From: ddfr@quads.uchicago.edu (david director friedman)
Newsgroups: rec.org.sca
Subject: Re: Aluminum Armour (was Re: HELP WANTED RE KINGDOM AWARDS)
Date: 20 Dec 92 17:50:04 GMT
Reply-To: ddfr@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations


"how many people (besides probably Duke Cariadoc) know, for a fact,
how thick the
leather used by the various cultures for armour was ?" (Dennis
O'Connor)

I don't know, although I would like to. As I think I made clear in my
T.I. article, the thickness I suggested was based on what would
suffice for SCA combat. I do not even know (as I think I also said in
my article) that period hardened leather armor was hardened with wax.
 Someone I spoke to, I think Balderik, had experimented with a
process that involved drying out soaked leather in a not very hot
oven to harden it, with no wax involved. As far as I have so far
discovered, nobody knows what period hardened leather armor was
hardened with. But I am rather more likely to acquire or generate
information about it than if I had felt free to use Kydex instead of
hardened leather.

Which brings me back to our discussion. I certainly agree with Dennis
that making armor out of steel does not guarantee that it is
authentic, for all the reasons he mentions--nor does making it out of
hardened leather. But using the more nearly period material makes it
more likely that you will be doing what they did, and limiting
yourself to period materials puts you closer to solving the problem
they were solving--how to make functional armor with their
technology--than letting yourself use modern materials. It is not
exactly the same problem since we are fighting with blunt weapons,
but much of it is the same--we, like they, need to be able to move
easily, not to get tired too fast, prefer materials that do not rust,
etc. 

I think part of my disagreement with Dennis is that he thinks he
knows more than I think I know. If we knew a lot about period armor,
we might be able to do what he believes he is doing--use one
inauthenticity (aluminum) to cancel out another (rolled instead of
forged plates). But that assumes that we already know all the things
he is guessing--how thick the armor was, how it was made, how hard,
etc. Since we do not know those things, we are better off making our
armor the same as theirs in those dimensions where doing so is
practical (i.e. we know enough and it is not too hard to do), use
technologies they could have used when we do not know what they did
use (hence beeswax instead of paraffin to harden my armor), and try
to grope closer, by successive approximation, to what they actually
did.

Going from the general to the specific, with reference to some of his
comments. One thing one might discover by using steel instead of
plastic (probably not true for aluminum, but the general argument is
about advantages of using period instead of out of period materials)
is that drilled holes have sharp edges and cut lacing (this is
something that Dennis already knows, but other people in similar
situations might not). That would push you towards punched holes,
which are practical (indeed easier than drilling, if you have access
to a hand punch) and closer to what was really used. If steel
lamellae of a weight that you find comfortable bend too easily, you
might dry work hardening them and curving them a little, which makes
them harder. One advantage of lamellar is that you can do your
experiment on one or a few lamellae--you do not have to redo the
whole piece. What little I know about steel lamellar (that 18 guage,
work hardened and curved, stands up to SCA combat, and that punched
holes in it do not chew up leather lacing) is based on the steel
lamellae that I used, as an experiment, to strengthen the left side
of my hardened leather klibanion.

If you make aluminum lamellar you will also be pushed into various
experiments to improve it--but those experiments are less likely to
generate information relevant to period armor.

One more point. I wrote that  ...  ". One result of his
"dissemination of information" may be a lot of people, less well
informed than he is, getting a vague idea that good, strong, lamellar
metal armor weighs five pounds. " Dennis replied:

"Not if my documentation is good. And if I enter the armour in an A&S
competition, the local people I know who judge them won't let me get
away with sloppy docs. "

I was not thinking of contests. I was thinking of all the people who
will see your armor, pick it up, maybe try it on. Do you plan to give
each of them a lecture on what is and is not period about it? If so,
that may have unfortunate consequences for any medieval feel the
event you are participating in may have.

David/Cariadoc