate to the sides, trying to "stick" to the nearest surface.

In addition, the plasma is "used up" and cools down. “In plasma cutting, plasma is created by a powerful jet of gas passing through an electric arc. It will take a lot of plasma to cut metal, like in the movie,” notes Bunevich. Well, the last problem, which also cannot be solved without supernatural power, is the electricity needed in large quantities to keep the cutter working.

If all these problems can be solved, the appearance of a lightsaber is quite possible. Read more about the correct scientific point view of the way it functions can be found in the book "Physics of the Impossible" by the famous popularizer of science Michio Kaku. It operates with several scientific instruments that do not exist in reality, but on the whole it is correct and understandable to the widest range of readers.

How to make a Jedi sword with your own hands aslan wrote in January 6th, 2018

In this post I will tell you how to make a lightsaber completely with your own hands:

To begin with, we need such a diagram with drawings of the original handle.

As a basis, I took a plastic PVC pipe gray color with thin walls with a diameter of 40 mm. I don’t remember the exact name, but in a hardware store you can easily find it in the plumbing department.

mark on it the length of the future handle.

Print and put on the pipe:

We cut off. It turns out like this:

Drilling holes in the ears:

We apply it to the handle according to the diagram, mark the position and make a cut for the power buttons.

And glue it

Now that the glue has hardened, we carefully level everything with a fine sandpaper, we go over the entire surface of the handle. After that, using a solvent, degrease the entire surface of the handle, prime and paint.

After the first layer dries (after about a day), we add plastic decor elements according to the scheme and paint again.

This is the paint I used

She fits best. Before that, I took cheaper paint from FOX, it turned out to be terrible, it darkens when touched, and after varnishing it becomes completely dark gray.

According to the scheme, we make a ring, and also paint it, it is possible in one layer.

After the paint has completely dried (in a day), we cover the handle with a glossy varnish

From plastic, according to the scheme, we cut out the last design elements, glue them with the letter T, paint them in matt black and glue them to the handle.

It turns out such a great handle

Now about the stuffing.

The whole filling is assembled according to this scheme:

A 12 volt battery can be purchased at a RU toy store or airsoft equipment store. The 12 - 5 volt converter is a regular USB car charger for the cigarette lighter.

Sound cards may be different. I usually take from HASBRO swords, but now they sell cheap swords at Fix Price, they have an identical copy of the HASBRO sound card installed, apparently someone was not too lazy to copy it. The sound quality is excellent.

You also need a speaker, it is best to take from portable acoustics. 4 watt 4 amp speakers work best, they are bassy and vibrate well.

For all this electronics, you will need a chassis so that you can easily disassemble the sword for repair or upgrade at any time. We cut out from the same pipe, I got something like this:

We insert it into the handle, mark the hole for the button and fill it with:

the next in turn is the battery, the positive wire is immediately output to the button.

And then according to the scheme, the rest of the electronics. It is very important that the 5 - 12 volt converter be connected after the button and not before it.

Now all this stuff can be attached to the handle

We add a button cut out of the cartridge from SEGI, and from the bottom we put plastic so that the buttons are pressed and you're done.

This is the beauty we have

Fortunately, there is such a mechanism. Plasma, composed of charged particles (at high speed), can be manipulated by magnetic fields. In fact, some of the most promising nuclear fusion technologies use magnetic fields to confine plasma. The temperature and total energy contained in the synthesized plasma are so high that even a metal vessel containing them would melt.

Maybe lightsabers would work. Strong magnetic fields, coupled with super-hot and dense plasma, offer a possible way to create a lightsaber. But we're not done yet.

If we take two tubes of plasma that are held magnetically, they will go right through each other... there will be no epic duels. Therefore, we need to figure out how to make swords have a hard core. And the material of which it will consist must be resistant to high temperatures.

Ceramics that can be exposed to high temperatures without melting, softening, or warping may be suitable. But the hard ceramic core has a problem: when the Jedi does not use the sword, it hangs from his belt, and the handle is 20-25 centimeters long. The ceramic core should pop out of the handle like the devil out of a snuffbox.

Brute force

This is how I (Don Lincoln) envision the construction of a lightsaber, although my project also has problems. In Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope, Obi-Wan Kenobi cuts off an alien's hand with a light, casual motion. This moment silently indicates how hot the plasma should be.

In Star Wars Episode I - The Phantom Menace, Qui-Gon Jinn inserts his lightsaber into a heavy door, first making a deep cut and then simply melting it down. If you look at this sequence and assume that the door is steel, take into account the time spent on heating and melting the metal, you can calculate the energy that such a sword should have. It comes out somewhere around 20 megawatts. Given the average consumption of a household electrical outlet - approximately 1.4 kilowatts - one lightsaber can power 14,000 ordinary houses until the battery runs out.

A power source of this density is clearly beyond the limits of modern technology, but perhaps we can assume that the Jedi know some secret. After all, they travel faster than the speed of light.

But there is a physical problem. Such energy implies that the plasma will be incredibly hot and only a few inches away from the sword wielder's hand. And this heat will be radiated in the form of infrared radiation. The Jedi's hand should instantly char. So, some force must keep the heat. Again, sword blades use optical wavelengths, so the force field must hold infrared but let visible light through.

Such technical research inevitably leads to the need for unknown technologies. But at least we can just say that a lightsaber is made up of some kind of concentrated energy contained in a force field.

Memory tells how Michael Okuda, technical consultant for the Star Trek franchise, explained the new technology that made transporters possible. He said there were "Heisenberg compensators" supposedly needed to correct problems caused by Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. It's the famous quantum mechanical principle that you can't know both the location and speed of a particle with high precision at the same time. Since a person is made up of many particles (atoms and their constituents), if you ever try to scan someone to find out the location of all their atoms, you cannot accurately measure their position and movement. So, when you try to reassemble someone, you can't accurately assemble protons, neutrons, and electrons together. At a deep and fundamental physical level, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle says that such transporters are impossible. But who is Heisenberg to the creators of Star Trek? When Time journalists asked how such a device works, they answered “very well, thank you.”

Still, it was interesting to see how close modern science is to creating iconic sci-fi technology. In the case of the lightsaber, the best modern technology can do is a plasma weapon enclosed in a magnetic field. Yes, it will also have a ceramic core that uses a very dense energy source, as well as a force field that blocks infrared, but not visible radiation. Ugh, just spit.

It remains to ask the engineers how difficult it will be to do all this. But they can, right?

A large number of boys and adult men around the world are fans of George Lucas' famous Star Wars saga. Who among them did not dream of becoming the owner of a real Jedi sword, flying through the labyrinths of the Death Star, or becoming a student of the wise Yoda? If it is problematic to realize the last desires, then the first one can be dealt with in one evening. How to make a lightsaber with your own hands, read the article below.

Making Jedi Weapons

In order to make a lightsaber with your own hands, you will need to purchase LEDs and an LED flashlight, plastic rods, resistors, aluminum foil, tape, glue, sandpaper and heat shrink tubing.

Disassemble the flashlight and remove the board from it by removing the LED. Mount your own LED and resistor on the board. Put heat shrink tubing on the resistor so it will hold on tight. How to make a real lightsaber? Of course you need a blade.

It is made from a transparent plastic rod of the desired length (if necessary, cut off the excess). Fasten the rod into the screwdriver, sharpening one end for this. Adjust the other end to the diameter of the flashlight body with a file.

We continue to work on light weapons

Now you need to carefully sand the entire area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe blade with sandpaper. This is done so that the light falling on the sword is scattered evenly.

Then coat the end of the plastic tube with glue and insert it into the flashlight body. Real fans don't stop there. How to make a lightsaber realistic? Add decorations to the body. To do this, take aluminum and copper foil or tape. Glue the body of the handle. Now the weapon looks more like a formidable intergalactic sword.

Both a child and an adult Star Wars fan will be delighted with such a gift.

How to make Obi-Wan's lightsaber

The episode of the famous saga called "A New Hope", where Obi-Wan fights Darth Vader with lightsabers, inspires awe in many fans. Such a sword can be built at home, however, this will require more skill than for the weapons described above. But that doesn't stop the men.

How to make Obi-Wan's lightsaber Take a piece of aluminum pipe and put it on a thin oblong lamp. Don't forget to connect the emitter. So the sword will burn for real. The controller is better built into the handle, the batteries are placed inside the hollow pipe. Attach a metal cylinder to the emitter, the sleeve will strengthen the effect of the emitter. The work is painstaking, all the wires must exactly fall into place.

Some craftsmen manage to create a sword from a nickel furniture leg and a polycarbonate tube. How to make a lightsaber from these items? Insert the colored diode into the holder for three batteries, place it in a metal pen (not forgetting the resistor). Secure the hilt and sword with electrical tape.

It remains only to decorate the craft at will.

How to make a lightsaber at home?

The imagination of space saga lovers never stops, they come up with many options for making light weapons. The sword can be crafted from cold neon. It is an electroluminescent cord that gives a bewitchingly bright glow. Connect neon and thin steel cord. Then connect the cord to the inverter, which is powered by batteries. It remains to attach the resulting weapon to the handle. Use an old flashlight housing instead - this is the most popular option. When you improve your skills, you will be able to create a double-edged Jedi sword.

Making a sword with a child

If a little admirer of the saga lives in the house, sooner or later he will ask you to give him a lightsaber, because playing with him is so exciting. Do not rush to upset the child, together with him you can come up with an easy option from improvised materials. For this you need a flashlight.

How to make a lightsaber out of paper? Find a lantern with a white lamp. It should shine brightly, otherwise the game will be less interesting. If your flashlight has become dim, change the batteries or purchase a new lamp.

What color sword would you like to create? Find the shade of polyethylene you want. Cut out a piece that will cover the front of the lantern completely and attach. Then take a few sheets of white A4 paper. Wrap the top of the lantern with the first sheet, securing from the inside with double-sided tape. If you see that the edges of the paper come one after the other, trim them. So the light will be distributed evenly.

Roll up the second sheet. Fix it on the first sheet of paper, trying to go on it as little as possible. Make the sword further by attaching paper rolls one on top of the other. It is not worth creating a very long blade, otherwise it will bend under its own weight. Turn on the flashlight and enjoy

If there is no time to create a sword

If you do not have extra time, perseverance or materials, but you still want to please yourself or your neighbor with an interesting gift, you can order a real laser sword. The Americans came up with a wonderful sword, the heart of which is a real laser. A weak red sword costs about 1800 rubles, and a powerful green sword costs 4800. It has a comfortable handle, amazing design and a built-in pressure sensor. The weight of such a weapon is about one kilogram.

You can make your own Jedi sword different ways. Some do not require anything other than a flashlight and plain paper, others will require many skills from you (knowledge in the field of electrics, soldering, and so on). Each fan of a star film can independently choose the option that is suitable for him.

• Translation

Thanks to the extensive white paper created by the writers, we have a pretty good idea of ​​how May be set up a lightsaber. And for several decades now, millions of fans of the Star Wars universe have dreamed of creating such technology. Let's see, in what approximation does modern science allow us to create a weapon a la lightsaber?



This is what the "original" lightsaber looks like cutaway.

First, let's figure out how the Jedi lightsaber works. Despite the name, this weapon's beam is not made of light. This is an erroneous term (if at all one can speak of an erroneous this case) of the same order as the "shooting star" in relation to meteoroids burning up in the Earth's atmosphere. Poetic, but nothing more. The most correct description of the principle of operation of a lightsaber would be the following: a plasma arc is created, which, with the help of a magnetic field and a focusing crystal, is “stretched” into a long thin line. But you need to keep in mind that something very similar to the power used by the Jedi and Sith to manipulate physical objects is involved here.

As an illustration from real life you can bring this electric arc, which changes its shape under the influence of a magnetic field while playing music:

Another arc example:

It is quite possible to imagine how this arc is “taken” in the middle and extended by about a meter, turning into a “blade” of the sword. Although in reality this is a very difficult task, but we will return to this later.

Today we already use technologies that are very close to the above description of the principle of operation of a lightsaber. For example, metal cutting machines in factories around the world use a "beam" of ultra-hot plasma (up to 40,000 degrees).

This diagram shows the construction of a plasma cutter, and it is similar to how a lightsaber might be constructed. Unfortunately, that's where the similarities end. The formed arc is very small in size (in the diagram it is indicated by a blue line). It ignites the pressurized gas, which acts as a heat transfer medium, drawing the energy of the arc out.

The main "disadvantage" of a plasma cutter, from the point of view of our task, is the very small size of the arc. In the best case, it can be "stretched" up to 12-15 cm. In addition, these devices consume a huge amount of electricity. The torch nozzle must be constantly cooled with running water, otherwise it will melt very quickly. In some torches, the gas flow acts as the cathode and the surface being cut acts as the anode. As a result, the plasma arc is relatively long and extended outside the apparatus. But in any case, such plasma torches cannot be used as weapons. If only because first you have to connect a high voltage cable to your opponent.

So far, we do not have the technology to stretch and hold the arc using a magnetic field. Even if pulled outward from some hypothetical handle, it will be unstable, constantly deviating to the sides at random, trying to "stick" to the nearest surface.

In addition, since the arc will be an extremely elongated loop, the closely spaced branches will simply merge and the arc will shorten again. But even if we somehow solve both of the described problems, we still have others: a powerful loss of heat and the intangible, so to speak, nature of the arc, that is, with its help it is impossible to block or parry the blow of the enemy’s weapon.

Another way

Probably worth thinking in a completely different direction. So, our task is to create a hand weapon capable of cutting various materials, having a luminous “retractable” blade. To date, the closest option theoretically available to us is a string of several filaments consisting of carbon nanotubes. The cutting ability of the string can be imparted by means of a pulsating electromagnetic field and/or plasma. This kind of "energy vibro-sword" in its design will resemble a bow, because you need to somehow pull this wire. Otherwise, you get a whip, not a sword.

To ensure the "retractability" of the blade, it may be necessary to make the rigid part of the blade telescopic, and place the wire in the form of a coil in the handle. To ensure high mechanical strength, the telescopic part can also be made of carbon nanotubes. The rigid part of the blade will be thin enough to pass through the material being cut following the hot wire, and at the same time thick enough to withstand the blow of the opponent's weapon.

To maximize the life of the cutting wire and reduce heat loss, it is necessary to apply energy just before contact with the surface being cut, starting a pulse from the handle to the tip. The filaments forming the wire will gradually wear out as the charge travels from the outer layers of the wire to the core. As a result, the effect of permanent ablation will be observed, which will require regular renewal of the wire, because it will be very thin. The thinner it is, the higher the cutting ability of the weapon will be.

The energy source will still be very large, it may have to be carried in a backpack. It will be necessary to solve the problem of thermal insulation of the handle, including by forcibly limiting the time of continuous operation. Given the very high brightness of the glow of the hot wire, you will need to use special light-protective glasses. If we are talking about using the most advanced achievements of science, then glasses can also be not just optical filters. Perhaps it would be advisable to use smart glasses. While perfectly transparent when worn normally, they will dynamically darken or render opaque only a small area of ​​the field of view, just enough to cover a hot glowing wire.

As a result, the described “energy vibro-sword” could look like this:

And what more or less accessible (or promising) technologies would you suggest using for such hand weapons?