The Armour Archive

I've been fighting for a while, and my vambraces are about ready to die. (I know block better and take care of your stuff...)Anyway, can the people who fight with splinted arms tell me if they have problems with their strength? I'm so used to solid steel on the forearm that the splinted stuff scares me a little. Do those of you who fight glaive or greatsword use them?

Any advice/experience would be great.

Thanks
Anton

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God help us we're in the hands of engineers...

I'd guess it depends on the arm. Some splinted arms are nade with thick leather and narrow splints with large gaps between them, some are made with thick leather and lots of little splints with almost no gap, and some are made of thin leather with wide splints and little gap.
The thick leather narrow splinted wide gap arms generaly protect about as well as heavy leather, basicaly because you are not likely to get hit on a splint.
For SCA combat I would assume that this works ok for most people, since there are so many of these arms around, Not sure I'd like if against a real sword though.

The thick leather with lots of little splints and little to no gap, will allow some give, and you will feel a blow, but it should absorb most of the force, and I'd say they protect quite well. (you will feel more than you would in steel however) The type I prefer is thin leather with wide curved splints and little gap, these protect reasonably well becuase you are going to get hit on a splint. and the splint spreads the force out. you will however feel the blow. Note however full steel arms if not made correctly or if padded improperly will allow the sting of a blow through, splinted armour even not padded properly generaly does not transfer a sting. (splinted armes due to their multiple peice construction ought to absorb more of the force) However I would still recomend some sort of padding under the arm armour.

one word of caution on taking my advice, I armour a lot more than I fight, and I really like splinted arms.

Sting I'm not worried about. It's collecting another little bump of collagen on my arm from a tiny fracture... my vambrace slid as I got whacked, and I guess it cracked the bone... This was two years ago and the bump is still there... I like to feel the blows so I can call them more accurately, I'm just worried about the ape with the glaive that catches me at war when my right-side buddy dies without me noticing.

If you go take a look at mine in the german transitional section of my site. (basically the same as dwarlock's I did use his patterns afterall).

Anyway when I went to my first fighter practice I was eager to test em out. So I found the biggest guy and got him to wack me all over while I stood there in the basic T position.

Ya can feel the shots but that's all. That's just with wearing a sweatshirt voleyball knee pads on elbows and knees.

No dents either.

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The budding mid 14th century German Transitional guy.
Mad Matt's Armory

My splinted vambraces are latigo leather, around belt thickness i suppose, with t6 aluminium splints salvaged from a cut down shield. The splints are around an inch wide with an equal amount of leather gap between them. I pad them with camp pad foam. I get some bruises, but nothing i cant live with.
slainte,
fearghus

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"How long will we fight? We will fight until hell freezes
over. Then we fight on the ice."
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The rules are: pillage first, then burn.
Failure to follow the rules will lead to
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