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DANGEROUS ARMOUR
It is most unfortunate that there are many armour smiths today making
and selling armour that is actually dangerous to wear rather than the
safety equipment it should be. Please be adamant with whatever armoursmith
you deal with and insist that they provide you with armour that is at
least safe to wear. We present here three threat levels of danger from
armour.
EXTREMELY DANGEROUS ARMOUR
Unrolled edges present the worst threat of injury. If there are unrolled
edges at the following locations the armour can be potentially lethal
to wear.
1- The cuirasse at the neck, armpits, and lower edge. The tassets all
exposed edges.
2- The helm all lower edges.
3- Any edge on a gorget or bevor.
4- The arms inside the arm, inside the elbow, inside the wrist, and all
pauldren edges.
5- The legs on the thigh anywhere, inside the knees and at the ankles.
The configuration at the neck can kill! especially in jousting armour.
There simply must be some flare at the back of the neck so that the edge
of the back plate cannot break the neck under impact.
VERY DANGEROUS ARMOUR
Unrolled edges inside the armour can be deformed by impact into something
like a parrots beak. This then scoops big chunks of flesh from the wearer.
Not necessarily lethal but not what you should expect from armour.
Back plates that contact the spine can transmit impact to the spine. There
must be a raised channel over the spine to transmit force to either side
of the spine.
DANGEROUS ARMOUR
Heavy weight is the sign of a poor armour smith or an ignorant administrator.
Both can contribute to armour that is simply to heavy to wear or to put
on a horse. Most antique armour weighs thirty to fifty pounds with seventy
pound armours being very rare and made of inferior metal trying to be
bullet proof in later armours. Half of the wearers weight in combined
harness and weapons is a basic maximum. Dangerous armour is easy to avoid
but it is inevitable that there will be cheap armour that cuts corners.
The least expensive armour has to cut corners dangerously. Unfortunately
group administrator’s can require unsafe armour. If your administrator
insists on unsafe armour and particularly historically insane heavy gauge
armour then complain loudly and or change groups. There are many out there.
One of the big problems with most modern armour is excessive finishing.
Some groups have instituted a needless "one gauge over" rule
because of people sanding an entire gauge or more off of armour plates
trying to get what they openly call a machine made look. This is universally
carried too far and smiths starting out with fourteen gauge and ending
up with thin spots that are less than twenty gauge are common. The surface
they are grinding away with machine tools is the hard glaze that makes
steel armour more impact resistant. No ancient armour was treated that
way and the brightly finished Victorian museum display restorations are
extremely misleading to the casual researcher. The old manuscripts are
clear. Abrasive finishing was minimal and frequently omitted altogether.
Armour for display is one thing but Blankenshield armour is made for fighting
in.
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