The Armour Archive

schreiber

Zinc poisoning is not lethal, but it is very unpleasant. Thank you! Hopefully coming from someone of such esteem, this notion may actually take this time! I've inhaled my share of zinc fumes and I don't think welding one or two hundred links a night will be a problem, provided there's ventilation. ...

schreiber

Its not the material, its the design WITH the material. Oh, I agree, which is why I'm planning on the assumptions I listed. It sounds like 1/8" ABS can take a hit perfectly well, based on what you're saying... ...so that leads me to wonder why it is that Kydex is the conventional wisdom, when ...

schreiber

PLEASE, THIS IS NOT MEANT TO BE A PLASTIC HATE THREAD. Purely from a SAFETY perspective, how many of you would trust your hands to thermoformed ABS for SCA style combat? Assumptions: The gauntlets are constructed to ground on the weapon. The gauntlets have 1/8" of felt padding on the inside. Th...

schreiber

AFAIK there's still a Woodcraft in Springfield (next to Fischer's hardware, which is another place to look).

I'd be careful about hardware stores, thought: they may be selling the titebond stuff.

schreiber

Didn't Clay do something like this back when he was still around? I've put some thought into this sort of thing, and it seems to me that reversing the dies would be the better option. I mean, if you're going to power it, I'd want to be looking at the side everyone else is eventually going to look at...

schreiber

Polypro is not for the home thermoformer. The difference between the form temperature and the godawful soupy mess temperature is too small. So small that you probably don't have equipment that will do it properly. Polypro would work well for unformed plates. It will help to know the application - fo...

schreiber

Pics don't work.
Click through gets me a page load error.
I wanna see this helm!

schreiber

Mac: you're right, but I was fixating on the Pembridge legs above the others. If that was me, I'd probably lace those twice before either getting it changed to another closure, or finding someone else to do it. At which point I'm paying someone to crawl around between my legs for 10 minutes, and I'm...

schreiber

Staples would have the pointy bits on the inside, rubbing constantly against the leg. I think if that was ever tried, it was probably only once... It seems like hinges would be much less effort to make than either coiling a spiral notebook wire, or making individual staples. Laces would be economica...

schreiber

I'm a big fan of Sturm, Ruger, & Co.

Anything else is a wall hanger, a reproduction, or for rebated combat and therefore not a weapon.

schreiber

That's some stellar work! Regarding the 1450 arms, How do you like having the couters laced to the vambrace/ rerebrace? I currently do this and basically I hate it. The lace always gets twisted around in the armor bag, and it's a complete pain to try to put on without help. I'm going to try to talk ...

schreiber

Ok, so from what you're describing it sounds like we're both right. I missed the part where you said "hammer drill" - I assumed you were talking air drill, since that's a popular way to go (and presumably powerful) - although Jim Baille swapped his for a clutch motor, which I think is more...

schreiber

By the way, put up some pics so I can see the new toy!
I need to take pics of mine in its current incarnation, I think I get shop time tonight and I'll see if I can put them up later.

schreiber

Every spring is going to have a particular resonant frequency based on the length of the spring. In order to tune it, you need the length of the spring to be tuned to the speed of the linkage. If you change the offset on your eccentric it'll change the speed of the hammer. A greater eccentric is goi...

schreiber

It depends on where you are. You have to remember that "Germany" is a 19th century concept. Luther translated the Bible into German in the 1520s, which as I understand it had more of a standardizing effect on the German language than any other event. He used Hochdeutsch which I understand ...

schreiber

Interesting...

Apparently this is the origin of the word "copse" as well.

schreiber

The Real Leather People sell this stuff they call boot leather, it's about 6-8 oz oil tanned black leather which is the most indestructible stuff I've run into. It's unfortunately not on their site.

But of course a proper fit, and arming points, are the real way to go.

schreiber

Well, those certainly seem like nudges to me. Electric is much better suited toward doing lots of welding quickly, and particularly with thick plates. I still keep my stick welder around (even though I DON'T have 220 to the shop and have to run an extension through a window) for when I'm welding thi...

schreiber

(I'm considering buying one of the 2, but don't know if a sharp sword would serve any purpose in an SCA environment) Notice that all the answers are from live steel people, not SCA people. No sword of any sort is going to serve a purpose in an SCA environment. Kudos for not just buying a Star Trek ...

schreiber

... Currently I have nothing, and have never done any welding. Well, my goggles for my oxyacetylene torch which I can see my work through all the time cost me $10 at Lowe's. Sometimes I can't believe nobody else preaches the gas gospel here. If you haven't welded before, you really should try a cou...

schreiber

Just some observations from a complete stranger.... If i wasn't soooo broke right now i wouldn't have taken any down payments. But i only have 4 people on cue right now sooo. (only 2 have paid me anything) This sounds REALLY familiar. Like I've read it at least six times, in threads that got pretty ...

schreiber

According to the Jameson distillery tour in Dublin (you gotta love THAT source), distillation of spirits is one of the things crusaders brought home. Wikipedia says the first recorded mention of distillation is 1405, but one of their source pages Henry II mentioned Irish using aqua vitae. All uncorr...

schreiber

I was just looking to see what a jingasa was. Looks like someone never got his copy of 1st Edition D&D's Oriental Adventures as a kid.... I did something similar on a smaller scale recently while making a spangen. I wanted a conical cap to rivet the bands to. I cut out the pac-man shape and lar...

schreiber

No, not rubbish - if that's your first attempt then you are going to go far. Here's some other pointers.... Now, the thumb... the originals and the Ghostpigs have the last thumb plate overlapping the second thumb plate, and yours are reversed (the last plate is under the second plate). You can actua...

schreiber

And internal grill with the sheet metal grill over the top would NOT fall into the "internal projections" catagory. It would just be ANOTHER grill. The internal projections rule is for things the POKE INTO the face area from the grill, not 2 overlapping grills. This theory isn't specified...

schreiber

It looks like you could easily weld bars inside to reinforce the grill without changing the look. I think this is asking for trouble. That could throw it into "internal projections" territory. Here are the relevant sections, which have been updated with metric: Face guards shall prevent a...

schreiber

For a first attempt you really are getting a lot out of this, so don't despair. Here are some tips... First, deeper, deeper, deeper. For soupcan style elbows, or for early floating elbows like on the John D'Aubernon effigy, you can probably get away with dishing. Even so, dishing should get you deep...

schreiber

If it was me, I'd sell it and use the money to buy 2 RW #8's, a 5" bench vise to hold them, and 3 or 4 RW #5jrs. Maybe even a couple XX's.

I think that punch is simply too much tool, and could be converted into several smaller, useful tools.

schreiber

The book is a good view of how one armorer makes armor.... Also, take the historical information with a grain of salt. I'll second this. TOMAR is a good book but it is not the Gospel of Armor. Anywhere you don't see a citation, assume that it's just one dude's idea of how it can be done - which is ...

schreiber

My suggestions, for what they're worth. 1) Replace all speed rivets. Go with solid brass at the very least. 2) If there are articulation leathers, use either oil-tanned leather or vegtan which has been treated. Immersion in neatsfoot overnight works for me. It softens it but it also makes it fairly ...

schreiber

SparrowHawk wrote:this list should be a sticky, as it seems almost every day someone is posting a new complaint about a lack of delivery and no contact from the armourer.

+1

schreiber

I armor, fight, do yardwork, and occasionally hike in Corcorans. m I like the jump boots because they have a separate toe piece which is harder than the one-piece vamp model. The tread isn't as great as some other boots, but I never had a problem with them and they're easy to clean. 10" of shan...

schreiber

Do you have higher res pics?
I'd really like to see construction details.

schreiber

Yeah.... I've been working on a gauntlet pattern for over two years now. I don't think Sean was unjustified in throwing sarcasm your way. Put bluntly, there is a reason why gauntlets are so damned expensive and complicated. If you're looking to make your own as opposed to having a non-existent secre...

schreiber

We have a Harbor Freight here in town, so I will check it out once I have my quarterly bonus in hand. Yeah, now don't go buck wild at Horror Fright. Their stock is pretty touch-and-go. Use it for stuff that's hard to screw up, like sandpaper or dust masks. Don't pay much attention to their machines...

Would you wear ABS on your hands?

Re: Swords

Re: Is this a good welding helmet?