So a childhood dream came true and I finally got a real lightsaber. It is just like in the movies! It goes bzzzzzz and cuts through stuff like a hot knife through butter, and the blade is a gorgeous tyrian purple in colour.
The problem is that I am currently not in my home town, I will have to take a plane. I have found out how to block the saber, so nobody can switch it on except me. I plan to put it in a beautiful wooden box with a velvet lining and claim it is a collector’s item. Still, it should show some suspicious parts in the security scanner, it is high tech after all. And a bit heavier than I expected.
What do you think: will I manage to get it on board through security as hand luggage? Will the German customs (I am currently outside the Schengen Area) let me bring it into the country? And if so: will they demand import duties?
Or is there a better way to do this?
Lightsabers are fine (well not sure if it counts as a sword or welding equipment, it may have to go into checked baggage in any case); your problem is that batteries with a capacity over 100 or 150 Wh or so are not allowed on board aircraft, so you will have to ship the power pack separately or purchase one locally.
Me: (hand wave) “These items are acceptable carryons.”
TSA Agent: “Umm… these items are acceptable carryons.”
No, no, no! I am not letting the baggage handlers lose it, break it or steal it!
TSA Agent: “What, you think you’re some kinda Jedi, waving your hand around like that? I’m a Toydarian! Mind tricks don’a work on me, only money.”
Sounds like you have your answer then. 
Not having enough money the origin of many a difficulty is, is it not? And I believe the TSA Agent lied: what really motivates him is not money, but sadism.
Anyway: I am not a Jedi. I just happened to get my hands on a lighsaber, and I am not letting it go. My precioussss!
Just make sure not to drop it perfectly vertical, then.
Maybe you could rebook your flight by way of the Kessel Run, I hear there is less official attention that way.
Given that TSA has refused to allow toy lightsabers on planes before, they’re probably going to be pretty bitchy about a real one.
Just say it’s a gun and you forgot you packed it.
But mine would be switched off, and even they admit that
It is not a long plastic tube, it is just the handle. Cylindrical, more or less, 10" long, 2" wide, shiny metallic with groovy grooves and
I see this is going to be difficult.
(But a nice article you linked to, thank you!)
Sorry, I am not in the USA. I found the lightsaber in Aladdin’s Cave, which is in the Arabian Peninsula. To get it to Germany I have to fly, I am not crossing land borders through Turkey or Russia with that treasure. I am not crossing the Sahara Desert either, nor am I willing to cross the Mediterranean on a boat full of desperate migrants. And I am afraid that if I check my lightsaber as baggage it will not arrive at destination.
Maybe you can hang on the outside of a Nazi submarine?
Stash it in your R2 unit.
Especially if you can’t control the blade.
This is all great information as I myself am going to be traveling domestically in the next few hours and may yet find a light saber on my way to the airport. It is the DC metro, after all…
Some sensible advise at last!
That will take a parsec longer
How good of a handyman are you? The safest approach is to remove the primary kyber crystal, rendering the device inert. But when you reconstruct it, if you don’t get the primary crystal perfectly aligned with the focusing crystal, it will potentially detonate.
It’s probably easier to remove the power source, as others have recommended.
Another possible approach: plasma fields are known to contain lightsaber beams, so if you construct a plasma containment unit, you should be fine. I don’t see anything on the TSA website banning Tokamaks.
Do droids require a separate ticket? You might have to claim it’s an emotional support R2 unit.