Subject: Rolls and ridges (Plate Armour)

From: [email-masked] (Ford Prefect)
Date: 28 Jun 1993 14:50:57 GMT

Hi everyone, particularly people who make armour.

When making Greavs, Knee Cops, and whatever else that requires
rolling an edge or puting in a ridge, do you do the roll or ridge
before you bend or dish out the piece to shape or after.
I have started making myself a 15th Century suit of Armour, I did
the greavs and Cruisses already they already have ridges.
The joints are next weeks batch or work :-)
Im doing this thing by hand so I just want to know which way is
easier and cleaner, before shaping or after shaping, so I dont have to
redo something too many times.

Also, does anyone have a template for a Breast Plate and back plate they
could snail mail me a copy of?

thanks in advance
Ara Kotchian
[email-masked]

---

From: [email-masked] (Carl West)
Date: Mon, 28 Jun 1993 18:53:24 GMT

Do the main shaping first, save the fiddly-bits for later.

- If you turn the edges first you'll find it difficult to planish right
next to the edges.
 
- If you do a hollow rolled edge (the wired rolled edge on armor is
largely a myth promulgated by victorian "scholars") first and then find
that you need to bend the piece, you may end up with an irrepairably
kinked edge.

- If you finish the edges first, then later find that the piece is a
_little_ too big, you can't make it just a _little_ smaller. You have
to reduce it by at least as much as you used up in the edging.

To make the rolling easier when the time comes: 

- smooth/straighten/even-up the edge to be rolled

- scribe a line on the backside of the work, say, 5/16" from the edge

- over the edge of a relatively sharp stake, fold the edge toward the
front of the work along the line. This should take three passes,
bending ~30deg at a time. 
(On inside curves try the pein end of a ballpein hammer)

- draw out the flange till it tapers to about half its original thickness

- file the edge even (helps produce a more even size roll)

- on a stake that fits the inside of the work, set the flange facing
up, strike down on it with blows that glance toward the work (not off
the edge). The edge should roll up nicely. You must study this well. :)
The hammer you do this with should _not_ have a high polish, the
`toothiness' of a matte surface really helps the glancing blows be
effective.

This is for an outside roll, inside rolls, flat hemming and roped edges 
are similar but different.

If I have failed to make something clear, please call me on it.

Carl West
aka Meister Frydherik Eysenkopf,OL

When I stop learning, bury me.