I decided to create Han Solo’s DL-44 blaster from the original Star Wars films, specifically the variant of the blaster as seen in the Force Awakens.

Since I had some experience with SolidWorks, I thought that I would challenge myself by making the blaster fully functional. I thought this would be a great exercise to better understand advanced mates. The DL-44 blaster was modeled after an existing firearm called the C-96 Mauser. The Mauser is known for its sophisticated firing mechanism. Although I am designing the blaster, I also chose to also design the internal mechanisms that would similarly be found on the Mauser C-96 as close as possible. The main challenge that I faced is mating parts such that they sequenced correctly as the C-96 does while firing.

Once I finished the project, I decided to 3D print and paint the blaster as an activity to better my 3D printing and assembly knowledge. The final printed model is shown to the right.