Raising pattern

[Thomas H]

I was thinking of raising myself one of those greek helmets. I thought about a pattern for a while and i came up with this. -->Nothing<--. What kind of pattern should i use to raise one. Thanks for all your help it is greatly appreciated.

[Steve S.]

I have never done any raising myself.

There is an article over on Anvilfire that shows a fellow raising a Norman Conical helm.

The impression I get is that armourers in period did not work with very precise patterns. The progress pictures of Eric Thing's Norman helm bear that out.

He basically started with a large disk of metal, and worked it into a helmet shape. The details, like the nasal (or in your case, eyes, etc.), get cut out much later, after the basic shape has been created.

The "corinthian" style helms that I think you are thinking about were often made of bronze.

Steve

[Thomas H]

I plan on using brass. i will be spending a lot on brass so i'd rather not have to cut out large chunks of scrap. I did mean a corinthian helmet. i couldn't remember the name for a minute. thanks steve

[Alec]

Steve is right. You start with a general shape, a circle, oval, etc. After 10s of thousands of hammer blows you have holefully achieved the shape you want without falling into one of the great raising pitfalls: edge tears, off center depth, etc. There is no way one of us amateurs could raise such a complex project as a T slot barbuta and expect a face opening that we cut out in the blank to end up where it should be on the final piece.

[Thomas H]

an oval it is then. I will post pictures when i start the helm. I might if i have time squeeze some kind of tutorial out of it.