Wisby #1 Coat of Plates
Dec 26, 2002 - This will probably be the last COP I make for a while.
I've already made one coat of plates, in fact it was the first armouring project I ever completed. That COP was done with the help of my friend Sir Christian. It has served me well and though it is a simple one with no dagging or special fixings it has been admired by some. A friend of mine Sir Andrew wanted one. He comissioned the project some time ago and picked some tools up for me at pennsic to compensate for my labor and covered the cost of all the materials. What are the materials you ask?
As a side note I have a lot of progress pics for this one. This page will be a fairly complete step by step process of the design, patterning, and construction of this COP.
Here you see a combination of the very beginning and further down the road. The project started out as a carboard template and a muslin front to simulate the plates and leather for fitting purposes. You'll notice a few things that aren't quite right with the paper pattern that were corrected in the actual COP. But as you can see the cardboard was taped into the muslin. The plates sitting on top of it are simply so I could get a look at what the plates might look like in the shell that would be the leather.
Some people never really think about how many plates are in a Wisby #1. Well, I was one of those people who didn't really think too much about it. Just to give all you people out there in internet-land an idea of what a mess of plates on the floor looks like here's a picture of the plates spread out and one of my cats nestled into the muslin. Damn cats.
Since this is the first COP I've made for someone who is not myself, and therefore not there to try the danged thing on whenever I wanted to make sure it was going together right there needed to be more added on to the fitting process. Thought it would fit right the first time? Nah, and it didn't. There was actually one plate too many for the abdomen and the chest pieces (as your saw above) needed more space for the shoulders. Those ended up getting cut-in a bit. "How did I fit him" you ask? Well, I would've hated to even touch the leather without due cause at that point in the project so I took out my old friend the muslin pattern. Laura sewed it together for me since I was busy doing something else (though I can't remember what) and then I attached the plates using those little brass paper fasteners. You know which ones right? Those little things with the two tabs that fold down? Yeah, those. Worked pretty well really. So I brought this with me to one of the parties my friend Russ was having and Andy tried it on. Lo and behold I saw the parts that didn't fit and it was good. Marked the muslin with a sharpy marker and we were done for the day. Let me tell you, sitting on the floor putting all those little doohickeys through the muslin was a pain in my butt. We have hardwood floors.
So what happens next? Well, what happens is that I spend more time on the floor sewing the two pieces of leather together with a leather sewing awl and a pair of pliers. Fun? Sure. Then after that my hollow punches arrived from Widget Supply. It's a really neat internet storefront and they have both center punches and hollow punches pretty darned cheap. Why couldn't I use a rotary punch like I did on my suede COP? Because the suede bunched and rolled a lot more than this calf-hide does, and the leather pieces are a lot bigger than mine. By the time I'm done with this page I'll have a comparison shot with my COP resting easily inside Andy's. So I've got the hollow punches. I used those to punch many, many holes in the leather after marking oh so carefully with a sharpy. After that I riveted in the first plates. I thought the stainless rivets were going to be a real pain to put in, but that isn't really the case. They're harder to cut, so I put my big bolt cutters in the vise to give me a stationary cutting station, but they still peined with my smallest ball-pein hammer. Not so big a deal. I'm sure I rested for a day (don't want to annoy the neighbors too much) and then I put in the first of the side plates, as you can see. There's also a shot of the front side of the COP. It looks a little weird because all the plates are trying to fall towards the floor, giving the leather a wavy look.
What's a Wisby without nice dagging? Mine. That's not the point. I wanted to make this piece look as nice as possible. Andy wanted dagging, so he got dagging. We looked at some of the pictures online and also in "Armour from the Battle of Wisby" which is an excellent book. We found that in period the dagging might look something like this, smaller square-ish dags. They look really nice in person. I cut out a template using my heavy cardstock and then traced it onto the inside of the leather. Cut with scissors and voila, dags.
O.k. We're almost done. Let's do some shop math.
What does this mean to you? Nothing much really. It does however mean that there are 135 rivets in this particular COP. Lots of peining.
And finally we have the comparison picture. My COP is the green one, as seen on my other Wisby COP page. Damn Andy's a big guy.
The only thing that will update this page is a picture of Andy wearing it, hopefully taken this spring.
Well, I lied. I had to do some more stitching on the COP edges so I figured I'd have my lady take a picture of me sitting on the floor sewing the damned thing. I love in progress pictures.
Well, here it is! Our first tournament of the season went of without a hitch and here's a picture of Sir Andrew in his coat of plates and pembridge helm. He looks very daunting.
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