The Armour Archive

mattmaus

the rust or russeting on the plates combined with the shiny shinyness of the rings would be the only thing that I found unnapealing about it. brighten up the plates and it would be spiff.

I'm assuming it's a work in progress as it looks to me unfinished.. but yeah....

It's far from 'ugly'.

mattmaus

Do 'customized' tools count? or strictly homemade?

mattmaus

Mark every piece on the inside both before and after shaping (if it gets rubbed off in the shaping process). I have made a set of "lefties" when I needed a match set. Hehehe When dishing helmet tops I mark them "HGH" for hammer-goes-here. I had 2 helmet tops cut out, matched halves. Started dishing...

mattmaus

When a Knight makes a suggestion on how to make your gear safer, Take it. ---------------------------------------------------- Greeves work well! They work really well against new fighters. ---------------------------------------------------- Don't buy expensive stuff when you start. You'll find th...

mattmaus

Which is where I got my method from. However... it doesn't always work. 1: A head is oval (or closer to oval than anything else), not round, and as I recall the circumfrence is figured differently. 2: the formula is better suited to theory than practicality as it works calculating the width of your ...

mattmaus

I usualy add about 3 times whatever the desired padding is to each helmet half and then a bit more for fudging. Keep in mind that depending on what kind of padding you use you may need to adjust this. If you use the green army mats, that stuff is hard as rocks and doesn't compress at all. The blue m...

mattmaus

I ended up ordering some from these guys. m While they typicly deal with full sheits, and ship them freight.... a lot out of my leauge. I explained to the gentleman on the phone what I would be using this for, and he immediately jumped into looking at his "drop" inventory, and was ablle to set me up...

mattmaus

Krag wrote:You don't want to overheat your piece! If you took it to yellow and scaling bad...time to start over.

Because I gotta know....

If you do overheat... what then?

I ASSUME. Let it aneal/normalize and then re-heat treat.

mattmaus

Didn't they used to sell kits for casting like baby's feet and such?

http://www.castingkits.com/proddetail.php?prod=30003

Not sure how it would work for a grownup, but I sure don't see an infant sittin still with hit mits in goop for 24 hours.

or maybe this....

http://www.castingkits.com/products.php?cat=7

mattmaus

I would personaly go fairly thick, as the hole in the bracket for the 'pin' is likely threaded. it's also got to be tough enough to handle being pushed away from the nasal by the threaded pin. I would not go less than 1/8"

mattmaus

Sixtus: Are you the Sixtus that Dane speaks of occasionaly spending monday or teusday afternoons with him? I recall something about someone sharing his insanity as he made scads of broaches prior to Baron's war. Archie: As I recall it's mostly lamellar. probably leg armor concealed by baggy trousers...

mattmaus

You are a true gentleman sir. Not hardly. I have purely selfish reasons to make all of the armor that I do. 1> I enjoy it. 2> It occasionaly produces money. 3> I don't make great stuff, but it's better than a lot, and I know where to point the world for great stuff, the world gets prettier bit by b...

mattmaus

The old helmet: <img src="http://members.armourarchive.org/mattmaus/helmets/wilob/helmetold1.jpg"> My biggest complaint with this in all honesty, is that it just was not safe for her . The thing is large enough to fit me with plenty of padding and I have a huge melon (7-5/8 or 7-3/4 hat size). As a ...

mattmaus

No grinding wheels came apart, but I've had sandpaper disks explode and that's scary enough. They seem to like to do this. Especialy near edges and stuff. I try to ues flap wheels when I can, they don't like to scatter themselves to all corners of the shop as much as just the sanding discs. When us...

mattmaus

Sir Haroun has used this stuff some if I remember correctly.

He got similar results to what's allready been listed here. From what he told me, and what I'm reading here I would guess that this boils down to a 'practice makes perfect' operation.

mattmaus

I used to have a cheap punch.... then I broke it. I got another one... and broke it too... go figure, guess they really meant that 18 gauge capacity and well... I tried 12. Oh well. At anyrate.... I punch (or drill rather since I don't have a punch anymore) 2 holes, then cut the center out with a je...

mattmaus

Trying to reach you about a helm we discussed. Would like to know if you're still interested, have the steel waiting with your name on it.

mattmaus

"Did you know your pants are on fire?" Not that I've ever ever ever ever ever even once done something remotely similar. (cough) But I've found that if I'm sanding and I start to smell my laundry detergent somewhat strongly all of a sudden it means that my clothes are at the kindling point and eith...

mattmaus

Thanks WMA, coming from you that means a lot.

Losthelm, I'm not sure what you mean by before and after pics...

mattmaus

Calling this done today. Made it for a local woman to fight SCA heavy in. It's not based on anything in particular, and I would hesitate to call it period. It is however much more peri-oid than the crap ass nasty spun dome black painted peice of trash she wears now. <img src="http://members.armourar...

mattmaus

SWEET!

Absolutely beautiful work.

But the real treasure here is the picture of the tool kit. truly worth a thousand words that. Probably more.

mattmaus

I can't say for sure, but I would susspect the period solution would be a tenoning swage or monkey tool. When you start thinking about things like this (rivets, acorns, leaves, spikes, spear point pickets and on and on and on and on) in terms of production runs for a small shop like most of us have ...

mattmaus

Disclaimers: I have not bought from them. I am by no means an armor expert. I am only offering my opinion. Just looking at the pictures on the website I don't like it. I have never purchased from them, and I would not. A lot of the peices look... funky. Even to my very untrained eye, I do not like t...

mattmaus

I've got a few people wanting perforated eyeslots/etc on helms. I've yet to check local suppliers, but I have checked McMaster Carr. In the never ending quest to get the best deal for myself, and for my customers, I'm shopping around as it were. Do any of you have apreferred web outlet for perf stee...

mattmaus

Verily, thou art the dude.

mattmaus

http://members.armourarchive.org/mattmaus/mattmaus.jpg

Me, couple years ago... but I'm old enough now to be set in my ways so I look pretty much the same.

mattmaus

Does anyone have a pic or a link or something they might point me to of a period burgonet or reasonably accurate replica with the hinged cheek flaps pulled up? Possibly a nice interior shot? Even just a description if you've seen/handled one first hand. Or a sketch maybe?

Thanks in advance...

mattmaus

Sorry. Sometimes I just get this hair wedged crosswise in unmentionable places. Actualy thinking about it some... one might could actualy roll a rivet hole. Start with a tiny hole, then move on to something like a center punch with an angle.. then back to a larger punch, then something similar to th...

mattmaus

The very.

mattmaus

losthelm wrote:how do you roll your rivet holes?

what kind of articularion do you have?

It takes a special stake. I'd show you a picture of it... but you're a non beleiver and unworthy.

mattmaus

jackchen wrote:About those who have mentioned rolling the edges, how about I file them round?

You'll want o do that even if you do roll them.

mattmaus

I could have sworn there was an essay on Arador, with some blank shapes for a multitude of helmets... no size on them... but

mattmaus

And me with this money in my pocket....

part of me was hoping that he'd stay missing so I didn't have to spend it...

the rest of me now says "YAY!!!! TOOLS!!!!"

Thanks Therion.

mattmaus

I'd jump on it... cept I'd fit in it twice almost!

Congratulate the man tho. That's a hell of a lot of weight to lose.

mattmaus

WWSVD? What would Sir Vitus Do? So... I'm thinking of ordering a mass of engraved bracelets... Anybody want one? Maybe have "Oh boy..." engraved on the inside... If they come in under $15 or so, yeah, I'd take one. Maybe two. I'd rather see it engraved with "Get thee bent heathens!" which is my per...

Hello? Wil/Brodir?

Most recent thing

Sources for Perforated Steel

Burgonet cheek flaps?

Re: WWSVD