Light Saber Saga Continues

It looked as if the light saber would be almost complete last night. Chuck brought the tools and parts over to our house and he and Sean sanded out some of the paint from inside the PVC so the metal pipes would fit into it. It was a very tight squeeze.
They thought if they got some of the paint scraped out of the inside of the plastic pipe, the metal pipe would slide into place easier. (The outside is PVC and the pattern calls for a metal pipe inside the PVC)
Chuck scraped and sanded and Sean provided moral support. Sean was eager to use the tool that sets the rivets, so Chuck showed him how it would work.

After getting the paint scraped out, the metal pipes still didn't want to slide in. So they tried vegetable oil first. That didn't work, so using their knowledge of science, and how plastic expands when it gets warm, and other things tend to constrict when they're cold, they decided that warming the plastic PVC and cooling the metal might work.
After dinner they set the PVC pipe in the oven (it was turned off but still warm) and the metal pipe in the freezer.

Yeah, that still didn't work.

They brought out a couple of different hammers to pound the metal pipes into the PVC form and it looked as if that might work, though it was creating a lip on the end of the metal pipe.

Then I heard, "Well, that didn't work."

There were several weak spots in the PVC because of the cutout design. One of those weak spots gave way. Because Sean was so excited to use the rivet tool, Chuck had him go ahead and set a rivet so he could see how it will look when it's finished.

This wonderful man is nothing if not determined to finish a job.

I made lunch for him this afternoon and took it to the fire station. We ate together and it was nice to sit with him for a while. It was a nice break for me because work has been especially difficult for the past few days.

He said he has already obtained replacement parts to start over on this light saber project. They learned a lot during the first attempt, and he's sure they can find a better way. 

That's not the only thing we talked about at lunch, but I thought it was funny that he brought it up. He wants to build one for himself, too.