Canadian inventors have made every Star Wars fan's dream come alive after creating the world’s first retractable proto-lightsaber.
James Hobson, founder of Hacksmith Industries and known as “The Hacksmith” on YouTube, was inspired to build a real-life lightsaber as a tribute to one of his favorite movies. He did so with the help of fellow inventor Bogdan Malynovskyy (also Canada).
The saber itself is designed to resemble the ones that are used by Jedi Knights, and Is attached to tanks of liquid propane gas and oxygen gas to create the high level of heat required to make the plasma beam.
Once lit, the beam heats up to an impressive yet terrifying 2,204 °C (4,000°F), meaning it can cut through almost anything!
James manipulates the color of the beam by using different kinds of salts infused with the heat.
Although he is now an official Guinness World Records title holder for his latest creation, many are left wondering what drove the engineer to build this in the first place.
A dreamer himself, James’ mission is to have fiction become reality and has made this the foundation of his company.
“We take fictional ideas from comics, movies & video games and make real working prototypes as a way to inspire youth into science, technology and engineering!”
He quit his job as a product developer early on in his career to be able to dedicate his entire life making impressively engineered mechanisms that many think only exist in the imaginary world of science fiction.
In his series “Make It Real” he has made other objects such as Spiderman’s wall climbers, Wonder Woman’s lasso, and Wolverine’s claws!
James says the main influence for his projects stems from the principles of British author Arthur C. Clarke who penned 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Clarke’s Three Laws state:
- When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
- The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
- Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
With this in mind, it’s easy to see why James has managed to fashion such incredible inventions.
In fact, his work has motivated many young individuals around the world who have seen his creations on YouTube to get more involved in engineering and STEM research.
Now that he’s managed to break his first official record, we look forward to seeing how James can bring his next invention to life.
Related Articles
