The Armour Archive

Saint-Sever

Instead of a basket or a full-on gauntlet, has anyone tried a "shield-glove"? Take the finger and thumb plates for an hourglass-style gaunt, and mount 'em on a leather glove. When used on the shield hand, the plates protect the thumb and fingers (or at least look like it enough to get a pass from th...

Saint-Sever

There was a beautiful Italian barbuta in the Deutsche Nationalmuseum in Nurnberg in the early 1980's that had three or four tantalizing lozenge-shaped holes in the top of the bowl, along with some significant gouges and dimples where other blows had skidded off or failed to significantly penetrate. ...

Saint-Sever

My two cents on training at most SCA fight practices: Fighting practice is fighting practice . People come to practice their fighting. A training practice is a horse of a different color, SCA-wise. Most of the training you're likely to see at a practice is conducted one-on-one, one trainer working w...

Saint-Sever

So, logically, in the West Kingdom becoming an authorized fighter implies a willingness to serve as Crown. Is that really what is intended ? I'm generally ok with interkingdom anthropological differentiation, but I'm curious whether there's a logical disconnect here, or if in the West people really...

Saint-Sever

This is a geographic SCA division. In the West Kingdom, the tradition is that a big Crown List honors the Kingdom and the outgoing Crowns. Old-school Western thought is that all authorized combatants should enter Crown and all KSCA are obliged to, if they can make it to the tournament. Entering impl...

Saint-Sever

Munition-grade, all the way. They don't have to be polished to a mirror, or made of SS only, and I can attach them to finger-leathers myself. You can make them out of mild steel, or hell, annealed brass if you want. I hate shield baskets, and hockey gloves under the shield only slightly less. I figu...

Saint-Sever

Who makes these things? I need a set of fingers and thumb for the left hand only, for a shield gauntlet.

Anyone around who can fill that order?

I'll buy these, otherwise.

M.

Saint-Sever

Whoever the last guy who posted on Page 13 was-- stellar idea!! The Masonic youth group for boys/young men is DeMolet. It's named after the last Grand Master of the Templars. That ought to be a group ripe for the picking, recruiting-wise. Of course, being Templar-oriented, they'd all have to be Chai...

Saint-Sever

http://sca.trmilne.com/photos/panteriaxiii/heavylist/images/2008-SCA-PXIII-heavylist145.jpg The same as last year. Soonish I will finish my new surcoat which will be in the right color red and have the cross on it. This is yet another example of me getting into a Very Bad Place (tm). And once again...

Saint-Sever

[When I get hit in the leg, I consider myself bested. The whole acting out wounds (let alone death) thing is just lame. In tournemants I hardly ever even target the leg, because it results in such a gay fight from that point on. In practices and pick ups, I ask my opponent if we can just call out b...

Saint-Sever

My take on the historical context would have to be that it was a change as fighting evolved. If you're on horseback, and wearing just mail, and "in the press" of a mostly footed melee, then footmen are a serious threat, and a shield which covers your lower body better is essential. The elongated te...

Saint-Sever

Its sad to me that this is limited to belted knights. I am not a knight but it is my trade to enslave the people and do harm to widows, orphans and churchmen. And such is the curse of the mercenary man-at-arms ;)... On the other hand, I am a belted knight, and as this emprise is both fair and seeml...

Saint-Sever

Insofar as SCA custom and heater shields are concerned, here's a couple of additional points: The paradigm of SCA combat was and is "knightly". This is "knightly" as seen thru the lens of Unconscious Arthurianism, the ideological engine that drives the SCA. The shield shape generally percieved as mo...

Saint-Sever

For Western European, post Roman Empire, the round shield dominates. Battle is primarily an activity that occurs on foot, not a-horseback. Why round though? People aren't very round. Oval seems more practical. And it seems rectangles/squares would be easier to construct. Maybe fatigue? A round you ...

Saint-Sever

We just picked up a Flip . You might like one, too. I'd go with this one too, if you're going to use it for fight feedback, YouTube and whatnot. Six buttons total, it records 30 or 60 minutes of video (depending on the model), and it has a flip-out USB connection that's a permanent part of the came...

Saint-Sever

This is my best guess: For Western European, post Roman Empire, the round shield dominates. Battle is primarily an activity that occurs on foot, not a-horseback. Armor for the head during this period is a light helmet with an open face. Most helmets provide no rigid protection below the level of the...

Saint-Sever

...that silly 'cant fight until your 18' bit. Which, IMO, is the silliest, non-issue thing we (as in "the SCA") have done to shoot ourselves in the foot regarding membership and recruiting. All the kingdoms as far as I can recall, allowed anyone 16 and over to fight heavy, with parental permission,...

Saint-Sever

The Age of Mail's answer to the 14th Century mafia is The Chain Gang. Welcome, BTW, to the Chain Gang. Thanks to a recent explosion in availabilty of high-tech and low profile impact protection for lacrosse, mountain-biking and whatnot, this is the fisrt time since AS Single-Digits that an SCA comba...

Saint-Sever

I eventually plan to get a mail shirt as well but I'm gonna save up for some welded Ti. Welded titanium would be awesome, but it's way pricey - I'm still a student. Plus, I was quoted a welded stainless short-sleeved hauberk at around $800 from Atlanta Armory, I'd expect to pay loads more for Ti. A...

Saint-Sever

We'd probably have to put a couple of squads into the respective armors and gear for an entire campaign season to really see what the break-down rates would be. LH isn't long enough and hard enough, and LH folks tend to treat their gear far more carefully than soldiers do. Four months of weather, ma...

Saint-Sever

And the cast of characters surrounding the Dude: (clockwise, starting at the upper right) Sir Farin of Ravberg (?) not confirmed Thorfinn Magnusson, formerly Thorfin the Comedy Relif Squire; now Duke Sir Thorfinn the Cruel Sir Wiglaf Wilfriding Some damned feathermerchant-type; grist for the Mill of...

Saint-Sever

Yeah, wearing hamata under a segmentata would have probably been cost prohibative for the average legionary, as they were responsible for buying there own equipment, for at least a good portion of the Roman Empire's existence. Not to mention weight-prohibitive. Legionaries walked, carrying the bulk...

Saint-Sever

Alberonn wrote:For a couple of years now several of our local group have been using Roach FRS pads to great effect. Good luck, Alberonn

They're inexpensive as well-- on-line, you can get both arms and knees/shins for about 100.00. The arms go for about 40.00, the legs 60.00.

M.

Saint-Sever

Do you know that in comparative testing Gorilla Glue proved to be the worst product in its category ? It's also an expanding formula, very useful for some applications, but this is definitely not one of them. Good quality spray adhesive is the right choice for this application, on several levels. G...

Saint-Sever

An aesthetic suggestion, and a practical suggestion: Aesthetic: replace the rivets with 1" long saddle stitches. It looks better, and communicates "craft", and "value". The rivets look cheap. Practical: the leather can tear, if it can stretch/slide over the underlying plastic when a blow hits it. Ma...

Saint-Sever

Alcyoneus wrote:
Saint-Sever wrote:We've been there, done that, 40 years ago. Do we need to go down that road again?

M.
Sir Michael, what is wrong with reinventing the flat tire?

Bee-otch.

Evil bee-otch.

M.

Saint-Sever

If you go and talk to the old-timers in the Three Old Kingdoms (West, East, Middle), you'll find that flails were tried and abandoned 'way 'way back in the bad old days, along with other experiments like flattened metal conduit for sword blades, C-5 brake pads for flanged mace heads and other intere...

Saint-Sever

Valerius's "school" descendant Luther Anshelm charges double-price for work in stainless. He says that double-price still doesn't compensate him adequately for wear and tear on his tools and soul. Besides, it's the wrong damned color for steel. Too white, not enough subtle ultramarines and umbers in...

Saint-Sever

I've been thinking about getting a shirt for under my maille. Right now, I wear lacrosse rib protectors under it the maille shirt, and that's it. I'm not sure the hexpad stuff would provide the same amount of protection... I bought one of their lacrosse hexpad shirts as part of my ongoing experimen...

Saint-Sever

Raising is magic. I had a lot of opportunity to watch Luke Apker (AKA SCA Tybalt di Milano), who was one of the most talented armorers that ever graced the modern art, do his thing. For a helmet bowl, Luke would free-hand a rough oval onto a sheet of steel with a Sharpie. Then he'd cut the oval out,...

Saint-Sever

Sorry about the confusion. :oops: I was referring to English spur straps, which are just 1/2" straps 18" or so long. You attach it to the guard simply by threading the strap thru, and then buckling it. If you want it attached at the pommel end, then attach a small D-ring to the grip with a dozen wra...

Saint-Sever

William of stonebridge wrote:At the risk of sounding ignorant, how do you mount the spur strap?

You can loop it thru the guard.

Saint-Sever

Resistance is feudal.... You will be assimilated by the chain gang. QFT. If they ever get around to knighting Thaddeus, I'm taking a reduction in grade to become his squire. M. Well its certainly over do ! Of course you could always move to NH and I could become yours :o If I were in NH, I'd sign y...

Saint-Sever

Go to a tack shop, and buy a pair of leather spur straps for 6 bucks. I've used 'em for years.

M.

Saint-Sever

Thaddeus wrote:Resistance is feudal....

You will be assimilated by the chain gang.

QFT.

If they ever get around to knighting Thaddeus, I'm taking a reduction in grade to become his squire.

M.

WTB plates for fingers/thumb-- but for left hand only

Re: Looking to buy new vid camera

Re: Low profile