Copper and brass rivets

[Michael Spaulding]

What should I know? Are there specific regulations for brass and copper? What is the minimum shaft diameter and is there a minimum head diameter?

Thank you!

[losthelm]

A lot depends on what your making and the engineered joint design.
Any standards should be listed in whatever group you building armour for.

In general I use smaller rivets for gauntlets and wisby style armour
larger rivets for articulation on knees, elbows, and their strapping.
More rivets for fixed joints like spangen helm plates.

I find it helpful to map the layout with a compas and make adjustments before drilling/punching holes.
If your making more than one spangen helm invest in some clecos usually found on eBay or the yardstore.com

[Michael Spaulding]

I'm actually looking to make some rivets with decorated heads at pre-made lengths to sell to help fund my need for armoring tools. Since I don't know a whole lot about armor needs at this point, what would be some of the more common sizes people would be interested in?

What uses would you be more likely to use decorative brass rivets? Helms?

[Sevastian]

I use 3/16ths shaft diameter dome head brass rivets for helmet construction. Most SCA helmets I've seen use this size. More rarely 1/8ths rivets used, often to realize a decorative pattern.

[Michael Spaulding]

Thanks sevastion!

[losthelm]

Vervells may also be a good option.

[Konstantin the Red]

If not a better one than rivets.

@Michael, did your tool shipment come in yet?

Are you employed? You sound like you have no remunerative options to make some bux open. I hope that is not the case.

Typical SCA use of brass or copper rivets is attaching straps one way or another, straight through the strap, w/washer, or to a Clip-N-Dee D-ring for easy or no-tools strap or cordage replacement if damaged.

I've said elsewhere, ya wanna sell armor in the armor market, specialize in something, especially something difficult to do really well.

Winter Tree Crafts, for instance, only feels like he makes about five or six items. Okay, maybe a dozen plus. One of these is a greathelm in .062" spring steel. Splint limbs only. One Wisby CoP. He makes all his bits from spring steel and I suspect he gets it heat treated -- I have not enquired closely. His market is primarily the rebated-steel WMA market.

He apparently stays busy enough on this short menu. Doesn't ramble around trying to be all things to all men.

[Michael Spaulding]

Hey Konstantin,

I do have a full time job, and we're doing well, but I have a second child due next month, so my hobby budget is on total freeze until the end of the year. The only money I have to spend on hobbies is money I can make. This is tough for me, because I have two dozen hobbies.

I did get my tools, and I've dished and planished my first piece, plus I've started rolling the edges. I run into a bit of a road block though. I cut the first piece out with aviation snips, and I am not going that again. I need a better option to cut my stuff out. With nothing in the hobby budget, I won't be getting any throatless shears.

[Konstantin the Red]

Borrow a friend's cutting tool, be it a shear or a jigsaw. Cultivate a new friend if necessary. You really don't have to be locked into doing 100% of this altogether on your own hook; too many don't think of that. Make sure that wasn't you.

If you have a nice thick chunk of metal, like an anvil, do without the break truck a couple days and see about a 3/8" or smaller cold chisel. It will take a while to cut this way, but it can handle pretty solid metal. Mark out your cutline. Hammer the chisel point into the cutline, getting almost all the way through the metal. Snip or break the piece off the rest of the way. What you've done is make the metal very thin right on the cut-line.

====== your metal lying on the surface of your block
===v=== cold chisel gouge almost all the way through its thickness
Snip or bust apart
Profit!

A throatless bench shear is just fast, nimble, and quiet. So it's a great tool to have. It's just not the only way to cut through metal.