Main > The Armoury

A trip 10 years into the past....

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Sir James A:
I figured I'd post up a few pics of some stuff from 10 years ago. I found my old thigh-high leather boots, which I'm going to chop down to mid-calf and use for my sabatons. I'm also about to sacrifice my old "the belt will hold it closed" gambeson from my SCA combat days, so I can re-purpose the blue closed cell foam from it for my current arming clothes & helmet.



You know you're at the height of fashion when you have blue foam visible through stretched black fabric, sewn with red stitching. :)

This is my old "leg harness holding belt", aka a weight belt with the kidney reinforcement removed.



My second attempt at a breastplate, back around 2000. It's 16 gauge, 304 (or 316?) stainless steel. I was lucky enough to have access to a full shop of tools, an SCA Armoring Laurel mentor (highest "grade" they give), and lots of fire and supervision. Unfortunately, it was only a couple times - and I don't have much skill, as the resulting breastplate is less than pretty.



My first attempt was so shameful I won't even post it. Picture a munitions grade breastplate. Now picture a large truck. Now picture that truck running over the breastplate...

Here is the first set of tassets I ever made (16 gauge mild), back in ... 96? 97? A couple years after I tried to upgrade from my "carpet and duct tape" cuirass I started with as an early teen into steel armor (no, I'm not joking).



The forming is really rough and basic. REALLY ROUGH. I used a 4x4 post that I hit with a sledgehammer a bunch of times to get a roughly rounded shape to hammer over, and then I hit it with a rubber mallet - turned sideways so that I was hitting with the rounded part and not the face. I cut the plates with about 14,372 jigsaw blades of my dad's that I broke before finally using a hammer and chisel, then grinding them to shape on the bench grinder. I finally saved up and bought the mis-matched, completely non-period sorta-italianish harness I have posted on facebook.

Looking back, my parents let me do some really weird stuff when I was younger. They're awesome. :D

Allan Senefelder:
James, while I fully understand looking at work you did in the deep past and saying " ickyyyyyyyy!" ( believe me theres stuff from the mid 90's I hope no one ever figures out I made ) the breast plate is a respectable first attempt, especially given the material you were trying to work with ( stainless, aka satans metal ). I'm betting that the inside sets of rivets on the tassets aren't blind rivets concealing leather articualtion with the outside rivest being slot rivets.

Sir Wolf:
heheehhe thanks for sharing those!

Sir William:
James, that's awesome.  Carpet armor...you're gonna have to share some pics of that!

SirNathanQ:
Now that's what I want to see  ;)

Hey, the breatplate isn't too bad. A lot better than anything I could churn out  :)

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