Other real world applications for Light Sabres?

[aussiemuscle308]

what else can you use this archaic weapon for? (in world) i've seen a little one in a fan film used as a cheese slicer/torture device.

[DudeGuyMan]

Any safecracker would pay everything he owned for one.

[Eleas]

What you'd have is essentially a light-weight, portable thermic lance. That sort of thing would have a shitload of applications. A fireman, for one, would likely sell his soul to get ahold of one.

[Srelex]

Industrial cutting tool.

[Molyneux]

Exotic lawnmower.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I would imagine it could also have fantastic medical applications. If you made the blade smaller and finer, you have a scalpel that cuts easily through any tissue and cauterises the cuts so no bleeding. That would make stuff like battlefield triage much easier.

THe aforementioned industrial cutting tools, Jaws of Life for firemen, all useful. Also the numerous illegal uses like safecracking, breaking and entering and so forth.

[Kingmaker]

You could hold it up at rock concerts.

Dangerous shaving device.
Laser jousting.
Portable power generator (use it to move a small steam turbine) - of course, if you have the power source to make a lightsaber, this is kind of pointless.

[Simon_Jester]

My god, the power source would be ridiculously valuable too. Something that compact, stable, and high-power... wow.

[Connor MacLeod]

My god, the power source would be ridiculously valuable too. Something that compact, stable, and high-power... wow.

They generally run off the SW equivlaent of a battery (power cell I think they call it) It's small and powerful yes, but not exactly rare or excpetional that I recall. I mean, Corran fucking Horn built a lightsaber out of spare parts he found around a planet, nevermind what Luke did on Tattooine. Exotic battery tech isn't unsuual in Star Wars.


The main applicaiton I think of when I see a lightsaber is as some sort of projectile. Imagine creating a bullet or warhead that projects a lightsaber like blade temporarily. The ultimate shaped charge.

[Simon_Jester]

I'm not sure it'd outperform real shaped charges; it's quite possible to build a shaped charge that penetrates lightsaber-deep into normal materials.

The power source isn't unusual in Star Wars, but in terms of real world applications, batteries that compact and energetic would have a tremendous range of uses. In fact, they do exactly that in Star Wars- high energy density technology plays a big role in so many things they can do.

[Sarevok]

I imagine a lightsaber would make a fantastic component of any armor piercing munition...

Edit : Ack ! Beaten to it by Connor.

[Serafina]

I'm not sure it'd outperform real shaped charges; it's quite possible to build a shaped charge that penetrates lightsaber-deep into normal materials.

The power source isn't unusual in Star Wars, but in terms of real world applications, batteries that compact and energetic would have a tremendous range of uses. In fact, they do exactly that in Star Wars- high energy density technology plays a big role in so many things they can do.

Ah, but the shaped charge is expende upon use, while the lightsaber can be reused and recharged. It also saves a lot of space, a small baton and an extra battery or two are much easier to carry than an assortment of shaped charges, and certainly easier to hide.

[Kristoff]

Knife that toasts bread while you're slicing it!
~1:00 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ttzWuaPGMo

[Metahive]

Funky, reusable glowstick for the next rave party.

[Simon_Jester]

Ah, but the shaped charge is expende upon use, while the lightsaber can be reused and recharged. It also saves a lot of space, a small baton and an extra battery or two are much easier to carry than an assortment of shaped charges, and certainly easier to hide.

Yes, but a lightsaber is a melee weapon, bad for fighting tanks.

Reusability is not a major concern in man-portable antitank weapons, simply because if your infantry unit can't carry enough rockets to kill all the tanks the enemy throws at you, the sheer firepower of the tanks will probably wipe you out anyway.

To make a lightsaber-analogue effective against tanks, you'd need a delivery vehicle: essentially, a rocket with a lightsaber as the warhead or something. That would be rather difficult to build, and it would make it very unlikely that you'd be able to recover the 'saber afterward.

[Vehrec]

Actually, I think a lightsaber tipped projectile would work pretty well-so long as the 'cutting edge' was wider than the 'hilt'. And you would need to hold it stable as it cut it's way into whatever you shot it at, tumbling would be a bad thing.

[Simon_Jester]

It would probably work; it's just that reusability is an unlikely goal to get out of the design.

[Ford Prefect]

The main applicaiton I think of when I see a lightsaber is as some sort of projectile. Imagine creating a bullet or warhead that projects a lightsaber like blade temporarily. The ultimate shaped charge.

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 has shown that lightsabers that fly like missiles is pretty much the coolest thing since lightsabers.

[Enigma]

I think soldiers or spec op teams would love it (as long as they don't use it at night. lol ). They'd love it even more if it as smaller.

Special police units like SWAT would find it quite useful.

Lumber companies would climb over each other for cutters that uses lightsabers instead of saws to cut down trees.

If it can be made small to dagger size or even smaller than that then they'd be perfect for police departments or any profession that might benefit from it.

Right now I have a mental image of a soldier climbing on top of an enemy tank and lopping off the gun barrel with his lightsaber. lol

[Sea Skimmer]

To make a lightsaber-analogue effective against tanks, you'd need a delivery vehicle: essentially, a rocket with a lightsaber as the warhead or something. That would be rather difficult to build, and it would make it very unlikely that you'd be able to recover the 'saber afterward.

Using a cluster of them on the nose of a bunker busting bomb is more likely then attacking a tank. But I mean hey, if you could make them absurdly cheap enough I can see a bomb which releases hundreds of self igniting lightsabers being a very viable weapon.

[Darth Tanner]

Lumber companies would climb over each other for cutters that uses lightsabers instead of saws to cut down trees.

Wouldn’t that have rather a large risk of starting forest fires going off of its thermal effect on metals? Although I'd imagine it would still be easier to cut a tree down with a light sabre and then drench it with a hose than getting a huge chainsaw in with all the dangers that creates.

[Sarevok]

What about lightsabers as a fuel rod analogues in a nuclear reactor ? Put lightsaber in contact with water and use the steam to drive a turbine !

[Metahive]

That depends entirely on how cheap it is to build a lightsabre powercell and how much juice they can hold. Modern lightsabres were build to only drain power upon coming in contact with other objects, that's why earlier lightsabres who lacked this feature required their wielders to use cumbersome external powercells. Taxing a lightsabre like this might just not be very energy-efficient.

[Captain Seafort]

That depends entirely on how cheap it is to build a lightsabre powercell and how much juice they can hold. Modern lightsabres were build to only drain power upon coming in contact with other objects, that's why earlier lightsabres who lacked this feature required their wielders to use cumbersome external powercells. Taxing a lightsabre like this might just not be very energy-efficient.

You'd also have to charge the power cell in the first place, presumably from the existing power grid, so what's point of draining that energy from the grid to charge a lightsaber to power a steam turbine to add some fraction of that energy back into the grid?

[Rossum]

Lets see...

A drill or cutting instrument for cutting out rock to dig tunnels (not sure how energy efficient it would be to regularly cut rock with them, or how safe it would be to use it in enclosed spaces).

A trap to cut the tires off a car (or tank). You could have it pointed sideways to slash off the bottom few inches of the vehicles tire or have it in the ground facing up to bisect the thing. Though I suppose traditional road-spikes, caltrops, and land mines would work for that.

Install one of these on an unmanned drone and go to town! A little flying airplane like thing could fly down low to the ground, pull out a lightsaber, and start slashing through the tops of vehicles or cutting pipes or bridge supports. Or if you want to attack vehicles on the ground, have a wheeled robot with a lightsaber. It could probably pull off some stuff by just spinning its top at high speeds and shredding whatever it touches.



Considering the lightsaber can deflect blaster bolts with reasonable accuracy (given jedi premonition) you could probably use it inside of something like a particle accelerator or a fusion plant or whatever else needs to manipulate stuff with energy.

Could it work as a point-defence system? I'm sure a robotics expert could build a radar-enabled robot arm that could continuously pull off the jedi deflect-balster-bolts trick. Though how a lightsaber would work on machinegun fire or grenades would be tough to say. Imagine a politician walking around with robotic security guards who could each whip out a lighsaber and deflect sniper bullets in 0.0001 seconds (or whatever other speeds would be realistic when sniper bullets are involved... those things can go supersonic can't they?). Actually... I'm sure if lightsabers are involved then somone could just build regular laser with the power packs to weaponize them. So an asassin would likely just use a laser (which travels at lightspeed). You would need a bodyguard who could see the future to be able to deflect a laser.

Use it in a scrapyard to cut used cars and such into small pieces.

If you get a whole bunch of them put together you could build an inpenatrable energy wall and I'm sure that could be useful.

Two lightsabers hitting eachother bounce off (or impact) so you've got a way to make semi-solid rods out of energy. Turn the power way down until the 'blade is just a rod that can impact other lightsaber blades and you could use them as some kind of temporary expandable building blocks or something. Maybe build a bridge by having two long ones build rails to the other side of a gap and then ride a sort of cart across them where the cart has mini-lightsabers as wheels or repulsers.

If the above thing works... maybe use the technology in making light rail trains?