As I was pondering last night about the cloak I am making, I realized I would most likely need to do expansion maille on the shoulders to have it lay properly. Unfortunately, I don't know how to do expansion maille. Could someone please help me with this? Thanks!
-April
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Death, carnage, destruction. My work here is done.
Expansion Maille help needed.
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Mad Matt
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To make an expansion just add an idler ring for each expansion ring. ie. you've got your new row of rings on. Attach rings to a single ring in that same row (to the row above) to a single ring.
When you add your next row connect to the idler rings like they're just a regular part of the row. So your expansion rings are connected to 3 rings instead of 4.
Contractions work sort of the same way only different. When you're making your new row of maille instead of connecting a new ring to two like normal put it through 3 rings. Make your next row like normal. It has the same effect giving you a ring in the previous row that's only connected to 3 rings and your contraction ring is connected to 5. It's just going in the opposite direction. Depends on which direction you're working on which you need to do. ie. if you're starting at the small end and working towards the big end you use the expansion. If you're starting at the big end and working towards the small end use the contraction.
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The budding mid 14th century German Transitional guy.
Mad Matt's Armory
When you add your next row connect to the idler rings like they're just a regular part of the row. So your expansion rings are connected to 3 rings instead of 4.
Contractions work sort of the same way only different. When you're making your new row of maille instead of connecting a new ring to two like normal put it through 3 rings. Make your next row like normal. It has the same effect giving you a ring in the previous row that's only connected to 3 rings and your contraction ring is connected to 5. It's just going in the opposite direction. Depends on which direction you're working on which you need to do. ie. if you're starting at the small end and working towards the big end you use the expansion. If you're starting at the big end and working towards the small end use the contraction.
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The budding mid 14th century German Transitional guy.
Mad Matt's Armory
For a in depth write up on how to expand or contract your maille, check out this site. Comes complete with pictures.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/trevor.barker/farisles/guilds/armour/mail.htm
A simpler way to expand a hauberk is to make the back portion wider than the front. I myself prefer the expansion method.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/trevor.barker/farisles/guilds/armour/mail.htm
A simpler way to expand a hauberk is to make the back portion wider than the front. I myself prefer the expansion method.
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Konstantin the Red
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A contraction is just an expansion turned upside down. Trevor's site shows that.
Personally, I still think making a cloak of mail is utter madness: it combines the weight of three hauberks with the bodily protection of, oh, about a bishop's-mantle. Now if somebody really really really wanted to swank it with an overcaped woolen cloak that incorporated a bishop's-mantle in its shoulders, they'd have something quite different indeed -- something that takes the concept of "heavy cloak" to an entirely new level. For a bishop's-mantle, such an ensemble would have the weird feature of having a front closure, so the closing technology would be rather strange. Perhaps the most convenient way would have the hem of the mantle be solid mail, with the opening slit being only up near the neck. Somehow, the whole thing makes me think of Darkover.
In making my mantle, I thought it best to concentrate the expansion links to some considerable degree out at the shoulders, and not as much on the centerline. Up near the neck, this is much less of a consideration, but after about twenty-one rows, I started putting the expansions to the shoulders only: I'm not circular, but oval. The mantle-top hangs over my shoulders to about the lower end of my deltoid muscle, not quite mid-upper arm.
Use rubber bands larks-headed onto links to mark or lay out where the expansion links are to go. Such markers can also be used for another expansion method: the expansion hole -- a deliberate flaw in the weave putting two columns of mail where one was before. It's literally pretending that there is an expansion link there, putting the extra links that an expansion link would hook into -- but not putting the expansion link in. This leaves a tiny hole in the weave that has no significant effect on the mail's protectiveness.
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"The Minstrel Boy to the war is gone..."
[This message has been edited by Konstantin the Red (edited 02-05-2003).]
Personally, I still think making a cloak of mail is utter madness: it combines the weight of three hauberks with the bodily protection of, oh, about a bishop's-mantle. Now if somebody really really really wanted to swank it with an overcaped woolen cloak that incorporated a bishop's-mantle in its shoulders, they'd have something quite different indeed -- something that takes the concept of "heavy cloak" to an entirely new level. For a bishop's-mantle, such an ensemble would have the weird feature of having a front closure, so the closing technology would be rather strange. Perhaps the most convenient way would have the hem of the mantle be solid mail, with the opening slit being only up near the neck. Somehow, the whole thing makes me think of Darkover.
In making my mantle, I thought it best to concentrate the expansion links to some considerable degree out at the shoulders, and not as much on the centerline. Up near the neck, this is much less of a consideration, but after about twenty-one rows, I started putting the expansions to the shoulders only: I'm not circular, but oval. The mantle-top hangs over my shoulders to about the lower end of my deltoid muscle, not quite mid-upper arm.
Use rubber bands larks-headed onto links to mark or lay out where the expansion links are to go. Such markers can also be used for another expansion method: the expansion hole -- a deliberate flaw in the weave putting two columns of mail where one was before. It's literally pretending that there is an expansion link there, putting the extra links that an expansion link would hook into -- but not putting the expansion link in. This leaves a tiny hole in the weave that has no significant effect on the mail's protectiveness.
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"The Minstrel Boy to the war is gone..."
[This message has been edited by Konstantin the Red (edited 02-05-2003).]
Thank you all for the advice. I will be trying it out tonight when I start back into the cloak.
Konstantin, I am making the cloak per request, not out of my own design. I am using aluminum links for the main part of the cloak and using 16 guage nickle plated silver for the top 6 rows to hold the majority of the weight. I am also not making a full length cloak. It will hit about his knees and he wants it to be in a "V" shape. I am complying. This is purely a show piece, not an armour piece.
-April
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Death, carnage, destruction. My work here is done.
[This message has been edited by Aphreal (edited 02-11-2003).]
Konstantin, I am making the cloak per request, not out of my own design. I am using aluminum links for the main part of the cloak and using 16 guage nickle plated silver for the top 6 rows to hold the majority of the weight. I am also not making a full length cloak. It will hit about his knees and he wants it to be in a "V" shape. I am complying. This is purely a show piece, not an armour piece.
-April
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Death, carnage, destruction. My work here is done.
[This message has been edited by Aphreal (edited 02-11-2003).]
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Konstantin the Red
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Oh, yeah, that. Thought it sounded familiar. In a weird kind of way, I sort of like the mantle-type idea. The reason I think "Darkover" when I imagine this is Marion Zimmer Bradley's describing a native-made cloak as "odd." Large dags, too, even... hmm. Strictly auxiliary, though. And still quite mad, mad, mad 
...
[edited 'cos "weird" is too weird to follow that I before E rule]
[This message has been edited by Konstantin the Red (edited 02-05-2003).]
...[edited 'cos "weird" is too weird to follow that I before E rule]
[This message has been edited by Konstantin the Red (edited 02-05-2003).]
Before anyone asks, yes the cloak is for me. It's going to be a renaissance fair piece, strictly show, that I think will at least look cool.
The basic idea is to have the cloak be slightly narrow at the top, just wide enough to attach to a clasp, have it widen slightly at the bottom, and possibly cut a slight toot shape into the bottom. think \/\/ at the bottom.
The cloak, being a show piece, will be aluminum rings with the nickel silver at the top and perhaps the sides and bottom. Heck, the top may attach to some leather that holds the clasp: we haven't gone into that much planning and detail yet. I've also knocked around the idea of using chainmaille to attach plates of leather to make the cloak, but April's taken a liking to the challenge of a cloak of chain.
Although I will admit, the idea of a cloak with bishop's mantle attached to the top is ALSO very interesting. (off to ponder...)
Paul
The basic idea is to have the cloak be slightly narrow at the top, just wide enough to attach to a clasp, have it widen slightly at the bottom, and possibly cut a slight toot shape into the bottom. think \/\/ at the bottom.
The cloak, being a show piece, will be aluminum rings with the nickel silver at the top and perhaps the sides and bottom. Heck, the top may attach to some leather that holds the clasp: we haven't gone into that much planning and detail yet. I've also knocked around the idea of using chainmaille to attach plates of leather to make the cloak, but April's taken a liking to the challenge of a cloak of chain.
Although I will admit, the idea of a cloak with bishop's mantle attached to the top is ALSO very interesting. (off to ponder...)
Paul