myArmoury.com - Maile "Sox"...er, I mean "Chausses"

Posts: 1,576 Location: Bergen, Norway

Mon 15 Dec, 2008 9:00 am

Reinier van Noort wrote:

Elling, do I see correctly that your padding is open behind the knee? You're opponent does seem to have padded hosen all the way down. How much would that interfere with bending the knee?

The padding goes all the way amound. the mail, however, is open in the back. My padded hose are attached to the side, rather than to the front of the belt, which works rather well.
I'll try to take some pictures of them. However, they are at our clubs storage room, and not at my place...

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James R.Fox

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Posts: 253 Location: Youngstowm,Ohio

Mon 15 Dec, 2008 10:34 am

Sirs-I would point out that there are Illustrations of mail having leather thongs threaded through it to stiffen it. Also, mail shirts ofen were laced together up the sides to prevent breaking the links at the arm-pit (a most vulnerable area) from metal fatigue.

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Steven H

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Posts: 545 Location: Boston

Mon 15 Dec, 2008 11:49 am

James R.Fox wrote:

Sirs-I would point out that there are Illustrations of mail having leather thongs threaded through it to stiffen it. Also, mail shirts ofen were laced together up the sides to prevent breaking the links at the arm-pit (a most vulnerable area) from metal fatigue.

The leather thongs in mail is a Victorian-era mis-reconstruction.

I've never seen mail laced at the armpit. Since the armpit is one of the specific places to attack it would counter productive to eliminate the mail there. And if you can rip mail by lifting your arm then I am impressed ;)

Cheers,
Steven

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Dustin Keith

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Posts: 18 Location: North Carolina

Tue 16 Dec, 2008 8:42 am

I've never seen mail laced at the armpit. Since the armpit is one of the specific places to attack it would counter productive to eliminate the mail there. And if you can rip mail by lifting your arm then I am impressed [b]

Funny enough.... although my mail is only butted :mad: The only places that it has ripped is at the armpits!![/b]

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Steven H

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Posts: 545 Location: Boston

Tue 16 Dec, 2008 11:18 am

Dustin Keith wrote:

I've never seen mail laced at the armpit. Since the armpit is one of the specific places to attack it would counter productive to eliminate the mail there. And if you can rip mail by lifting your arm then I am impressed [b]

Funny enough.... although my mail is only butted :mad: The only places that it has ripped is at the armpits!![/b]

Okay . . . if you can rip riveted mail by raising your arms then I'm impressed :wtf:

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Marcus Rizzo

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Posts: 11

Tue 16 Dec, 2008 11:52 am

Dustin Keith wrote:

I've never seen mail laced at the armpit. Since the armpit is one of the specific places to attack it would counter productive to eliminate the mail there. And if you can rip mail by lifting your arm then I am impressed [b]

Funny enough.... although my mail is only butted :mad: The only places that it has ripped is at the armpits!![/b]

In my opinion what tends to make mail rip at hte armpits (this goes for butted AND rivited) isn't people raising their arms (because yes lets face it, it would be a: a very tight fit b: you need to be quite strong), rather when people take them off they tend to have someone help them, who pull on the sleeves rather than the shoulders/near the neck line.

Armpits tend to be one of the hardest places to make maille protection for (and usually are designed to have very little weight resting on them) so when anything like the above situation happens you tend to have 80-90% of the hauberks weight resting on two to three rings, which break, and after that it slowly spreads.

but back to the leg armour now :D, I wish I could have some, but at most I can argue for a soldier of my rank to have padded leg guards, and that is stretching a point.

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Dustin Keith

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Posts: 18 Location: North Carolina

Fri 19 Dec, 2008 7:24 am

Marcus,

That is a very good point. Although I usually put on and take off my own mail, I do have my arms in the sleeves, and your right, as Im getting it on, all the weight is being applied to those two points. Good observation. I think I'll try and alter my method.

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Elling Polden

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Posts: 1,576 Location: Bergen, Norway

Mon 06 Jul, 2009 6:34 am

in the better late than never spirit, I have finaly got some pictures of my leggings, in their separate parts.

In short, the leather rim is riveted to the top of the mail, and then stitched to the padding. The padded hose is suspended from the side, rather than the front, as regular clothing hose are.

Attachment: 172.46 KB
the padding [ Download ]

Attachment: 200.37 KB
the mail [ Download ]

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