I am a NOOB who wants to make his own chainmail

[feyn]

The tile already pretty much says it all. I want to make a chainmail for myself. This will not be an exhibition piece, on the contrary, it will be worn day and night sometimes for 2 weeks in a row. It will be worn in rough terrain sometimes, so it will get into contact with mud, sunshine, rain etc heck it might even be worn when I have to get through a small river or so.

So the 2 most important requiries are that it needs to withstand whatever it is thrown in (or is thrown at it) and it has to handicap me as little as possible. The optimum would be when it fits me like a second skin (my research so far suggested that the better it fits the less it handicaps me). Once it is done I plan to wear it as often as possible for atleast 6 months, to get used to it, especially the weight. Since we talk weight, I hope to be below 12 kilogramms for the full chainmail armour including padding. The from should be roughly like this :

http://www.raisonsbrassband.com/images/chainmail shirt for ebay.jpg

onle the "skirt" a little longer, roughly to the knees. Like in the pic I plan to make the hood seperately. This piece will be used for 2 seperate characters :

1. A young dwarf, merely 90 years old (almost a teenager still), who has lost his family and all his fortune, along with almost the complete restopf his trtibe due to a big mining accident. He and 2 friends are the sole survivors,since they where not there when it happened. Now they try their luck as soldiers of fortune together.
The armour is his proudest posession, and shows he has seen better days. It is worn a bit, but is of a good quality.

2. A bounty hunter, specializing in orcs, but not really all that successfull. So if he is not hunting behind a bounty he takes any job that pays his meals, preferably jobs that involve fighting, since that is the only thing he is any good at.The chain mail is the only piece of his armour he has bought for himself, and that really fits. The rest consists of whatever he can get his hands on (even an orkish shield).

Let us get to my questions :

1. What would be the ideal material ? Itis ok if it gets a little rust, but it needs to be usable for years to come, and not rust away ina year or 2. It also needs to be tough enough to take falls etc. It shouldnt be too heavy, as I said I want to keep it under12 kilogramms since there might come other armour over it in certain characters (like an iron or leather chestarmour, platelegs and arms, all kinds of helmets) and I need to keep my equipment light enough to be able to to jog in it (cool would be if I could run in it, but i am realistic). Also how much do i need ? How big should the rings be, diameter, how thick needs the material to be etc. ? Should it have some protective coating ? etc.etc.etc.


2. How much money will I roughly need for this project ?

3. Are there any special tools that I should get ? For example I heard there is a special kind of pliers with which I can easilyoopebn the rings and close them.

4. Are there any special techniques and where can I learn them ? I have heard you can do patterns ertdc. into it. How hard is that and where can Iearn that ? Especially for the dwarf it would be so cool to have something on the chest and on the back. It shouldnt be too hard to take them out and replace them with plain chainmail or another pattern, or do I vastly underestimate the difficulties in doing that ?

5. I have seen you can buy ready made ones quite cheap. How difficult is it to change one of those so it fits perfectly ? Should I buy a bigger one and shrink it to size, or a smaller one and make it bigger ?

6.Can you buy chain mail fabric anywhere ? How good a solution is that for my project ?

7. How Do I get the perfect meassurements for my chainmail ? Like how tight should it be so it fits the best ?

8 Do you have any tips on where to buy what I need ? I live in south germany, but if it makes sense financially I am ready to take a trip somewhere.


Let me thank you in advance for any help or tips you can give me, espcially those answering important questions I have forgotten to ask since I don´t know yet what I am doing
This is the first really big costume project for me. Usually I have played pirates, and bought what I needed on flea markets, online etc. But this year I want to take it on a whole new level ! That dwarf has been on my mind for 3 years already, and with him many more sophisticated characters that need complicated costumes, and I know you are the right people to ask for tips on this

 

[sq10e]

okay, I can give you two resources to look at.
theringlord.com
armourarchive.org

The Ring Lord is a site that sells chain-mail making supplies, even has a few instructions on how to do it, has descriptions of each of their types of rings so you could find the material you want (they have just about everything from titanium to mild steel to stainless steel to aluminum to jewelers gold <for necklaces and bracelets and such> )
Having done the smallest dabbling in chain-mail, it would be prohibitively hard to make an inlay and switch it out like you were suggesting. Perhaps a light tabbard or surcoat with the design you want.

The Armour Archive is a collection of resources for people that want to make any sort of historical armor, has links to sites that sell materials (like the ring lord), tutorials, and also some forums.

Hope this helps

oh, and the ring lord has a function that lets you calculate how many rings you need to buy based on the measurements you provide

 

[Darth Lars]

Is this for LARP:ing? Then you should be able to find lots of info from other LARP:ers.

Years ago, I heard that rings for Orc chainmail could have made from PVC pipe, bundled up together and cut on a bandsaw. This would have been relatively light.

 

[Joe Pep]

well, there are some other questions that you should ask.... if you want strength galvanized steel... heavy as hell, but the real deal.. i myself have made several pieces in galvanized steel, and they are very heavy to wear.... but they are strong... it really depends.. i myself would go with anodized aluminum if i had to wear it all of the time. but if you want something that is cheap, tough, and look authentic.... go with the galvanized steel...
the next important question is how much money do you have to spend... to you have enough to buy pre-cut rings or are you going to get wire and make your own... before you do so... if you are going to go with galvanized steel.... go to the local hardware stores and look for 14 gauge galvanized steel spools to buy.. it all depends on how money and or time you have to invest in this project.... if you go that route you can find tons of resources on the net how wind it, cut it, and put it together... enjoy....

 

[Witchking]

All the chain mail in the lord of the rings movies was made from cut PVC pipe and then fabricated like real chain mail. Light weight, but looked real. If you're going for a costume look only, that'd be the way to go. If you want it to be fully functional and wearable, go with the metal rings.

 

[Fairdos]

if you want real metal but less weight aluminum rings would work, I suggest though doing alot of trial and error pieces, for the costume to look good you need the pattern to weave correctly, theringlord.com has alot of pics of finished things as well as tutorials for weave patters, good luck and happy mailing, it's fun but time consuming I used to maille some two years ago but life has slowed that down

 

[Randino]

I've done a lot of fighting in chainmaile armor. If you want the best, you need to have the suit tailors to fit you perfectly. My suit is close, but it's still a pain at times. The weight moves around to much, and it slows you down. You are right about it taking some training to be effective in.

What I've got on here is 16 gauge steel butted chain with 3/8th inch diameter rings. This was hand made from scratch by a friend for me. Since you are from Germany, you probably recognize the colors on the shield.

There are a lot of options to consider. Ideally, go for a fitted suit of riveted steel. It won't blow out rings, and will be much lighter than a butted suit. It's not cheap though.

If you go for a butted suit, (Where the chains are just bent closed, as opposed to riveted or welded closed) You will want to have spare rings, and know how to fix the suit. You will blow out rings, usually around the neck, arms, and in the middle of the "skirt". You will also want a gambison, which is basically a quilt sewn into a jacket to wear under the chain.

So, If you can get away with fabric chain, it will be cheaper, and lighter. If you want the real thing, it will be heavy, and more expensive. It will look better in person though.

As for tools, that all depends on what you want to make.

 

[samurai169]

I've been making chainmail for twenty years, and restoring 400 yr old armour for my collection for 10 of those years. There are several different types. From what I read European is the style you want. Cost is going to vary. Are you planning on making your own rings its far more cost effective and easier than it sounds. Do you plan on actuall combat?? Also if you plan on wearing it jogging or anything like that if its loose there is a possibility of causing internal damage (bleeding). A piece that size is going to be very heavy. You might want to consider aluminum rings. I've made mine out if everything from titanium, brass, copper, galvanized steel, stainless steel, & high tension spring steel. You have been given some good advice from those above if you have any questions pm me if I can help I will

 

[Contec]

ring patterns
CGMaille.com - Tutorials

 

[Lflank]

Buying rings is massively expensive---much cheaper to make your own. You'll need:

wire--the standard wire for making chainmail seems to be 16-guage galvanized steel (some people use lighter 20-guage). 16-guage is what I used for my chainmail shirt. You can get big rolls of it at Home Depot. If you want lighter armor, you can use aluminum wire instead, but it costs more and is harder to find.

a metal bar---about a foot or 18 inches long, this will be the same diameter that you want your rings to be. Some people use 1/4 inch, some people use 5/16 inch. I used 5/16

wire cutters---obviously

a drill---drill a hole through one end of your metal bar, just wide enough for you to poke the end of your wire through


To make rings: cut a length of wire about a foot and a half or two feet long. Poke one end through the hole in your metal bar, and bend it over so it won't fall out. Then carefully wrap the rest of your wire tightly around the bar, leaving a little space between each loop. You should end up with something that looks like a spring, about eight or nine inches long, wrapped around your metal bar. Use your wirecutters to clip off the piece of wire holding it in the hole, and slide the whole coil-thing off the end of your metal bar. Then go down the length of your coil and clip off each individual ring along the top. You'll end up with a handful of rings. To make a fullsize mail shirt, you'll need around 10,000 rings. It took me about two months to make mine. IIRC, it took me seven or eight rolls of wire from Home Depot, which cost me around six bucks each, I think.

 

[Contec]

To make rings: cut a length of wire about a foot and a half or two feet long. Poke one end through the hole in your metal bar, and bend it over so it won't fall out. Then carefully wrap the rest of your wire tightly around the bar, leaving a little space between each loop. You should end up with something that looks like a spring, about eight or nine inches long, wrapped around your metal bar. Use your wirecutters to clip off the piece of wire holding it in the hole, and slide the whole coil-thing off the end of your metal bar. Then go down the length of your coil and clip off each individual ring along the top. You'll end up with a handful of rings. To make a fullsize mail shirt, you'll need around 10,000 rings. It took me about two months to make mine. IIRC, it took me seven or eight rolls of wire from Home Depot, which cost me around six bucks each, I think.

I put metal bar into my cordless drill instead of hand wrapping it. I also don't need to make that "little space" between each loop.
It's looks like this : (got this picture on google)

Then i just cut each by hand (But you could cut all at once, if you have the right tools )

 

[Flecktarn92]

Building a rig to make your own springs is very easy. When I started I found this video and the guy make a very cool mechanism How to make chainmail, chainmaille Part 1 - YouTube.

I would go with 16 gauge galvanized steel. It has a funny smell but it wont rust. In the videos the guy says to use wire cutters which works but after awhile its starts to hurt. If you have a dremel you can just go up and down the spring which cuts the time down drastically.

 

[Witchking]

I received a couple of PM's asking about the plastic ring chainmail, so for those thinking of doing the plastic chainmail as used in the Lord of the Rings, here's the method used from what I remember....

On the behind-the-scenes of one of the movie DVD's, 2 guys are shown at a table--they made ALL of the chainmail for all 3 films....something like 5000 suits or something ungodly like that. There may be a clip on YouTube or on the web with this particular BTS clip. That's basically all they did through the entire film making process of what, 4-5 years?

Basically, go to Home Depot or Lowes, go to the plumbing aisle, and buy the long PVC at whatever thickness you want....just look at one of the ends and look at the thickness of the pipe--that'll be your ring thickness/diameter. Then use a miter saw or scroll saw, make a jig with a piece of wood or similar material so that all of your cuts are the same thickness. Then spend the next few hours or days doing nothing but slicing the pipe into the little rings...I think about 1/8" thick slices. I think if you use a miter saw, you can cut a bundle of 4-5 pipes at one time.

Keep in mind that you'll need two buckets...one for whole rings, and then one bucket for rings that you'll cut with a pair of cutters or shears--just a snip so that you can spread the rings apart...you'll basically take 1 cut ring and place 4 of the others in it, like a keychain. This will be your 4 into 1 pattern. I think the LotR guys used a soldering iron to melt the cut ring ends back together once the whole rings were hung on it. Then just repeat into whatever pattern it is you're making. I think most of the tube comes in a matte gray, but you may still want to spray paint the finished pieced if you want a different color.

Hope this helps....and please feel free to add to this or correct the info if I'm off on anything.

 

[Ralph]

Good advice above on making a suit yourself at home, i just used gal wire and a winder from a car jack, couple bits of wood to hold that, and wind away!
Fair warning, it gets heavy using metal (even gal fencing wire) and is *very* time consuming. Mine was very cheap though, fencing wire comes in rolls of 500mtr locally and the tools are two pair of pliers and a small bolt cutter (to split the windings of rings)
I would like to extend mine a bit more, its a long singlet at the moment (no arms and needs to be longer) and i have put a few hundred hours into it already.
Its great when you take it off after wearing it for a few hours. Your legs are used to all that extra weight and when you suddenly get 12-15 kg lighter you 'bounce' as you walk!
If i were to start again - i would buy rings if i could afford it.

 

[Randino]

Keep in mind if you use a dremel, or some sort of saw to cut the coils of metal rings, you loose a little metal, and when you close the rings, they end up less than a perfect circle. The best way to cut your own rings, (be it more time consuming) is with high quality clippers.

Another thing that is hugely important is the ring closures. If they aren't edge on edge and flush, you run the risk of catching on yourself, and other things. It makes the suit bite you when you get hit.

 

[Lflank]

Another thing that is hugely important is the ring closures. If they aren't edge on edge and flush, you run the risk of catching on yourself, and other things. It makes the suit bite you when you get hit.

This is why it's a good idea to wear a padded quilted shirt, called a "gambeson", under your chain mail. A gambeson also absorbs the impact from a blow, which chainmail by itself can't do. I made my gambeson from a large quilted cloth pad used to wrap TVs and computers during moving.

 

[Lflank]

You may also want to consider scale armor--it's easier to make than mail. Scale is made by cutting small metal plates (sheet steel, aluminum, bronze) about the size and shape of dog tags, then sewing them to a cloth backing. The process looks sort of like this (forgive the crude drawing):

Here is a vest I made from scale (this is actually a variant called "lamellar", in which there is no cloth backing and the sides and bottom of the scales are sewn together too):

Lamellar scale can also be made from small pieces of leather; plain scale can't, since the ends of the scales tend to curl up and make you look like a pine cone.

 

[feyn]

First of all I would like to thank all you guys for the many tips and links in here !!! This will help me a lot. Now I don´t want to do any real fighting (except with LARP weapons ^^), but I will fall down on it, it will get mud and rain on it, and it will be worn in difficult terrain, so i guess plastic won´t do. I want to use this at least for 4-5 years (after all it´s a lot of work), 3-4 cons each year (2 of which are a WHOLE WEEK, to LARPers from germany, see you at DRACHENFEST and MYTHODEA ).
Aluminum sounds really intruiging though, i definitely will try that out ! Since there are quite a few possible materials (galvanized steel also sounds really good for example) I think the best course of action is to make a small piece (like 8x8cm or so) with each material, to get a feeling for the differences, the up´s and downs of each material before I build a whole mail. Thank you guys again for all the good tips !!! I knew I would find people here, who know what they are talking about

As for the armour in the last post, by iflank, wow, that looks really cool ! I guess for a dwarf thats a really good idea, and you can combine both sorts of mail in many variations. Did you build everything yourself ? How did you fix that bit of chainmail on the helmet ? Just small holes through which you fiddle the rings of the mail ? Doesnt that weaken the rim if you do it that way? It definitely has a cool look though !


@Randino :

Yea I heard the fitting is extremely important,whichis thne reasonI want to build it myself inthe first place. If you buy one it will never fit even close to perfect, and thus is a real burden as you said. You also chafe your skin easily etc.
But how tight to you need to be ? After all you need to be able to breath and move. I must say,you build a fine looking piece of armour there!!! This is how mine hopefully looks whern I am done
As for the coat of arms, I dio know the golden eagle on blue ground, that is either Upper Silesia or the town of Oppeln, but white eagle on blue ground ? The andechs family has a white eagle on blue ground, but they also have a lion. I know I know this one, but right now I just don´t remember it *blush*

 

[Lflank]

As for the armour in the last post, by iflank, wow, that looks really cool ! I guess for a dwarf thats a really good idea, and you can combine both sorts of mail in many variations. Did you build everything yourself ? How did you fix that bit of chainmail on the helmet ? Just small holes through which you fiddle the rings of the mail ? Doesnt that weaken the rim if you do it that way? It definitely has a cool look though !

Yes, I made everything but the belt (including the spangenhelm, the drinking horn, and the shield hanging on the wall).

Yes, the chainmail on the helmet is fed through small holes in the rim--it doesn't weaken it. But since the rings are butted and not riveted, they sometimes pop open and slip through the holes. That's a given with any butted-ring mail--the rings can occasionally open under stress.

 

[Zlosk]

I make maille, and have made a couple shirts and coifs. I'm 5'-9.5" (177 cm), weigh about 190 lb (86 kg), have a 43" (109 cm) chest and 32.5" (83 cm) waist. I coiled, cut, and wove my first shirt out of 16 ga. (.06", or 1.5 mm) wire x 1/4" (about 6 mm) inner diameter (ID) rings made from galvanized steel. With short sleeves and mid-thigh length, it weighs 28 lb. The matching coif weighs 7 lb. After I completed that shirt, I decided that I would never work with galvanized steel again, as parts of the shirt made at different times were (and still are) different shades of gray. I also decided that I would never again wind and cut rings that I could buy - I'd much rather spend the time weaving rings than winding and cutting.

1. Ideal material. For your requirements, I would use 14 ga. (.080", or 2 mm) x 5/16" (8 mm) I.D. aluminum rings. They will take quite a bit of abuse, won't rust (at least not like steel), and are lightweight. However, they don't have the same "jingle" as steel, and they will leave a black residue (aluminum's version of rust) on your clothes and skin after a while. Washing the armor with dish soap works fine to clean it.

2. Cost. It depends on your size, how much you value your time, and if you already own some tools. I would require about 28-29 thousand rings to make a shirt. If it was me, I'd order the rings from theringlord.com (TRL), and they would cost about $250.

3. Special tools. My favorite tools for armor are bullnose pliers. For steel, I prefer to have teeth on the jaws. For aluminum, I prefer to have no teeth on the jaws.

4. Special techniques. Probably the best tutorial to make a well-fit shirt is Butted Mail: A Mailmaker's Guide. For help with anything maille, the forums at TRL and the Mail Artisans International League are great.

5. Cheap, ready-made, suits. I've heard of some people getting decent shirts, but I've heard a lot more stories of bad closures, and shirts shedding rings while being worn. I do not know about the tailoring. I believe that you get what you pay for, and with the cheap shirts, I have to assume that you are not paying for quality.

6. Maille fabric. To my knowledge, the only company that sells maille fabric is mailletec.com. I recall that WETA had started up a maille division specializing in PVC maille, but I have not heard anything about it in a long time.

7. Perfect measurements. This is kind of difficult to specify, as one person's idea of perfect differs from another. The general rules of thumb are to add 10" (254 cm) to your chest size, and that the back should be 4" (~100 cm) wider than the front. The 10" is to allow for the gambeson under your armor. If you know what you are going to wear under it, wear it when you take your measurements.

8. Tips for buying. I'm sorry, but I don't have any. I live in the USA. While TRL ships from Canada to Europe, I know it's expensive. Numerous non-North American maillers have complained about the lack of ring suppliers.