Chain Mail
No, not the garbage that fills your Inbox each morning.
I'm talking about ...
Medieval Armor!
What follow is my first foray into this hobby.
As is my usual way, there's no half way.
No small samplers or simple wall hangings to get the hang of working with Chainmail.
I'm going straight from spending a few hours on the Internet reading about it and looking at examples of how to weave and ...
Making a full shirt. The goal right now is a half-sleeve shirt that reaches past my hips to allow it to be "belted" in place.
I'll be adding pictures and documentation as I create each section of the shirt.
To make your life easier, each Item, Update, Section, etc.. will be seperated by my pretty Red horizontal bars.
Day 1
As is my usual way, I simply jumped straight into this after doing the appropriate amount of research to let me think I was fairly well armed for this battle.
I started by making a Sleeve for the Shirt first.
This is a good thing because in my enthusiasm for creating something, I failed to take any photos of my progress.
That will be corrected as I make the next Sleeve.
I did however remember to make notes on how many links, rows and columns were needed to make the Sleeve.
Thanks to that moment of brilliance, the finished pair should match!
For now, all I can offer is a couple photos of the finished Sleeve.
I should note that what you see here is the result of over 9 hours of work.
That includes creating the Coils, Cutting the Rings from the Coils, Closing the Rings,
Weaving strips of Rings and then Weaving the Strips to create the larger sections of the project.
Yes, for the curious, I will show pictures of those steps later.
At this point, you may be wondering why a person would even want to do something like this.
I can't argue your logic ... There is no real need for Chain Mail today.
Well ... Firstly, Chain Mail is just very pleasing on the eyes. It's also very expensive.
So, instead of hoping, wishing and dreaming my way to never owning any, I'm making it for myself.
Second ... I want to quit smoking. And I know that as long as I keep my fingers busy, I can go for hours without another Cigarette.
I'm hoping that as I spend countless hours making this shirt ... and maybe a hood (coif) to go with it afterwards ... I will be able to finally quit.
And if I don't quit, I will at least be happily insane!!!
How I make my Chain Mail
I should note that the photos are fairly large, so to aid those with slower connections, they will open in a seperate window.
Just click on the word "Photo" at the end of each description.
I am using 16 Gauge Galvanized Steel Wire. It is available at most hardware stores for a reasonable price.
1: After winding the raw wire onto a 3/8" diameter rod, I am left with a Coil. Photo
2: Using Mini Bolt Cutters, I then cut each ring from the Coil. Photo
3: The cut ends of the rings are left slightly off-set due to the inherent nature of the coiling process. Photo
4: I now divide the rings into two roughly equal piles. One pile is left "raw". For the second pile, I "Close" all the rings. Photo
5: First step is to open a "Raw" ring. There is a right and wrong way. The "wrong" way will cause the ring to deform and also makes it near impossibly to close the ring properly. Photo
6: Add two "Closed" ring to the Open ring and then close the "Raw" ring. You have just created a "Starter Section".
7: Open another Raw ring and add to Closed rings to it.
8: It's now time to start Weaving. Hold the Starting piece as shown.Photo
9: Using 1 "raw" ring and two "Closed" rings, weave the Raw ring through the two "Closed" rings. Photo
10: Close the raw ring. Repeat Steps 7 to 9 until you acheive a Strip of Mail the length you require. Photo
11: When making the Shoulder Segment, I need a selection of varying lengths of Strips. The Photo here will show you how I count. Photo
In that Photo, it would be a Strip of 5 Rings. and I would need 3 of them if the piece called for 6 Rows. I don't count the Center Row. I don't know why, but it's how I do it and it works for me!
These instructions are just here for the curious.
This is my first attempt at making Chain Mail, so if you follow them and something goes wrong ...
Don't Blame Me!
I will add more Photos and Steps in the future when my own project reaches those stages.
Eventually, you will have a number of Chain "Strips" that you will then weave together to create a Sheet of chain mail.
What you then do with that Sheet is up to you! I will be making a Chain Mail Shirt and that will be the focus of this page.
The SLeeve
To make a Sleeve, I need the following Strips.
6 @ 31 Rings Photo
These will eventually make the "tube" that fits over the Arm (Bicep)
1 @ 31 Rings
1 @ 27 Rings
1 @ 23 Rings
1 @ 19 Rings
1 @ 15 Rings
1 @ 11 Rings
1 @ 7 Rings
1 @ 3 Rings
Photo
These will eventually form the triangle that wraps from under the Armpit and over the top of the Shoulder
The Strips are then laid down beside each other and woven together, creating a flat sheet of mail.
I have two photos showing the weaving of the strips.
Photo 1 shows the first weave "in progress" as I catch the first two rings of one side of each Strip.
Photo 2 shows a second "weave ring" already in place. The process continues from there to the end of the Strips, then repeats until all Strips are joined.
The finished product looks like this. Photo
Repeating this process of Strips and Weaving for the triangle shaped sheet for the Shoulder.Photo
As seen in the previous Photo, the Strips don't create a nice 45 degree angle. Removing one ring from the "short" side of each Strip "finishes" the edge of the Sheet. Photo
I then join the two Sheets together with the same weaving process.Photo
I then wrap the sheet the around whatever is about the right size and weave the two edges (of the Arm Sheet) together to form the finished Sleeve. Photo
A few Elastic Bands helps in the weaving of the Seam at this point. Otherwise, the Sheet simply slides off the sides of the Bottle.
If I was doing more than a single project, I think I would make a similar sized Cylinder out of a hard styrofoam (the Blue stuff) to allow me to pin the Sheet in place while I weave the seam.
It takes about 150 Feet wire to make a single Sleeve.
Think about how far that is for a moment ... Half the length of a Football Field!
It's also just about 1300 Rings for each Sleeve.
Yup ... that's a lot of Rings for just a Sleeve!
How that math works ...
Let's talk about 2 Strips of 10 that we will be joinng together to make small Sheet.
We have 30 Rings in each Strip - 2 Rows of 10 each, plus the 10 that join them together.
For Both Strips, that makes 60 Rings.
We also will need 10 more Rins to weave the two Strips together.
That brings us to 70 Rings for a piece of Chain Mail that I call 10 X 4.
And, if I was to add a Finished Edge around that Sheet, the Count would be closer to 80.
The next step will be forming the "Collar"
This will be done by expanding each row by adding rings to one side of each strip.
The Collar should then be the correct shape to join the two Sleeves via the Shoulder Sections.
That update will have to wait for a few days though ...
I wiped out the stock at the local Hardware Store and am waiting on delivery of more wire.
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