I’ve been collecting a lot of Star Wars toys lately, and one of the things I was most excited to get was the latest version of Hasbro’s big X-wing. Amazingly enough, the modern X-wing mold’s origin can still be traced back to 1998’s Power of the Jedi 2 Electronic Power F/X X-wing mold. I remember seeing TV commercials for the Power F/X toy back in the day, but never had one. The mold has gone through a number of revisions, but the bones are still the same in today’s X-wing toy. I was thrilled to get a big new X-wing toy, but I was incredible disappointed by the S-foil deployment gimmick when I finally put the toy together. Out of the box, the wings are saggy, loose, and do not deploy evenly. I figured the mechanism could not be that complicated, so I cracked open my new X-wing and got to work. The jist of the mechanism is a lever that depresses a spring-loaded plunger that deploys the wings. The level slides to the side to lock in place, but when slide to the side the lever does not depress the plunger evenly or far enough, so the wings are uneven and floppy. I fired up the computer and designed a new piece and printed it on my 3D printer, going through a half dozen iterations in a weekend until I had a new piece that held the plunger all the way down evenly when locked in place. The ABS plastic part printed on my UP Mini was good enough for me, but not something I was interested in making a number of for others. Instead, I ordered a couple of test prints from Shapeways and found the best one, which is available now in my new Prometheus Rising Heavy Industries Shapeways Store! I may use Shapeways to offer some of my own toys in the future, but for now it is the home of my first third-party toy add-on part. Keep reading after the jump for details on the development, installation, and end result of my X-wing bar.
Prometheus Rising Studios 
