The Armour Archive

Hey guys,

I've got a couple of commissions from Dan for a leather helmet base and a cuirass setup for a Bronze Age impression I'm doing. I'm going to put bronze studs into the armor, and will probably need 200 or so of them. I know I want the heads to be about 3/4" in diameter, and I'd like them to have a bit of a raised look to them, rather than just being completely flat.

I'll probably also want a handful of them that are 1 & 1/4" diameter, probably around 20 of them. They'll all be for going through Dan's cuir bouilli, and I'm not exactly sure how long I'd want the ends of them to be in order to go through the stuff solidly, but I wouldn't want much of an excess, so that the work may go faster, at the same time...

So I'd like an opinion on how long to make them. Taking a piece of his armor I already had it seems as though it's about 3/8th's of an inch thick. Would 3/4ths of an inch long go through that and have nice room to get riveted in place?

I have NO IDEA how much I should expect to pay for these, but I'm probably going to be disappointed at the cost... Lol.

Quotes wanted, thanks!

-Gregory-

Your best bet is an upholstery suppy and using some kind of large headed decorative tack. I bought a bunch of nice brass tacks with something like a 3/4" domed head, about 1-1.5 mm metal thickness (yeah, stout!) with the intent of making a Roman military belt with them. The only issues I see for a soultion like this are: the shanks are steel and might pose problems to peen; and you are most likely to find brass, or bronze-look but not actual bronze.

example:

http://www.snapfasteners.com/decorativenails1.htm
http://www.snapfasteners.com/decorativenails2.htm

I could have custom cast stud made for you but the cost would be fearsome for pieces---at least $3 apiece. Ouch! Another though would be to get them laser cut or punched and dome them yourself, then solder on shanks or pins---or rivet each through the center.

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So what are you making?

Yeah, what I'm looking for has to be all bronze, and they kinda' have to have a less than modern feel to them...

I could have custom cast stud made for you but the cost would be fearsome for pieces---at least $3 apiece.

Even when I'd be getting almost 250 of them! Ouch, indeed...

-Gregory-

Yeah, I can't get my volume discounts anymore. Still looking though...