The Armour Archive

a rough life indeed, note the extra bit of metal riveted on top of the meta carpal plate between the thumb hinge and the knuckle plate.

There is this hinge also from Berlin.
I posted some more images, with Goll's permission, in Jason Grime's Maximilian style hunting gauntlet thread a couple years ago.

Ah, there we go. Those photos cast considerably more doubt on the already iffy association between gauntlet and hinge. It is interesting, though; if the little flower shaped bit of latten were removed, the holes look like they would line up for moving the hinge forward to a better position.

Mac wrote:I have taken the finger end of one of the gauntlets into pieces to show something of its construction. The finger leathers here are temporary ones. They are serving two functions. The first is a way to mark the knuckle locations. The second is for temporary assembly. The cardboard template is my standard finger-taper gauge.
Mac

Standard finger-taper gauge? Is this developed off your patrons hand tracing?

So... first, about those thumbs. The starting pieces were too big for the dapping block, so I had to start them off by dishing into a pipe adaptor bushing and raising out the wrinkles. When they were finally dished enough to use the dapping block, I continued with that. I suspected I was in trouble when the edges looked a bit jagged, but I carried on anyway. To make a long story short, cracks appeared when I began back raising the points.



It was clear that these were a failure, but I figured that if I carried one of them to completion, I could at least tell if my starting piece was the right size.



The size was good, so I made another pair. This time, though, I took more care and did not let there be any waves or wrinkles in the edges. One of them came out fine, but the other developed a break in the middle of the point. I used my mini-torch and some 20ga iron wire and welded that back up. All's well that ends well.

Mac

The remaining knuckles went smoothly enough. The ones for the little finger were smaller than the others, and I was not sure if I should stop with the forth depression on the dapping block of go the fifth. Nothing exceeds like excess, so I went a bit deeper.



The resulting knuckles were a bit pointier than their brothers, but not enough to remake them.



Here's what they all look like laid out.



This will look nice when it's done.



Mac

Making the finger plates begins by sketching out where they will go on the temporary finger leathers. The templates are then cut to match the lines on the leathers.



I'm using a fine point marker for all the finger plates. Small plates need accurate cutting, and that takes thin lines. The templates were all turned over and traces again to help insure symmetry.



I gave all the plates a curve by hammering them in this swage block. The hammer in the pic was too big for the job, so I switched to something lighter.



Here's the two index fingers after making sure all the edges matched up nicely.



Just as a sort of reality check, I am temporarily riveting all the plates to the temporary leathers on the left gauntlet. If the left one is OK, I presume the right will work as well. I only got the index fingers done this evening, but I expect the do the rest of them tomorrow.



The rivets are #2 carpet tacks because I have a mess of them. When they get riveted on for real, I will probably use #4s because they have a longer length of straight shank before the taper starts. The shortfall in the leather at the fingertip will be corrected in when I cut the final leathers.



Mac

Mac,
Do the finger plates get any sort of compound curve, or are they just a simple gutter shape?

Roland,

Nothing in armor is ever really just a gutter. They are plannished up a bit from the back til they look "lively". If you laid a straight edge along the top of one of the plates it probably show it to bulge ever so slightly in the middle.

They probably look rounder than they really are in this pic because the light source is a florescent bulb which is crosswise to their lengths.



[edit] By way of demonstration, I cut out a spare plate this morning and shaped it up differently to show the difference. The plate on the right was formed with a mallet. The one on the left was plannished up with a crosspeen. There is not much difference, but there is some. In addition to what you can see, I found the the plannished one was easier and faster to make. It will also grind out more easily, and look better if the grind lines are lengthwise.



Mac

Mac,

Can you elaborate a bit more about how you size the width of the leathers and the plates?

I see your standard finger taper template and the tracing of your patron's hand, these are both Flat / 2D.
Is the std finger template for the flat / 2d width, equivalent to the tracing?
How do they relate to the curved dimensions of the leather and the plates?

Cutting the corners off of these types of plates is important and probably under-considered.
Due to the way the hand-finger join works, you need to do it there, and due to the way the knuckles are attached you have to do it on those corners too. It is a detail that is very hard to find from original sources, people just don't shoot those pictures and not all that many of these survive with real fingers.

The same thing shows up in my 14th c. finger plates.

http://www.allenantiques.com/A-236.html

When you play with them, some of the little shape details really make the plates move on each other better than straight gutters would work.

Wade

Tom B. wrote:Mac,

Can you elaborate a bit more about how you size the width of the leathers and the plates?

I see your standard finger taper template and the tracing of your patron's hand, these are both Flat / 2D.
Is the std finger template for the flat / 2d width, equivalent to the tracing?
How do they relate to the curved dimensions of the leather and the plates?

There is a certain amount of guess and golly in the process, but it has a basis in reality....
--Human fingers all taper in width and circumference from the hand to the tips.
--All the fingers on your hand taper at about the same rate.
--Everyone's fingers taper at a similar rate.
--Armor that tapers at a similar rate to the fingers looks nicer and works better than that which does not.

I derived my standard ringer taper gauge imperially from my own hand. (don't worry, I used the normal looking one ) It may not be perfect, but it has been satisfactory for all the gauntlets I have used it on.

To make a finger leather, I cut a piece to match a likely looking segment of the gauge, and trim it from which ever end I need to till it looks "right". Therein lies some of the hokus pokus. Sometimes you need a wide leather, and other times you need a narrow one for the same finger. It depends on what the armor has to look like.

It helps to understand some additions things about fingers...
--The first finger is always the widest/thickest one.
--Each successive finger will be narrower than the preceding one by about the same amount.

Thus, you might find that each leather begins about (say) 1/16" narrower than the one before it. For armor requiring wider strips the difference will be greater than for armor with narrow strips. This is just about the relationship between widths and circumferences.

Once you have a tapered strip of leather that seems good at the base of the finger, you find the length by wrapping it around the finger while grasping a likely weapon hilt simulacrum. The wide end of the strip must be attached to the gauntlet so that it is in the right place, and you should have a glove on you hand.
--The strips will always be longer than your fingers.
--The middle finger will be the longest
--The first finger and the ring finger will be quite similar in length, but the ring finger is typically just a bit longer.
--The little finger will be the shortest, but depending on the shape of the gauntlet knuckle, it may not be as short as you would guess.

All of the plates and finger knuckles will bear a relationship to the width of the finger leathers. In general, they will be about the same width at any given point, but that will vary some, depending on style.



There is a certain amount of room to fudge things. For example, I have chosen to make the knuckle plates be "square", rather than having them taper. This means that the distal end of plate "A" must be the same width as the proximal end of plate "C", so that they both fit knuckle "B". Although that messes with the taper a bit, it is of little consequence.



The place where the standard finger taper gauge really comes into its own is in making scale fingers.... but that's outside the scope of today's lesson.

Mac

Mac, you just taught me something about myself that I've never noticed before even though I look at my hands half a million times a week. Now I can not un see what I've just seen.

Man, I wish I'd gotten to read that before my gauntlet project. Every syllable of this whole gauntlet section is getting written down in my notes for the next time around.

Keegan Ingrassia wrote:Man, I wish I'd gotten to read that before my gauntlet project. Every syllable of this whole gauntlet section is getting written down in my notes for the next time around.

Yes, a hundred times yes.

Dear JT.

I love you and the archive that you support. Without you Macs instructions would be unavailable to anyone not hiding in his rafters and taking photos... But understand this quite clearly: If the archive crashes again and any portion of THIS THREAD is lost there we be a line outside your door with baseball bats and thumb screws.

Is there any way we can flag this for double super-safe backup or something?

Sean

Sean Powell wrote:Dear JT.

Is there any way we can flag this for double super-safe backup or something?

And, for Mog's sake, sticky this thread!

Have you considered saving a local copy of each page? There's only 29 pages - would only take a sec...

Zubeydah wrote:Have you considered saving a local copy of each page? There's only 29 pages - would only take a sec...

I have been doing this as well as saving high resolution versions of the images.

I can never tell which things are going to be well received. I just keep writing, and every now and then everyone applauds.

Mac

I got four more fingers done yesterday, and expect to get the last two done this morning.

I am contemplating replacing the main metacarpal plate. It's a problem when a project sits for years. You have better ideas in the mean time. More on that later.

Mac

Mac,

I always look at how efficient you are in armour production and envy the talent and experience you have. I am gearing up to make a few pairs of gaunts and I learned something new that will help fine tune things a bit more than they were.

'I am contemplating replacing the main metacarpal plate. It's a problem when a project sits for years. You have better ideas in the mean time. More on that later. '

Yes but I suspect you are happier with the end result than you would have been. Sadly most of my projects end up being long term ones.... and I almost always learn new things in that time. So a mixed blessing to do things over long periods of time.

RPM

Thanks Mac!

It's a subtle difference, but it is noticeable. When you temper fingers, I take it the amount of warping is reduced due to the compound nature of the curve?

And with the finger tip, do you dish it at all, or does the curves come from the planishing too?

Roland

Mac wrote:I have cropped out all the best views of the gauntlets from my pics.

For comparison, see Goll's numbers 1049, 1071, 1323, 1325, 1326, and 4904. I will come back and link in some pics of those later.

Mac

I noticed that there are no good pics of the back of St. Florian's hands.
Were you able to get enough info about the metacarpal plate from the views you have or did you have to use a different source?
There are a couple of good pics of St. Florian's counter part, St. George, from the other side of the altar.

To save you some trouble here are the the photos and links from Goll's thesis.

Goll 1049


Goll 1071


Goll 1323


Goll 1325


Goll 1326


Goll 4904

Tom, you have some iffy stuff in there. For example, 1325 is from the 'Siegmaringen' harness in Detroit, and is a restoration.

Tom B. wrote:

Mac wrote:I have cropped out all the best views of the gauntlets from my pics.

For comparison, see Goll's numbers 1049, 1071, 1323, 1325, 1326, and 4904. I will come back and link in some pics of those later.

Mac

I noticed that there are no good pics of the back of St. Florian's hands.
Were you able to get enough info about the metacarpal plate from the views you have or did you have to use a different source?
There are a couple of good pics of St. Florian's counter part, St. George, from the other side of the altar.

To save you some trouble here are the the photos and links from Goll's thesis.

Thank you, Tom!

Those are the bast pics I have of the Florian gauntlets. I extrapolated form from them the best I could. If I used the St George ones, or anything else, I just can't remember. Those gauntlets were roughed out almost ten years ago now.

Mac

James Arlen Gillaspie wrote:Tom, you have some iffy stuff in there. For example, 1325 is from the 'Siegmaringen' harness in Detroit, and is a restoration.

I know it. There's so little to go on, that it's worth while to look at the questionably stuff as well.... just to have something to think with. The ones I didn't mention, but looked at were the ones in Chumburg and Madrid. They somehow avoided getting the asterisks on my list, and I forgot to search them back when I posted.

[edit] Strictly speaking, I guess they did not make it to my notebook. They are not on the same Picassa page with the others, and I can't seem to find them now.

1096 Churburg s49
1142 Churburg s49
1143 Churburg s50
1090 Madrid e89
1136 Madrid e88

Am I missing any others?

Mac

Roland Ansbacher wrote:Thanks Mac!

It's a subtle difference, but it is noticeable. When you temper fingers, I take it the amount of warping is reduced due to the compound nature of the curve?

And with the finger tip, do you dish it at all, or does the curves come from the planishing too?

Roland

You are welcome, Roland.

I am not sure if this will improve the anti-warp properties, but I don't think it will hurt any.

The fingertips are done the same way.

Mac

Mac wrote:

James Arlen Gillaspie wrote:Tom, you have some iffy stuff in there. For example, 1325 is from the 'Siegmaringen' harness in Detroit, and is a restoration.

I know it. There's so little to go on, that it's worth while to look at the questionably stuff as well.... just to have something to think with. The ones I didn't mention, but looked at were the ones in Chumburg and Madrid. They somehow avoided getting the asterisks on my list, and I forgot to search them back when I posted.

[edit] Strictly speaking, I guess they did not make it to my notebook. They are not on the same Picassa page with the others, and I can't seem to find them now.

1096 Churburg s49
1142 Churburg s49
1143 Churburg s50
1090 Madrid e89
1136 Madrid e88

Am I missing any others?

Mac

I will add those as well in a bit.
There are more in Goll's stuff, some of which are iffy at best.

It is easier for me to look them up so I will do that too.
I will make a list and you can let me know which ones you want me to post images of.

I got the fingers all roughed out, and the ones for the left hand riveted down to the temporary leathers. The leathers look much better once they are pulled into shape by the plates. You can see that the overhang has gotten a bit excessive on the little finger side of the hand. Small mistakes in planning the knuckle widths have made a big impact. It's still OK. I will trim the overhangs down close to the plate edges and use that information when making the permanent leathers.



Mac

Tom B. wrote:
I will add those as well in a bit.
There are more in Goll's stuff, some of which are iffy at best.

It is easier for me to look them up so I will do that too.
I will make a list and you can let me know which ones you want me to post images of.

Thank you!

Mac

Mac wrote: Thank you, Tom!

Those are the bast pics I have of the Florian gauntlets. I extrapolated form from them the best I could. If I used the St George ones, or anything else, I just can't remember. Those gauntlets were roughed out almost ten years ago now.

Mac

My folder of St George & St Florian

St George images
(Click on Image to open)

Mac wrote: 1096 Churburg s49
1142 Churburg s49
1143 Churburg s50
1090 Madrid e89
1136 Madrid e88

Mac

The images seem to be missing from both my Picasa pages and Pinterest
I have found a few items like this from time to time and try to add as I find them.
I hope you did not waste a huge amount of time because of this.

Goll 1096

Goll 1142

Goll 1143

Goll 1090

Goll 1136

Here's my current dilemma. When I get everything taped to the glove and grab a sword-hilt-simulator or a lance, the base of the thumb feels the tiniest bit cramped.




It's not uncomfortable. It's just not ideal. It would work. It would work well. It's just not everything I could hope for.

If I remove the bolt from one end of the hinge, and take the same grabs of those objects, we can see that things woudl be a bit nicer it the metacarpal came down another 1/4" (6mm).





So... What to do. It will work just fine the way it is. It will work a bit better if I replace the main metacarpals. The problem is, of course, that replacing those plates is not trivial. The flutes would have to match up at both ends to things I have already. I think I can do it, but it would be a tedious day's work... maybe two.

I am going to think about this for an bit....



Mac

Thansen wrote:

Mac wrote:I have taken the finger end of one of the gauntlets into pieces to show something of its construction. The finger leathers here are temporary ones. They are serving two functions. The first is a way to mark the knuckle locations. The second is for temporary assembly. The cardboard template is my standard finger-taper gauge.
Mac

Standard finger-taper gauge? Is this developed off your patrons hand tracing?

I missed this one.

The Standard-Finger-Taper-Gauge was based empirically on my hand. As far as I can tell, most people's hands are sufficiently similar in that regard that it will work well enough for all normal hands. If I measured a reasonable sample size of hands I would probably revise the taper, but probably not by much.

Mac