Breaking taps and depressing times

Have not been posting much on this blog because, well, not a lot of armour is getting done! The summer is finally vanishing, and I am attemting to cork up the windows, and ready the armoury for the winter. There was a rush job that came in yesterday though....not all that long a job, maybe 15 hours or so...but it involved disassembling fairly mundane things like door handles. And sure enough, one of the screws broke off under the level of the brass.
Fine, I thought, I'll just drill and tap it out. Which I did....drilling it out was a piece of cake, and it went without a hitch. Then came the tapping. I swear I did nothing untowards...no odd twisting or yanking, but sure enough, I broke the tap off in a blind hole. In brass.
That happened at 4 o'clock. Its now midnight, and I have managed to break about half of the tap out of the hole...all that is left now is the hard part way down there in the bottom.
Well, bright an early tomorrow, I'll get the rest of the tap out, and drill it oversize, and install a large brass machine screw, which in turn, I will promptly drill and tap for the correct screw. It usually takes about 8 to 10 hours for me to get a broken tap out. This is falling right in line.

A random pic from Malta

The picture below is, well, not quite random. It was taken to include a lot of historical facts and representations. You should click on it to enlarge. But before you do, lets get a feeling of where we are and what we are doing. At first, it looks like a jumble of honey coloured stone buildings, and after a bit, you see what is going on. This picture is taken from the land entrance and outerworks served by Fort St. Angelo, at the west end of the city of Vittoriosa looking South. You can see the vantage point in the map above, and you should remember that North is at the bottom.

Below is another map, you might want to compare it to the one above. Decide which is better...grin!

http://www.mma.gov.mt/port_valletta_map.htm

If it had a drawbridge, we would be standing on it, but what we have instead is a causeway over the dry moat. The fortified gateway is to our left, the main entrance is to the right. There are cannons facing us over our shoulders, and loopholes in the looming walls overhead. Down below is the dry moat, which has been filled with tinned steel covered sheds acting as warehouses. The roadway is not new...it has just been paved over the roadway that existed back then, though admittedly it was blocked by a string of fortified gates which have all vanished by now. Back at the time of the great Seige, we would expect much the same junk in the moat...and a lot of garbage and trash. This made the moats even harder to cross. To the right you can see the defences of Vittoriosa, which get lower as you go down towards the water. Tempting to an attacker, way too tempting. Those defences go in steps towards the waterline, and each step is swept with small arms and carronades loaded with grapeshot. There were several attacks in this moat, and around to the right, none succeeded. The honey coloured stone is sandstone, which is easy to cut, easy to transport, and soaks up cannon shot like a pillow soaks up an uppercut. The distinctive half round mouldings mark the top of the wall, the part above that is a firing step. As you can see, the firing step is easily ten feet across. Good luck knocking that down with a cannon!

To the front, is the creek. It is actually named "Dockyard Creek", and it isn't actually a creek, is actually an inlet deep enough to take ocean going ships, and opposite the creek is the site of the former Castelle St. Michael. The ottomans did so much damage to it that they tore it down, and turned the foundations into warehouses and customs buildings, which accounts for the straight (military, shipshape and bristol fashion) streets, and renamed it Senglea. In the background, farther south, you can see the cranes for the next creek down (French Creek)...there is a dockyard there, and those cranes are massive! And over to the left about midway up the pic, you can see the gateway to Castelle St. Michael. All that is left of the poor Castelle St. Michael are the walls, out of site on the other side of all the building that was done in Senglea.

In the front, across the creek, is the "great crane". Actually, the roots of the great crane....those buttresses on either side of the doorway in the building with the battered (sloping) walls right at the water line form the base of a bifurcated derrick which would reach out out over the ship, and install heavy cannons in the galleys. It was made of timber, so has not survived, but the huge steel bases are still in place. One wonders what motive power they used...I suspect it was treadmills. Old technology, but good technology.

I found another map, a beautiful engraving by Stockwell here....http://historic-cities.huji.ac.il/malta/valletta/maps/stockdale_1800_valletta_b.jpg They call Dockyard Creek by a different name..."Galley Harbour".

Mr. Bourland's armour...reprised

Mr. Bourland had vanished for half a year or more (It turned out he had been deployed) and his armour was stored fairly neatly up in the showroom. Except for one detail....it had been stored under the air conditioner. It got rusty. Darned if I was going to ship a rusty armour. So I tossed the ratty old faulds and tassets and made new ones. This is what I came up with.
They are sitting on the pic-nic table, letting the lacquer dry. Then I had to duck out, and by the time I got back to them, it was next morning. The armour is all covered in frost! Oh no, (I thought) I just made his second set of faulds rusty too. But no, it was all good. The sun came out, the frost flashed off, and the armour is all assembled now, and ready to ship.

Above is a closeup of the new tassets I will be making. I stole the design from an armour I had made a few months ago, and put my personal spin on it.

This week in armour

A bit of a rush job, but not so bad all in all. This is an articulated left arm with hinged vambrace. Kind of a nice bit of kit. I probably made the hinged wrist section too short...but better short than too long.

This is a left shoulder. Actually, it is a beta version that I had made, then discarded when I had learned all that could be learned from it. I went back to it because a customer wanted one but didn't want to pay for a really good one. So I went with this and he payed half price.

The six lames in the rerebrace make this armour quite distinctive. Actually, they were not designed to even BE rerebrace lames, but were rather, cut out originally for use as lames in an articulated knee or elbow cop. You can see the similarities in the lames here and in the lames in the elbow cop at the top of the page. I don't think that they look all that bad, but the lesson learned is to use larger and fewer lames...these just make the armour look busy.

These bottom two pictures show how much articulation you get by using lots of lames! I used a king post attachment this time...it seems to be very effective. In this case, for the king post, I used one of my handy dandy lions. They dress up even the plainest of armours!

Research

click on the pic below to enlarge.

This appears to be drawings from the period...possibly Durer or a student of his. These are clearly "studies", that is to say, not meant to be finished paintings, but rather detail elements that can be presented to a patron for approval. It looks like a broken up portfolio, and is hanging on the wall in Prague Castle. Knowing the European way of doing things, these are probable originals.
Items of particular note include the stunning sword knot shown third from the bottom on the right hand side. Its a fancy enough knot that the artist really got into the details of it. He shows the finished knot, and then details of how it must have been made.
(That the artist has an eye for detail can be seen by the studies of the forshortened heads of the horses second from the bottom, left hand column.)

And the back plate of Mr. Merz armour

closeup of the buckle. They are solid brass centre bar buckles. Very workmanlike. Nuthin fancy.

Here is the view from the back, with the person wearing it standing straight up. That two piece design makes for a long placquart! Oh well...if for some reason is doesn't fit, I can go to a standard three piece easily enough. They always fit.

The above view is from the back, with the person bending over. This shows maximum reveal. Not too bad. Again, if for some reason, the owner slouches a lot, I can always add in a middle piece, and cut that long placquart down. You can see the space for the shoulders really well in the above pic.

A three quarter view of it...the side straps are one inch, the over the shoulder straps are inch and a quarter.

And the view directly from the side. The back plate slides under the breastplate, so the buckles are spaced well back, to allow for movement. I built a considerable amount of "growing room" into this armour since the wearer is likely to get at least one more growth spurt before the next couple of years goes by.

There we go...a nice armour. Now all we need is the gorget, shoulders and arm harness.

What do you think Charlie?

New knives for 2008-2009

We just bought a whole new batch of costume daggers, suitable for medieval feast cutlery. They are "in stock" and "in the showroom". You can forget about buying one from my showroom or sales booth if you are under 18 though.

These are not knives I have made....they are actually all made in (of all places) Pakistan, however they are inexpensive, pretty, reasonably useful, and all under twenty bucks. How can I beat that?



Integral slab handled dagger, the blade is all one piece, the handle is made from coloured, resin impregnated compressed laminated pine. After the hydraulic machine is finished, the pine is half the thickness, and as hard as maple.
The result is not such a bad material. The blade...well, what do you expect for fifteen bucks...its stainless steel. That means that when you use it, it will "stain less" than most steel. Best you can expect though. Good enough for opening boxes, and worrying that last sliver of chicken off the carcass.

The very slim line "red" handled dagger. These days, the colour seems to less dark red and more brownish....no doubt the reaction of the dye to the wood. I still call them "red handled daggers". Tooled leather scabbard. Just under 8 inches long. Made for a small hand. It has a "bigger brother" though. The handle is made on a lathe, and it has one of the dreaded "rat tail" tangs. For some reason, the rat tail tangs are not so bad when used on knives...I have never had one fail, even when I was using a set of them for throwing one summer. A rat tail tang is actually period...I guess they are bad news with a sword, but not so bad for a knife.

The mountain man dagger. No kidding...thats the name they gave it! This remarkably slick little piece is a little industrial masterpiece....at seven inches long, it is made from that compressed pine wood and gleaming brass.

A solid little knife...lots of decoration. like all these knives, they are dishwasher safe.

So this is whats new in the showroom. Cute little knives. Go figure!

Mr. Merz' armour, part II

Below is the picture that Mr. Merz sent me...the inspiration for the armour. It is one of the lovely paintings from the Osprey book series....(darn, I can't read the artist's name). This series of books is actually pretty good research...it relies a lot on existing statuary, armours, church brasses, and such to help bring the period under discussion alive. They employ top of the line graphic artists (one of their most prolific artists was (name deleted) of Oh Wicked Wanda fame from the seventies.)
Of course, the result is still one man's interpretation, but in the world of re-enactment, this interpretation is pretty much accepted.
Mr. Merz told me that the armour on the far left is the one he wanted, but in a two piece design. How do you think I did so far?

I didnt bother lacing up the armour for the pictures, and I see that I have to get the scissors out to do a little trim on the leather straps in front.

The armour has been sanded with 100 grit paper, and a lacquer finish has been applied. Any scratches will appear in the lacquer...a moment with a rag (wet with lacquer thinner...thats nail polish remover) will melt the laq, and blend out the scratches. A superior finish...one which can be easily fixed.

Mr. Merz' armour

This is the two piece body armour I am making for Mr Merz. The armour is fairly straightforward, however he specified handmade belt buckles and laces. Here you can see the holes for the laces which will attach the faulds. I'll put pics of the faulds up tomorrow....grin....the tassets are a little, um, customized, and need to be finished before I can drill the holes in the faulds to accept them.

Click on the images to enlarge them. Here you can see the handmade buckles really nicely, and you can make out the copper rivets which attach the picadills which will prevent the armour from sliding metal on metal.

And a closeup of the buckle. The ring of the buckle is fairly straightforward steel, and the tongue and keeper are made from hammertone forged steel. They look rough on purpose...grin.

Weapons from Prague part 1

click on the images to enlarge....
Above is a nice range of swords, actually single handed swords. Some so short they might properly called a "dirk", though of course, a dirk by definition is a broken sword remade into a big old knife. Across the top is a "celtic sword". Characterized by the sweeping anthromorphic hilt, this is of course, a much later period copy... A stylistic variant which does not prevent this from being a very nice battle sword.
Second from the left is a short sword. Can't tell much about it since it is encased in this no doubt modern scabbard. The leather wrapped handle is kind of nice to see....seems like a nice sword to handle, and the wheel pommel balances this sword out to be very quick.
Third and forth from the left....built up sword like objects, unlikely to be actually used in anything other than a play or a pagent.
fifth from the left...a very real sword...with a nice wide "viking" style fuller. The big ring pommel is kind of neat...it seems a little reminicient of an "Irish" sword, but I suspect this one has seen service. The sweep of the edge coming into the tip is VERY well done. The Smith was proud of this job. The word that comes to mind is "workmanlike". Short, nasty, and useful.
Second from the right....same design, but not done nearly as well. No nice wide fuller, this sword would handle like a club. That is to say...effectively.
The far right on the top row....a falchion of some sort...looks like a medieval copy of a persian blade. One wonders if this one was used in pagents as well. It isn't an actual persian blade because it is not as well made, and would not qualify as a "collector's item". Though you never know.

Bottom Row.....MUCH more interesting.
far left....a basic short sword with a "Brazil Nut" shaped pommel. Used a lot in Germany and England.
Second from left bottom row...Very well made German design, with nice wide fuller. I bet you can see the "running wolf" marks of the Nurenburg blade makers if you look close!
Third from left, bottom row.....nice fighting sword. Probably standard issue to anybody who guarded the Hansiatic League ports. The blade widening towards the crossguard is kind of unusual...one would think that would reduce the effectivness of the defence.
Forth from left, bottom row....standard blacksmith work. Looks like a reasonably good job...the quillion looks as though it had seen some rough times. Probably a standard issue sword.
Third from right, bottom row.....A viking sword! Oh my....wonder how old THAT one is! The lobate pommel, short quillions, and almost no room for the hand is SO distinctive. The blade looks to be awfully plain. One wonders if this was supposed to be sold to Denmark or Sweden like most of the short swords made in Germany. (Vikings didn't make their own swords....they bought the blades from Germany...their cousins so to speak)
Second from right....yes, this is most definitely a German sword. The double ring is so distinctive. Of course, "Germany" back in those days tended to mean the "Austrian-Hungarian Empire", so it covered a LOT of ground.
And the far right....the straight wide fuller implies a better sword than the handle gives credit to.

Thank you Pierre for bringing back the pictures of such great weapons which are stored in the castle which overlooks Prague.

Roman helmet

Antonious Pius asked me if I had ever made any Roman Armour. A little, here and there over the years. This is a helm which I had to make in a real hurry because the commercial "piece of junk" helm the lass had ordered for her hubby was temporarily out of stock. I offered to make her one, and would meet the price of the offshore piece. So this is a little rushed......but as the pic below shows when you click on it to blow it up to a more reasonable siae, the results were not too shabby. First I had to do a little research. It seems that the helms were made from spun bronze bowls. I could not find any examples of spun steel bowls, so right there, the "period-ness" of the piece suffered since I simply did not have any bronze spinnings.

The other problem was the large outside rolled edges. I hate outside rolled edges.

Above is pic of a roman helm from the British Museum (I think) I am not dead sure, but I "think" this shows a steel spun bowl, overlaid with a fair amount of thin bronze. Or maybe gold...it seems awfully well preserved for bronze.

After assembling all the disparate pieces, I was left with something like this. The bowl was way too thick for me to even think of doing that "bellows" effect at the back of the neck...it was battle grade at about 10 gauge....and 8 gauge near the bottom. Too heavy to even think about wrinkling the metal.

From the front, it looks not too bad. The lion was a sort of after thought.....I suppose I should have put two of them up there, one over each eye. But as I said, I was in a hurry, and only had the one lion.

I kind of like the rings on the cheek pieces. Very spiff.

This shows the little ear guards. They are harder to do than they look, and they look darned hard!

And a fairly fancy carrying handle on the tail drape. Well, it looked okay at the time.

There you go your excellency...a cute little battle helmet.

The emperor Antonious Pius's blog is here....http://antoninuspius.blogspot.com/