The Armour Archive

Ok, guys. I've been trying to get my kit together over the last 9 months or so since my daughter was born.

The part of my kit that is really giving me grief is knee cops.

I want to wear a simple knee cop. These are commonly called "crusader" or "soupcan" knees, simliar to these:

http://www.geocities.com/madmattsarmory ... age046.jpg

I would like to wear these over maille chausses.

I have strapped them with a "Y" strap, where the branches of the Y rivet to the wings of the knee cop on either side, and, obviously, then buckle together behind the knee.

The thing is, they keep sliding down my leg! How you you keep simple, non-articulated knees (and elbows for that matter) in place?

Steve

point the tops of them to the maile.

I tried this.

Before I tried the maille chausses, I made gamboised cuisses.

I riveted a leather band to the top edge of the knee cop, and stitched this band to the cuisse.

There are two problems: When you kneel, the cop tends to ride high, since it is anchored to the cuisse - it can't pivot and stay centered on the knee.

Second, I can't remember any period artwork that supports doing this.

But, tonight I'm going to try stitching the leather on the cop edge down onto the maille.

Steve

yeah, pointing them to your chauses is the best way to do this.

The only other way I know of is to back the copps with foam that is fastened very securely to them and fasten them tightly to your knees with straps. This will keep them in place, but it's unacceptable for a number of reasons. It just doesn't work as well as points.

Oh, yeah. It technicaly possible to hold the copps in place with duck tape. I did that for a while. It sucks.

f

Steve,

There's one of the old Osprey titles concerning Crusaders which shows a pair of (possibly) historic "soupcan" poleyns. The back side shows the line of "rivets" along the top is really like a mini-vervelle, and extant mail is attached through the post. There has been some debate as to whether these are medieval or Victorian reproductions, but the possibility of their being real does open some new attchment methods as well.

Mart

I point my poleyns to my cuisse and they ride high when I go to my knees. This isn't a problem though as they still cover the points on the sides and the part of the patella which isn't in contact with the ground

What Gregoire said

blintersifrid wrote:What Gregoire said

Thirded

I wear padded chausses and lace the cops to them. I have no problem.

Steve -SoFC- wrote:Ok, guys. I've been trying to get my kit together over the last 9 months or so since my daughter was born.

The part of my kit that is really giving me grief is knee cops.

I want to wear a simple knee cop. These are commonly called "crusader" or "soupcan" knees, simliar to these:

http://www.geocities.com/madmattsarmory ... age046.jpg

I would like to wear these over maille chausses.

I have strapped them with a "Y" strap, where the branches of the Y rivet to the wings of the knee cop on either side, and, obviously, then buckle together behind the knee.

The thing is, they keep sliding down my leg! How you you keep simple, non-articulated knees (and elbows for that matter) in place?

Steve

Just a clarification on the Y strap you're using
I set mine up with ends of the fork rivited well into the knee cop, I'd have to say they are paralell to the center of the joint. The upper portion is slightly longer than the lower portion of the strap to allow for the large muscle mass above the joint.
The buckle is attached to the cop so the Y strap goes most of the way across the back of my knee, the two ends join about 2/3 of the way and form the single strap bucling "inside" rather than behind the knee

As an additional point of knowledge - I wear carpenter's knee pads with the plastic "cop" on the front. This adds a little extra protection for the knee cap when the cop shifts out of place on my knees.

And working on the asumption that your knee pads are in good shape and fit well, you might try pointing them to just the pad.