The Armour Archive

I have been making Aluminum gauntlets, and one concern is obvious lastability...especially if you play as much greatsword as we do here in Calontir. so I thought "Try T6" its a bit lighter, much stronger... and I found a place selling it very cheaply...so...
concerns....it's much harder to work, I dont know how it would stay or if it would get brittle in a tight bend...and since I dont see alot of T anything in gaunts for sale there must be a reason why people are not using it. ANy info or has anyone tried it?

T6 means jack if you don't know what the alloy is.

Matweb.com shows about 26 different alloys of aluminum in T6 that aren't cast aluminums.

2024 T6 Ultimate tensile strength is 61900 psi
6061 T6 is 42000 psi
7075 T6 is 76000 psi (nearly 2x of 6061)

Mild steel is 60900 psi.

The T rating is the method of hardening/artificially aging the material.

I've been using gauntlets of .09 6061 T6 or T651 for many, many years. I don't use baskets ever. A pair of my gauntlets will hold up for a couple years of fighting a couple times a week, then get a semi-major re-forming, and are good for another couple. They won't last forever, but I haven't seen gauntlets that will. Even the highest-end models require maintenace commensurate with their use.

But like the Baron says, just having the temper designation means little without the alloy information.

ok, T6 aluminum like we make shield blanks with

The alloy number, not the T number, will give you the knowledge about what you can expect that aluminum to do.

You can design a gaunt without really tight bends... where were you thinking of having these? Sides? Thumb region?

Aluminum in general doesn't like to form really tight-radius compound curvatures -- you get workhardening and quick fatiguing. But larger radius compound curves it can do. Simple curvatures aren't a big problem -- the kind of bends you make finger scales of.

I have a pair of Ashcraft Baker T6 6061 clamshells that I've been using for a year now and they are great. Their weight is negligible and the protection is excellent.