The Armour Archive

I'm thinking form fitting and made from fairly heavy material, is this how it's done?
I've added arming points to a t-shirt and a dinner jacket/suit, and when I attatched my arm harness, it likes to pull the garment down and sideways, so that the armour comes out of place and slips down my arm. (The dinner jacket only has 1 useless button on the belly...)

It has to fit, and be made of materials that will not stretch much when armor is pointed to it.

The ideal arming coat is a pourpoint.

I was looking at HE's vest style pourpoint would that work? or should I try to find a sleeved one?

The vest style one is only suited for pointing legs to if I remember correctly. I think they were worn underneath a jupon that arms and stuff were then pointed to.

http://www.revivalclothing.com/article- ... uence.aspx

The more well fitting it is the better. If it's not well fitted it can move around and bunch up and generally be annoying.

yea Im looking for something that isn't overly heat trapping but as period as possible, Im in central TX and a gambison most of the year is a no go. I was contemplating having someone sew a minimally padded, mainly just shoulders and arms padded with the torso unpadded to mitigate the heat issue. I'd prefer to wear a period style gambison but I over heat easily (history of heat exhaustion/near heat stroke from iraq)

I have to manage my heat really well too. I've had a lot of instances of heat exhaustion and stuff so I'm just prone to it if I don't hydrate like crazy and make sure to eat.

Mine is not padded at all. I pad my armor where it needs it with felt or wool. Mine is cotton, which isn't too bad but if I had to make one over again I would make it out of maybe 3 layers of medium weight linen instead.

I'm actually just waiting on the linen pourpoint that I traded someone to make for me and using my old one in the mean time. It works ok but it doesn't fit right at the waist and under my ribs so it has a tendency to creep and bunch up in the front. But I won't ever suspend limb armor any other way ever again. I never have to worry about my arm and shoulder armor scooting down or slipping.

Well, as a purpoint has to be well fitted and I can't afford it, I geusse I'll try a tight flannel shirt, that might work. (I'm wanting to point my legs to a belt.)

I made the one I've been talking about with extremely basic sewing skills.

i dont have the patience or skill to hand sew anything that size I may try making one if i can find a cheep sewing machine

chris19d wrote:i dont have the patience or skill to hand sew anything that size I may try making one if i can find a cheep sewing machine

We bought a sewing machine, though we returned it, because I decided it was extremelly complicated, and more touble than it's worth. That's just me though, of course.
If you know how to use one, it could be a big help.

yea never used one, and the limit of my sewing skill is basic stitching for simple leather projects

JoJo Zerach wrote:

chris19d wrote:i dont have the patience or skill to hand sew anything that size I may try making one if i can find a cheep sewing machine

We bought a sewing machine, though we returned it, because I decided it was extremelly complicated, and more touble than it's worth. That's just me though, of course.
If you know how to use one, it could be a big help.

What about someone in your local SCA group? Most of the time you can find someone nice who can sew to help. That's how I learned the basics.

may check the local good will tomorrow and pick one up if i can find it cheep enough, but probably just going to pay someone because sewing =/= fun

And with all that, an essential property is the completest possible arm freedom. The arms of a gamby don't feel in the least like a dress jacket, which is built to look its best with your arms down by your side, and that is simply not what a gamby does. The only thing I know to compare its mobility with in outerwear is a gi jacket. Otherwise one has to go to the long-sleeve undershirt for a similar feel about the shoulders.

JoJo, I really don't think anything modern-built is going to get the job done. We've found that lashing metal onto a garment calls for a fair measure of toughness, determined close fitting, and fasteners about as long and strong as the zippers of a tent, and about as comprehensive. It all adds up to building it from scratch. Cloth and patterns, thread and notions. Ghetto improvisations lead to less than great performance. Make your gear to work with you, not so you're fighting your gear half the time!

Seek a simpler sewing machine if you must. More importantly right now, seek someone in your local Shire or Barony who sews, and can tutor you to make a sewing machine less mysterious. I wish you had not given up that first time.

Save the money and get one properly built, anything else is pretty much a waste of time, materials and money.

Ulric wrote:Save the money and get one properly built, anything else is pretty much a waste of time, materials and money.

Sadly, I must agree with this.

I've gone through five arming coats, tried to sew up two that never made it to the field, and my HE arming coat is giving up the ghost. The arms almost ripped off this weekend.

Does anyone have any experience with the Agincourt Arming Cotte from Revivial? It's on sale and HE doesn't have any arming coats right now.

-Aaron

Aaron, is your HE coat past all repair? It might be more cost-effective to pay someone to repair your Historic Enterprises coat to last until HE has them back in stock. Gwen at HE may be able to advise you on how best to repair it.

JoJo's first homebuilt may not be a Charles de Blois quilted cotehardie. Mine was -- but I think I started off with a better general grasp of how to make things to begin with.

For JoJo, I think we should recommend the SCA-Engineered type of gamby. It has a body, fitted close, which is easy to tailor because the torso doesn't really flex all over the place, just a modest banana bend in the middle. The sleeves are attached to the torso at the point of the shoulder with a lengthy piece of nylon web, 1" to 1 1/2" broad, the armpit left open. There is an upper arm and a lower arm, and these attach together over the point of the elbow with another length of nylon webbing strap. If you have plenty of webbing strap, run it from your collar all the way down your arm in one piece, to the middle of your forearm. The inside of the elbow of the sleeve is open also, with the sleeve part ends angling up to and touching over the point of the elbow and under the webbing strap.

Upper and lower sleeves fit close about the limb. The torso may be assembled "in quarters" for both a good fit and a fourteenth/early-fifteenth century look -- a distinct almost-wasp waistline, a bit of big flare-out to the shoulders and chest, very macho; similarly expansion of the skirts. Keep these lower quarters that make up the skirts so the skirts are straight and narrowly conical; you don't need a curved seam on the side seams or your skirts will poof out oddly -- the male hip doesn't need the room there. Straight seams, flare the skirt out some, but not a whole lot.

Either lace it shut with long boot laces run through eyelets, or install buttons and buttonholes one per inch. Which is a whole lot of buttons. And you'll want a sewing machine unless you desire to handcraft buttonholes with needle and thread. Machines set up to do them automatically. We've tried things like Velcro in a long strip all the way up and down -- and we think Velcro is a big meh. To get the strength, the strip needs to be wide, and that gets unfriendly to wear; Velcro strips are stiff. I'm sure some of us have tried a big YKK coat zipper too.

Ulric wrote:Save the money and get one properly built, anything else is pretty much a waste of time, materials and money.

I disagree with this. My first home made arming coat is far from perfect but it's infinitely preferable to just strapping on limb armor, at least for me.

chris19d wrote:yea never used one, and the limit of my sewing skill is basic stitching for simple leather projects

If you can sew that much, you can sew your arming doublet or pourpoint. It doesn't have to be pretty - it's going to be under armour, after all - it just has to work.

JoJo, here are the main points:

1. It must be fitted, everywhere. The more fitted, the more it works like a second skin. The more it works like a second skin, the less you'll be fighting your harness and the more you'll be fighting your opponent.

2. It must be well sewn of durable material. A layer of densely-woven hemp canvas between layers of finer linen is best.

3. Holes where points will be threaded through must be sewn eyelets made properly. Do not cut the fabric and pound in a grommet! Use an awl or Philips-head screwdriver to gently part the fibers and make a hole. Then sew buttonhole stitch around the eyelet. That will provide sufficient strength to suspend any piece of harness. You don't need leather; you don't need metal reinforcement. You just need well-made eyelets.

4. Your armour must be fitted as well. Arming doublets and poutpoints are not designed to work with poorly-fitted armour. They are not padded much if at all. Your harness distributes the impact from blows, not the garment beneath. If your armour is not very well fitted, the addition of a layer of padding works fine; I found one layer of thick wool blanket to be sufficient padding. Yes, I said "wool blanket". TRUST ME. You will not cook, you will not die - provided you're not an idiot. You need to drink plenty of water ALL THE TIME. The materials used historically WORK. These men fought and lived in their clothing and armour. When we try and second-guess them, we always screw it up. Do what they did, and guess what? Your harness will WORK.

5. Do not point your legs to a belt. No evidence exists to the best of my knowledge that this was ever done historically, and we know not only that pourpoints were used for that purpose, we know that pourpoints work, practically speaking. In fact, most users will testify that pourpoints work better than belts. If you're at all interested in comfort and effectiveness, use a pourpoint.

6. Start from scratch. Modification is a waste of time, effort, materials and money. Yes, making an arming doublet is more expensive than putting some grommets into an old flannel shirt. However, if you knock some grommets into an old flannel shirt you'll end up making a pourpoint anyway, after you've spent hours - time is money - knocking brass grommets - which cost money - into an old flannel shirt - which is now ruined for anything other than club-wear for very, very specific types of clubs. That's false economy. Spend your time and money right the first time, with the benefit of our experience and advice.

7. If you can't or won't sew, there IS someone near you who does. This person can be bartered with. There's something she wants you can provide or arrange to provide.

8. Lace the garment closed as described with a boot-lace. It's infinitely more comfortable than buttons.

Cheers,

Bob

Wh said we don't have arming doublets right now? I just looked and they're available on order. We stopped carrying them as an in stock item some time ago. What brewer said- they have to be fitted or they don't work right, so I make every one to order/to measure these days.

Gwen

Hi Gwen,

I'm on the "notify me" list. When you have the time, I'm very ready to out money upfront and order!

The website just let me order one, so I imagine it would let you order one as well.

I'm running at a full 8+ weeks because of the joust, but we're still cranking out a couple a week.

Gwen

Hi Gwen,

I'm working on ordering an arming coat from you now. The voider hole option ROCKS! Thank you!

With thanks,

-Aaron