The Armour Archive

schreiber

I have never bought from them, but this is what I know. They have been in business for a longer time than any other professional armorer I can think of. You don't get that through unreliability. A good friend bought a breastplate from them a couple years ago. Wait was about 6 mos., quality was super...

schreiber

Im just starting out and have a idea of what i need to do but info from experince armourer would help alot lol --thx 1) Read, study, repeat. Get lots of books on armor - all of them help in some way even if you're not interested in the time period. All of them help more than you think they do - you...

schreiber

Well, gplant, I think you're falling into a common misconception - that people who are into armor will only accept mid 14th century and later plate armors as valid. None of the shortcomings you mention preclude your making leather armor - and paper armor is historically authentic. (You just need mul...

schreiber

If you're in a rush, go to a fabric store and drop $25 on a pair of Ginger scissors. They are almost identical to the Tandy Super Shears (which, given the post above, seem to be no longer available). They should get you through 6oz with no problem, 8 with a little effort, and 10 with some screaming ...

schreiber

I'm looking for bottom dies. I have a lathe, but I can't make them - well, I can, but only the way I figured out. If I want an exact radius die, I need to either: a) invest several thousand dollars in different equipment - or - b) Do the math, use a chart, and go by thousanths of an inch: out one, i...

schreiber

Well, here's my take. I've seen splints done rather effectively with 12g mild. Personally, if the splints are the only hard protection, I would not go less than that, or 14g ss. But then, I live in Atlantia. I've been tossing around the idea of doing splints, and I keep landing on the idea of attach...

schreiber

Hey Halberds, what yard store do you mean?
The aircraft supply site has nothing that would lead me to believe it has air hammer accessories.
I'm really interested in what other sites sell planishing hammer anvils. Pref. in the 1" shank standard.

schreiber

Illegal? Where's that coming from? I don't even remember signing contracts when I've bought kegs. Amoral? Maybe. Unfriendly? Probably. But I wouldn't feel bad about it, considering the number of warm, metal tasting, 6" head beers I've had out of a keg. It's a rotten system of delivery and to tell th...

schreiber

Ditto on Potomac. If you're not walking in, picking stuff out, and walking out, then it'll take a couple days. If you're like me and have a day job, that's a week. I let an order sit for two weeks once, and they got rid of it since it had been so long. It felt good watching them stop what they were ...

schreiber

All of the kegs I've ever gotten were Aluminum. If it were stainless then your deposit would be more than $10, I'd wager. They're also generally not supposed to put up with more pressure than you can manually pump into them, so they're probably thinner than you'd expect. I think you're better off wi...

schreiber

To date, I have made 3 marquees, two squares, two rounds, an oval, and two wedges. Here's how I did it: I only post stuff like this on boards I know the other 10 people involved don't read, because that statement is likely to get my ass kicked. I designed them, drew them out, made sure the math was ...

schreiber

That's a great idea, but I think I'll use the 16lb Rhino Pro I haven't had the heart to toss out....

And I would think the Salvation Army would be a starting point for bowling balls. They don't have league nights.

schreiber

sweet, thanks!

schreiber

Nope, no diagrams, but I've got a piece of advice... change tooling.

Just as you wouldn't dish a knee cop with a ball pien hammer, the hammer you use for knee cops is probably not up to the task. Shallow dish, large radius on the hammer, that's how I'd do it.

schreiber

What, no pot jokes yet? Maelgwyn, do you know anything about using hide glue? Cause hide glue I got. Seriously, I've got scads of 10oz sitting around (just organized the leather recently) and 2 guys I need to armor up in the next year. I've never done any hardening other than the generally frowned-u...

schreiber

The search is not working, the search is not working. I tried.

I remember discussions on baking wet leather to harden it as opposed to boiling in water or immersion in hot water. Does anyone know of an article on this? I can find Cariadoc's pretty easily but it's about immersion.

Anyone?

schreiber

Wow, I hate to be the one to pee in your wheaties. You say "Kunstbruder" - art brothers, right? You didn't say "my actual brothers of the same mother and father" or even "my group of best friends since grade school", and in those omissions you are really saying "people in whom I can not place absolu...

schreiber

I'm surprised not to see any of the European armorers listed. Yeah, seemingly everything coming from eastern Europe is pretty top quality. Seems like Czech and Poland are hot places. But for beginner stuff, they can't compete. I think everyone subconsciously omitted anything that could take more th...

schreiber

Definitely check out ironmonger. My friend Gwen got a small basicnet that is just right for her - same deal, she's not tiny, she's just not a 6'4" stick wielding brick wall. He sells "munition" bascinets that are finished with 80 grit and then painted silver. (If it were me, I'd ask him to leave the...

schreiber

Well, I'm a lot farther from places where people generally work steel, and your mild prices undercut what I can get them for - the last 16g mild sheet I bought was about $80.

I haven't bought stainless recently - can anyone verify that SS 14g goes for that much?

schreiber

Schreiber it's always worth it to make something you wanna make. Ok, true - based on the way the question was phrased, I was assuming that the goal was to own a pair of clamshells, not necessarily to become a maker of gauntlets. I haven't made gauntlets yet. When I do, I'll probably do the same thi...

schreiber

Chris: I have pictures of that, but no hosting space...
I'll see what I can come up with....

schreiber

I already had my once-in-a-lifetime trip last October, and if you're willing, here's what I really wish I had better pics of: -the Totenkopfs. You have one, but I'd like to have better pics of both of them. -the black painted sallet. (most people only know of the pic from AAOMK, which doesn't show t...

schreiber

Honestly, Sir Andrew Ward is making his clamshell gauntlets again, and he's selling them in 16g stainless for $115. At that price it's really not worth it to make them. Gauntlets are also pretty much not a beginner project. I assume you read the other thread. There are things that you need to be abl...

schreiber

Painting an entire 15th century complete plate harness is kind of like buying a Ferrari and then moaning about the mileage. If you can afford the car you can afford the gas. If you have a full plate suit you can pay someone to keep it clean. Nothing to back this up, but all of the reenactor helms I'...

schreiber

There are far too many beers between then and now for me to remember all the specifics of gauntlets I never wore. I do remember that he bought them at Pennsic under the pretense that they were heavy-legal gauntlets. Indeed, under the rules of SCA combat, they were heavy legal gauntlets. I do remembe...

schreiber

Heh. Buddy of mine was yelling one afternoon about how "there's this chick walking around in full plate, and I'm not kidding, she's like 4 foot 10 tops!!!"

I'm guessing I've seen her now, too....

schreiber

I find what was done in period to be the best design. Disagree. My main point about gauntlets, a point which is very much ignored by behourd combat armorers, is that THERE CAN BE NO FLOATING ARTICULATIONS. About 8 years ago a friend was fighting spear at Pennsic with gauntlets that had floating thu...

schreiber

Welcome to the Archive. Ok, everyone who knows where Catalonia is, raise your hand... I think that anything appropriate to France would be appropriate to Catalonia in that time. That leaves a lot which is pretty documentable. Great helms are at that point pretty much the rule still, though their app...

schreiber

m I hope this is authoritative enough, but this may merit an AA article as well, since it comes up every time someone talks about galvy steel. I was able to independently verify on several sites turned up by a google search on "zinc shakes" that the information on the Arador page is pretty factual. ...

schreiber

Start with 2000 grit? Forget the sandpaper and just rub it with your palm or a sheet of looseleaf. Most armor, especially hand-me-downs, is not finished to the point of needing anything with 4 digits. If you're using sandpaper, it's going to depend a lot on what the rust is like. Light rust to some ...

schreiber

Sorry, to clarify, not trying to take a big dump on them here, the craftsmanship is beyond reproach. I was mainly referring to the space - too much. "General forearm protection" was loaded too - I'm basing a lot of what I said on making and wearing vambraces. I've never worn bazus, but I imagine tha...

schreiber

Yep, those look monstro big for you. (Generally, I'd say if you don't like it, that's all that matters.) Not that I know anything about bazus (yet, only made 1 steel pair), but for the general forearm protection category, those won't work. It looks like if you ditch the wrap and strap it to your for...

schreiber

Remember that 9 oz is really just comparatively thin to what we're doing. You'll never see a wallet, or a car seat, or a handbag made out of it. Right now I'm wearing some ~6oz oak tanned sandals, and they are only going to wear out if I don't oil them. There are plenty of other uses for 9oz, and if...

schreiber

Hey, some of us got suckered into working for the first week.... (man, I miss the first week...) At the risk of becoming one of the "bla bla blah" crowd, I'll add some hints. I don't think you'll find many people who have done this, because leather costs real money. You'd have to do it more than onc...

Re: Hey could anyone spare me some tips and tricks of armour

Baked leather