Mac's blog

[Tom B.]

Hey Mac, On the bifurcated gauntlets of Charles the 5th, The plates on the inside are articulated on leather, so there are not plates rubbing on each other

That's my fall back position, if I can't make it work this way.

Have you got any better images than this one?



Mac

Again best I can do from my phone here in China.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/CzKhuwaHjjrq527V7
https://photos.app.goo.gl/VktjgLJNbsiiohi97

[Tom B.]

Anything to learn from the images of mitten gauntlets with seperate pinkies in this thread?

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=177437&p=2707965

[Mac]

Anything to learn from the images of mitten gauntlets with seperate pinkies in this thread?

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=177437&p=2707965

I had forgotten about those weird gauntlets in Philly and Madrid. They are certainly worth looking at while thinking about this project.



Mac

[Mac]

Again best I can do from my phone here in China.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/CzKhuwaHjjrq527V7
https://photos.app.goo.gl/VktjgLJNbsiiohi97

Those are helpful, but I can't figure out a way to post them here.

Mac

[Paul Miles]

Again best I can do from my phone here in China.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/CzKhuwaHjjrq527V7
https://photos.app.goo.gl/VktjgLJNbsiiohi97

Those are helpful, but I can't figure out a way to post them here.

Mac

Open the link, click the picture. After it loads, right-click the picture and select "Copy image location". Paste that in between some

[Mac]

Open the link, click the picture. After it loads, right-click the picture and select "Copy image location". Paste that in between some [IMG] tags and you should be all set. This process may be a little different depending on your choice of browser.

Thank you!

Mac

[Mac]

The notion of having the radial and ulnar first finger cannons conjoined between the second and third finger is now considered "A Stupid Idea".



What seemed plausible in cardboard proved very difficult, and probably unworkable in steel.

I've been gradually whittling away at the first attempts at the cannons with an eye toward having them articulate on their outer ends and be secured to the inside of the knuckle rider on their inner ends. This will necessitate putting a thin steel strip inside the rider to anchor the leather to. This is, of course, no big deal. It's how normal fingers are attached with Gothic gauntlets.

I hope to have something to show tomorrow.

Mac

[Woodswork Armory]

Mac I had a dream last night, or one could say a vision. Or maybe it was a thought I was going to tell you and discarded it as stupid. the suggestion was going to be " Cut off the inside flares of the plates and only keep the outside flares riveted, then attach leathers" In this horrible drawing I show what I mean.. hopefully And yes it was an actual dream!

It probably won't work but maybe it's something to suggest

[Marshal]

Oddly, I can see the pictures everyone posts...except Mac's. Those just say "Image" with no, uh, you know, image.

[Tom B.]

Mac’s images as well as most of mine are hosted on Google Photos.
Is there a chance you are located somewhere Google is blocked or your browser does not play well with Google?

[Marshal]

No, I use Google a lot, and my email is gmail. Usually no problem with it. It's probably Firefox or an add-on blocking something or not supporting something, but it's weird that it's so selective.

Stranger still, where you quoted one of Mac's posts above, his photos show in your post of his post---but not in his original post.

Gotta love the internet.

[Paul Miles]

I can see Mac's just fine, but Willy_Trambone's posts in the Classified always show up as "Image" to me. If I right-click, I can choose "View Image" and actually see them. Perhaps you could try the same with Mac's "Images".

[Sean Powell]

The notion of having the radial and ulnar first finger cannons conjoined between the second and third finger is now considered "A Stupid Idea".

What seemed plausible in cardboard proved very difficult, and probably unworkable in steel.

I've been gradually whittling away at the first attempts at the cannons with an eye toward having them articulate on their outer ends and be secured to the inside of the knuckle rider on their inner ends. This will necessitate putting a thin steel strip inside the rider to anchor the leather to. This is, of course, no big deal. It's how normal fingers are attached with Gothic gauntlets.

I hope to have something to show tomorrow.

Mac

I was afraid of that. The pair I saw in Solothurn (I still need to find my photos!) were riveted only at first and last finger and then connected to leather down the medial split. As I recall the glove was sewn there but I may be misremembering... But where else would you secure the glove and you definitely wouldn't want them to flop around unsecured.

Sean

[Marshal]

I can see Mac's just fine, but Willy_Trambone's posts in the Classified always show up as "Image" to me. If I right-click, I can choose "View Image" and actually see them. Perhaps you could try the same with Mac's "Images".

That works. Thanks.

( I didn't even try it before as the "Image" didn't look to be a link, just the word. )

[Kristoffer]

It seems that the first section below the main knuckle plate on bifurcated gauntlets tend to be made in one piece. I would consider sculpting one continous plate from rather shallow on the main knuckle side and transition to deeper depressions on the finger knuckle side. The articulation rivets between the long and ring finger would sit rather awkward and probably need flat heads but I am sure it could be made to work. Are you sure you cannot make a knuckle rider plate that folds under the main knuckle plate almost fully that you can attach some cannons to? Such a knuckle rider would probably need sunken and filed rivet heads holding leathers that hold the cannons.

[Tom B.]

It seems that the first section below the main knuckle plate on bifurcated gauntlets tend to be made in one piece. I would consider sculpting one continous plate from rather shallow on the main knuckle side and transition to deeper depressions on the finger knuckle side. The articulation rivets between the long and ring finger would sit rather awkward and probably need flat heads but I am sure it could be made to work. Are you sure you cannot make a knuckle rider plate that folds under the main knuckle plate almost fully that you can attach some cannons to? Such a knuckle rider would probably need sunken and filed rivet heads holding leathers that hold the cannons.

This was his first plan.
He was not able to make this plate short enough.

Here we see trouble brewing. That narrow mitten lame is taking up too much of the available finger length. As it stands, there will be almost no "finger cannon" visible. When I put the parts on my hand, the space mostly goes away on fingers one and two, and on fingers three and four, the knuckles touch the mitten lame.

[Mac]

I don't have anything to show right now, but I don't want to give the impression that I am a total slacker.

The split mitten assemblies I have built are not fitting well over a glove. They are a bit tight, but mostly, they are too short. The thickness of the glove limits how far the armor settles onto the hand, and that manifests it's self mostly in the length of fingers. The greatest shortfall is between the first and second knuckles... that is to say in the first cannons. It's nearly 3/8" (9mm). There is a secondary problem with the length of the terminal lames. The first and fourth fingers are OK, but the second and third end up slightly beyond their plates. This is all determined by having the finger assemblies detached from the knuckle rider and settling the various parts on the gloved hand while holding the sword-hilt-simulator ™.

Clearly, I should have tried the armor on over a glove earlier in the procedure, but I thought (erroneously) that I was making adequate allowances.

I have started in on the new fingers yesterday, and will continue with them today. In addition to replacing the cannon lames, and terminal plates, I am taking the opportunity to make the knuckles a bit wider as well. If all goes well, I should have something to show for it by Tuesday.

Mac

[Mac]

Here is where I stand this morning. The old finger set is at the bottom of the pic, and the new one is at the top. The first cannons of the new set are intentionally overly long, so I can trim them as needed.



Here is the problem. It is an ergonomic fact that in order to grip an authentic sword hilt, the first finger knuckles must bend about 90°, and the second ones about 45°.

The new third/fourth finger set does that nicely, but the first/second finger set falls short on the first knuckle flexion.



That's all I can get out of it, and still maintain sufficient underlap. The knuckle plate is not wide enough to do what I need. Last night, I started a new pair of knuckles, which are almost ready to try out. If all goes well uncommonly well, I will be able to use the parts I already have. If not, I will be remaking the proximal and intermediate cannons. The distal plate (fingernails) will almost certainly be usable if I template the intermediate cannon carefully.

I don't have any pics of the new knuckles, because my camera battery quit as I was framing the shot. It's surely not always like this, but it certainly seems so.

Mac

[Sean Powell]

Mac,

Not that I'm proposing remaking the knuckle rider but is it possible to move the articulation rivets towards each other any more? I know that this makes the finger cannons want to collide but maybe if the pivot of the upper cannon moved palmar and the other pivot moved dorsal with the arc-length in the cannons adjusting accordingly the distal finger joint would tuck inside the proximal?

This happens to be a problem I'm trying to overcome in a scope for working inside of a stomach and taking biopsies. The travel distance for any overlaping joint is 2*tan(angle/2)*h where h is the vertical distance from center of pivot to top of finger cannon. Any time the spacing between pivots is reduced to the travel distance the cannons collide. If you limit cannon size by distance it gets hard to get two 45 degree bends in a tight space.

Idea! What about the leg armor where the cuise where the upper lame should be bulges outward under the knee cop. That gives extra space. It might be doable in finger cannons. Let me draw something.

Sean

[wcallen]

Mac,

Not that I'm proposing remaking the knuckle rider but is it possible to move the articulation rivets towards each other any more? I know that this makes the finger cannons want to collide but maybe if the pivot of the upper cannon moved palmar and the other pivot moved dorsal with the arc-length in the cannons adjusting accordingly the distal finger joint would tuck inside the proximal?

This happens to be a problem I'm trying to overcome in a scope for working inside of a stomach and taking biopsies. The travel distance for any overlaping joint is 2*tan(angle/2)*h where h is the vertical distance from center of pivot to top of finger cannon. Any time the spacing between pivots is reduced to the travel distance the cannons collide. If you limit cannon size by distance it gets hard to get two 45 degree bends in a tight space.

Idea! What about the leg armor where the cuise where the upper lame should be bulges outward under the knee cop. That gives extra space. It might be doable in finger cannons. Let me draw something.

Sean

Since we are off ranting, I have several pieces of old armour where the plates should collide inside of the outer plate (elbows, gauntlets are most common). Somehow... the authentic solution seems to be to just let the plates overlap. Maybe because they are so thin, or maybe they are just magic, for some reason the problem doesn't seem to happen. Yes, the plates overlap. But they just work. I know that I have played with them in the past and I can usually get them to overlap either way depending on how the joint is flexed. So it doesn't appear to be something in the basic geometry of the joint that makes one side always go over the other.

Wade

[Mac]

Mac,

Not that I'm proposing remaking the knuckle rider but is it possible to move the articulation rivets towards each other any more? I know that this makes the finger cannons want to collide but maybe if the pivot of the upper cannon moved palmar and the other pivot moved dorsal with the arc-length in the cannons adjusting accordingly the distal finger joint would tuck inside the proximal?

Moving the pivots toward one another would probably do it, but I am going to take this opportunity to change the proportions of the first/second finger knuckle to make it look a bit bigger than its third/fourth counterpart.

The colliding is not as big a problem as one would imagine. See Wade's post above.

This happens to be a problem I'm trying to overcome in a scope for working inside of a stomach and taking biopsies. The travel distance for any overlaping joint is 2*tan(angle/2)*h where h is the vertical distance from center of pivot to top of finger cannon. Any time the spacing between pivots is reduced to the travel distance the cannons collide. If you limit cannon size by distance it gets hard to get two 45 degree bends in a tight space.

Ah, Sean, how I miss our lunchtime conversations about your medical apparatus projects.

Idea! What about the leg armor where the cuise where the upper lame should be bulges outward under the knee cop. That gives extra space. It might be doable in finger cannons. Let me draw something.

Sean

Those are very interesting, but the range of motion is quite limited. You'll see what I mean when you sketch it out.

Mac

[edited to make sense... I hope]

[Mac]

Since we are off ranting, I have several pieces of old armour where the plates should collide inside of the outer plate (elbows, gauntlets are most common). Somehow... the authentic solution seems to be to just let the plates overlap. Maybe because they are so thin, or maybe they are just magic, for some reason the problem doesn't seem to happen. Yes, the plates overlap. But they just work. I know that I have played with them in the past and I can usually get them to overlap either way depending on how the joint is flexed. So it doesn't appear to be something in the basic geometry of the joint that makes one side always go over the other.

Wade

Just so!

I already have the lames passing each other. I'll be sure to get pics of that after lunch.

Mac

[Mac]

The knuckle replacement turned out to go much more smoothly than I had any right to hope for.

Here's the first one, compared to its un-transplanted brother. That small gain in flexion angle will make a big difference. The old one will grip a rattan stick OK, but the new one will grip a real sword.



The same, laid out flat with the others. I think the decision to make the knuckle a bit bigger was a good one. They not only work better, but look better proportioned as well.




Here is that thing about the underlaps passing one another more or less harmlessly inside the knuckle. It's remarkable that they should do this without causing any real trouble. It's not at all what one might expect. This sort of thing is, I think, more or less the norm in 16th C knuckles.



The old parts have all ended up on G.I.Job's dung heap....



... and the new ones are ready to be fitted to the rest of the gauntlets.





Mac

[Sean Powell]

So I was in meetings most of the afternoon but my mind couldn't put the puzzle down. I know I have seen elbows and knees where the cannons overlapped to no ill effect. To be fair the only time a gauntlet needs to open fully flat is for prayer. Almost any other time a slight curvature is acceptable. Still, I'm stuck on a technical issue at work at geometry problems like this help me clear my head. I drew it up anyway as a way to learn more about how pieces like this could move.

The thing I noted working at 120 degrees of flex (60 per finger cannon) to make it more visible is that the distance the cop edge to pivot point on the left side is longer than on the right but the cannon height is the same. It leans the arc-segment away so it can pass over the smaller upright arc-segment. I don't know if this is of any use to anyone but I found it interesting.

Of course the extant examples DON'T have close pivot points so even if this is *A* technical solution it isn't *THE MEDIEVAL* technical solution.

Sean

[Mac]

I got the parts taped in place to see how much underlap I had on the finger plates.



Presumably, one will be able to employ either of these loose grips.



Oh... and this too. Sadly, I have no pointy ear prostheses in the shop.



This is the first approximation of the underlap....



...and where I will make the first trimming cut. There will not be much slack in the leather that will constrain the non-riveted sides of the assemblies. Sliders may help, but I have to think this through carefully.



Mac

[Mac]

The left pair has been trimmed and checked and trimmed again. The right ones are marked to be trimmed to match.



Both of them are temporarily assembled.



This is what they look like inside. The leather tabs are anchored to a thin metal strip inside the knuckle rider. This is, of course, just the way that normal Gothic fingers would be attached. I have had to trim the heads of the rivets to get enough leather length to accommodate the movement. I'm currently thinking about whether or not there's a better way to achieve this.... perhaps a wider strip, so that the leather could be mounted to a bit farther back.... not too far, or it will get in the way of the metacarpal underlap.



Mac

[Mac]

So I was in meetings most of the afternoon but my mind couldn't put the puzzle down. I know I have seen elbows and knees where the cannons overlapped to no ill effect. To be fair the only time a gauntlet needs to open fully flat is for prayer. Almost any other time a slight curvature is acceptable. Still, I'm stuck on a technical issue at work at geometry problems like this help me clear my head. I drew it up anyway as a way to learn more about how pieces like this could move.

The thing I noted working at 120 degrees of flex (60 per finger cannon) to make it more visible is that the distance the cop edge to pivot point on the left side is longer than on the right but the cannon height is the same. It leans the arc-segment away so it can pass over the smaller upright arc-segment. I don't know if this is of any use to anyone but I found it interesting.

Of course the extant examples DON'T have close pivot points so even if this is *A* technical solution it isn't *THE MEDIEVAL* technical solution.

Sean

Here's what the articulation looks like. In the upper row, we see that extending the cannons out flat makes the underlaps collide inside the knuckle.

The second row shows that a slight rotation of the knuckle in either direction lets one or the other to pass under its mate. This relies on having enough slop to allow a slight amount of hyper-extension.



In practice, the joints are very unlikely to try to extend perfectly evenly. There will almost always be an overlap direction that happens normally. This same thing applies to knees and elbows as well.

Mac

[Kristoffer]

They are turning out rather spectacular Mac, I would expect nothing less from you but they are really stunning. Good job!

[Mac]

They are turning out rather spectacular Mac, I would expect nothing less from you but they are really stunning. Good job!

Thank you!

They are giving my some trouble, but I think they will look nice in the end.

Mac

[Chuck Davis]

I propose a raid on Mac's shop to obtain that scrap pile!

[wcallen]

I propose a raid on Mac's shop to obtain that scrap pile!

I expect that you have your own scrap pile.
I have one too. Mine just got a little bigger after the example bits I made for The Forging this year. I guess that is OK, they weren't meant to become real armour anyway. I am starting to get a real pile of greave parts...
Of course, Mac's is more fun.

Wade

[Indianer]

Don´t mess with GI Joe. He is as naked as he is vicious

[Mac]

It's thumb day!

Note the mark on the indiside to tell me where to center the boss. There's a tiny center punch mark on the outside as well.



I pushed up the bosses hot....



...and then started shaping them over this upturned end of a bickorn.



Here is where they stand now.



The fit OK, but get a bit too close to the sword hilt simulator. I will take a bit of metal away before I am through.



Mac

[Indianer]

dammit...these are beautiful. If only I could put them under my pillow at night.

Mac,
- what´s the diameter of your pipe stake?
- Do you always only use this one?
- Are there more tasks you use it for?

Thank you kindly.

[Mac]

We are probably going to do an enclosed thumb tip, but this "fingernail" will serve to tell my whether the rest of the parts are OK.



The "tail" of the thumb plate is touching the wrist here. It will probably need to be flared more, but I won't know for sure till more of the gauntlet is in its final form.





I may or may not be able to get a start on the thumb tips tomorrow.



Mac