The Armour Archive

I have a lot, and I mean a whole lot, of red oak offcuts from milling rough boards into finished lumber. Clean, dry, flat and square, mostly.

I started building a new shield a week ago out of 2 pieces of 1/4" marine grade ply. When I failed to notice that I hadn't sized it to account for the front face being several inches wider than the back, I ended up needing to fill in that edge.

So I used the oak. I've just glued it on with titebond 2, then trimmed off the excess. As I went, I realized I could do more, and have laminated a couple pieces on to the face along the top, and I've taken a thin piece, water soaked it, and bent it around the bottom edge. Where I didn't get the clamping perfect, I have filled in gaps with epoxy.

Click for more pics.


Soooooo.... do you think it will work? As in last? Oak is not a traditional material for shields, but I don't have any ash just lying around.

At the moment, in its nearly finished state, when I tap the shield it sounds like tapping a 60" guitar body. Which I take for a good sign.

Oh, and no, the oak doesn't make it stupidly heavy. Surprisingly so.

Nice, I like it.

You planning on covering the whole thing with canvas?

Canvas face, probably going around the edges. Maybe a leather edge.

The back gets some cool heraldically appropriate upholstery fabric with a nice damask design. Same stuff on the back of my current shields.

I'm betting that you will find this will improve the edge longevity of your shields. If for no other reason, the fibers are laying across the edge of the shield instead of end on. Which will make them more resistant to being hit.