Temple of Doom machete replacement?

Anybody else a bit unhappy the machete that came with the Indy ToD PF? Shape's wrong, too long and well... looks like plastic, it IS plastic I know, but it should look like a sword not something out of a cereal box.

So I thought about replacing the blade with whatever I could find that matched close enough. Then I found out that the Indiana Jones letter opener set from Noble is almost exactly the right size!!!!!

You can get the set on Ebay for like $27 right now, and it contains both the machete and Irina Spalko's sword, both with real metal blades.

You can check out my comparison pics here. I still need to figure out how to fit this into Indy's hand. It'll probably mean some heavy work with a dremel and removing Indy's thumb and reattaching it somehow, but I think it'll be worth the trouble!

Now I just need to save up for a Dremel.

That looks sharp! Hee Hee. Seriously though, it looks really good.

Kredepops said:

I still need to figure out how to fit this into Indy's hand. It'll probably mean some heavy work with a dremel and removing Indy's thumb and reattaching it somehow, but I think it'll be worth the trouble!

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I think you'd be better off cutting the letter opener off at the guard and modifying it to fit in the hole in Indy's hand, rather than risking cutting the statue. If you screw up, you're only $27 down the hole, not $300.

Whoa...that's a great idea. My TOD Indy just arrived on my doorstep. I think
I will try to track down one of those noble sets. I also think what el skutto suggested would be a better approach by cutting the letter opener off the gaurd. And perhaps some epoxy to re-attach the pin off the factory blade to the letter opener blade would work.

Thanks for the GREAT idea...as I also thought that the original blade looks kinda wonky.

El Skutto said:

I think you'd be better off cutting the letter opener off at the guard and modifying it to fit in the hole in Indy's hand, rather than risking cutting the statue. If you screw up, you're only $27 down the hole, not $300.

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LOL that's true! I'll have to see if it's possible to cut the letter opener at an angle like the original blade. It'll take some tools though that I don't own, since I'll have to precision cut through the metal.

A Dremel is a really good investment. I recently bought one to make a custom Stormtrooper E-11 blaster, and have used it numerous times for hobby and home applications since. There are some precision cutting discs for the Dremel you can purchase also.

I just purchased the letter opener that you have off of Ebay. It will be a little while before it arrives and I can attempt the same modification to the machete.

Are there any paints that could give the blade a metallic finish? That seems like a much easier route, especially since the blade pops fee and is ready to go.

Paul : Cool, maybe I can learn from your experience, I'm not much of a handyman and I bet I could do with a few pointers before attempting to do this

MarfMaster: I looked into that too, you could try with some chrome spraypaint, but I always think it ends up looking fake anyway.

Apart from the black text stamped onto the blade that letter opener is perfect.

How long does it scale out to?
(it does look like painted plastic)
There is a discussion of the screen used one on COW
https://www.indygear.com/cow/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=45530
one of the bits in there..
"Here are some quotes from other Machete threads:

'doc riviere wrote:
hi,

I have an original one, it is 78cm including the handle !

Doc R.'

The Noble Collection machete length appears to have been based off of doc riviere's movie prop (or one like it.) doc riviere's screen used machete is 78 cm and Noble's is a tad over 76cm...a difference of less than 2 cm!!!

There are longer screen used machetes from TOD, as doc riviere further indicates below:


'doc riviere wrote:
yes, it is this one ! the other, the big one was used by thugee guard in the Palace, the small one was used for the fight between indy and the 2 thugee before the bridge scene...'
So either length seems pretty close to SA, depending upon the scenes."

kl241 said:

Apart from the black text stamped onto the blade that letter opener is perfect.

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That is fortunately easily removed with a bit of acetone I did that with my 1:1 Noble machete.


d_jedi1 Yeah that's another matter, I remember that discussion when Todd made his first machete. His was based on the one used for shots where Indy was far away, it was extra long so it would be easily seen by the audience. The shorter one was used for close-ups

I think the letter opener may be a bit on the short side, but the plastic one that came with the figure also seems a bit too long, so either way it won't be completely SA. I can live with it being a smidgen shorter though, like the 1:1 Noble machete which is a mere 2cm shorter than the real prop.

Oh the letter opener is overall 20.4 cm.

I will gladly share with you how my attempt at the modification goes. I have also heard of a product called alcad that some model builders use to simulate a shiny metallic finish...might be worth a look?

Mr. Paul said:

I will gladly share with you how my attempt at the modification goes. I have also heard of a product called alcad that some model builders use to simulate a shiny metallic finish...might be worth a look?

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Found some info re Alcad:

Alclad chrome MUST be applied with an airbrush. Around 10 psi and in several light coats. You MUST also use a black enamel basecoat. They are key steps in making Alclad look right.

It might be worth it to try this first and repaint the existing sword. The results look promising.

The Aclad one is the most advanced chroming method out there, without going into electroplating. All the other metallic paints are dull and not convincing.

This Indy machete is a serious candidate to do it.

I haven't watched the movie in a long time; was the machete's blade shiny, dull or rusted?

Kredepops said:

Anybody else a bit unhappy the machete that came with the Indy ToD PF? Shape's wrong, too long and well... looks like plastic, it IS plastic I know, but it should look like a sword not something out of a cereal box.

So I thought about replacing the blade with whatever I could find that matched close enough. Then I found out that the Indiana Jones letter opener set from Noble is almost exactly the right size!!!!!

Click to expand...

Looks very good. I think a lot of people would consider a conversion to metal.

Kredepops said:

Now I just need to save up for a Dremel.

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Are these still available anywhere?

Did anyone ever successfully mod this? Is there a way to remove the Noble blade from the handle and insert it into the PF one?

I picked up one of the Noble machete letter openers and removed the plastic handle pieces from the hilt. The blade appears to be either permanently glued or welded into the metal hilt. I'm not sure how to remove it from the hilt short of just cutting across it with a table saw. Any suggestions?