troy

Hi All First off hope everybody had a great xmas and all the best for the new year. As resolutions go making a new website ain't exactly great but I've hit a snag - got most of the graphics I need and how to make them into a page in dreamweaver sorted out but for the life of me (and a lack of understanding code at all)I don't know which action or server-side script I need to process the data entered into my form and hopfully send to me via email. I know this is very technical stuff but in the past folks from here have solved other problems in a language even I can understand so am hoping some one knows. It really is'nt an emergency to have a form on the site but some one told me that it enables those poeple who use external email to send a message to me (i.e don't write emails with outlook express etc but use AOL or something) Cheers for any help Paul

Hi Luthiel First time I made armour for my youngest he was about 7 years old (photo below shows another set made for my 9 year old) I used 3-4mm tooling leather for them and hardened it slightly with beeswax altho for a 5 year old just wetting it and letting it dry will stiffen it enough probably - your notice I went for the plain chest pieces made popular at the time by the film troy - scale armour would mean adding alot more weight to the whole thing so using thinner tooling leather might help. rather then using the method descibed in my tutorial - http://blog.mtn-m.co.uk/__oneclick_uploads/2009/11/leather-armour_l.pdf - it might be better if you use an old t-shirt of his (which would be better it slightly too big for him)to get a pattern from. Hope this advise helps Paul

just had an email from a beginner and has asked if I had any info on braiding 2 x 4 round strands into one 8 round strands (to create a loop) - same old problem, I did have a drawing/pdf somewhere but can't find it now - has any body got something or know of a previous thread that deals with this? cheers for any help plus hope every body had a great xmas and have a great new year. Paul

Like most creations worth creating, months of morning sickness and pains finally paid off to produce the next age of fids!!!!! Today may have started just like any other - half dased zombie like behaviour until the first coffee, dragged around the field by the dog and those little darlings of ours playing their favourite game 'no I won't get up' then the tiny but rough sound of footsteps aproached our door producing a package full of promise of things to come. Thanks has to go to brian kidd for all his hard work and generosity, I just hung around and drank beer - it sure is a beauty and I can only hope my braiding is up to the challenge of matching its grace. The next photo is me playing around with adobe illustrator, just part of the other type of things I do - its a portrait of me and the wife done completly with just words!! Cheers again brian and will post again once I use it.

finally got round to making the leather armor tutorial; [link]http://blog.mtn-m.co.uk/__oneclick_uploads/2009/11/leather-armour_l.pdf[/link] I would say that is more for the experiance leatherworker as their is alot more photos than their is words but hopfully it will aid someone aspairing to be a warrior. Paul

thats a couple of really good links there peter and will be putting them in my favourites - cheers

Used to play the flute when I still at school - was in the orchestra and played solo once, but dropped it after leaving for some daft reason. Then took up the tenor sax while living in germany in the late 80's early 90's but that only lasted for a year or so - have actually just bought another which is temptingly sitting snug in its case and am hoping that the thrase 'will all come back quickly' is true as the walls in these houses are paper thin!!! am gonna try and master 'lilly was here' to start with. - youtube link to song

Don't know if this experiance will count, seeing as I've only been on a horse 5 times, I live in scotland and my riding rythem is similar to that on 'city slickers'. A few years back the family and I managed a 5 weeker on the west coast (of USA) and amongst other places, we visited rubies inn in Utah where provided us tourist types with day/s out riding with a wrangler. Went out 2 times taking in the gorgous scenery and ridges of the locality with no problems at all even during the steep ups and steeper downs which amased me. Then on the last occassion instead of riding out into the country we did a ride not far from the hotel with two wranglers, cause some of us wanted to gallop and others not - everything was going honky dory even riding near the bryce canyon, then on the way back we split into the two groups with low branched trees between us. I was with the slow group to help my son!, the other group had a problem with one of the horses (something to do with order of march thing as I was told later) and our wrangler galloped off towards them to help - it was at this point obviously that our two horses wanted to follow....at full gallop through the tree's.....inbetween trying to aviod the branches and stay on the saddle I was yanking like hell on the reins and shouting....did'nt do a damn thing of course but for 5 or 10 seconds I was on the ride of my life; the horse at some point bucked, I was swaying left and right from the branches and to top it at one point I looked across at my son and he was smiling his head off. The above is probably not half as bad as most of your experiance - have certainly learnt alot since then like 'to turn left or right' and especially 'applying the brake properly'but hopfully it might make some laugh.

Just got it finished - used the 5 x 9 as stated before - used 3 strings on the top knot and 2 on the bottom and the strap is 6 x snake looking braid (from ron's adv book). Did attach the strap with a concho, not technically viking but Im technically not viking either!!

Cheers for the suggestions, love that knot LB. And KH, I'll be using thin latigo (5mm wide) as it's all I got at the moment and have decided to use the 5 x 9 wide turks then try 4 interweaves. Just had to cut a bit off a round fence post for the mandrel - will post with succesful or failed results!!! Sorry to hear that another excellent braider has pasted away - am ashamed to say I had never heard of him but would be interested in carrying on his work if any of you ever managed to order the CD's.

Hi Ray Don't know if this helps but recently I made the black arrows (on hardwood dowels)with plain old fiebings dye, sanded it down with wire wool and applied aussie conditioner - unfortunatly some does come off on first use but not much - I used three coats of dye to get a solid black colour, but perhaps one would do for your job.

Hi Brian Not got it yet, hope it's not caught up in another of our imfamous postal strikes. This knot I got planned could be a hell of a way to break it in, so to speak! Have been thinking about this knot again and perhaps just a simple 36 bight pineapple will do but still worried about the length - the picture below so you can see for your self - this would also mean that it could match the lower knot which I guess would only need a normal 16 or so bights - might actually try them as guacho and have the interweave running the other way. don't know if it's important but the capacity of this horn is 1 litre.

Got a viking style drinking horn I'm working on and have had the great idea of using knots top and bottom for the shoulder strap. The bottom is quite narrow and I have ideas for a pineapple in that place, but the top has a circumferance of 25cm - working with 5mm lace I worked it out the top knot would need roughly 35-36 bights to cover it. I also thought it would be great to do a heel type knot using 4 strands, meaning I could use the 8 end laces to make the strap with - crasy I know. My question is, would a 5 part 9 bight turks head be OK to do interweaves on - I am looking at the 5 parts as I don't really want to end up making a long knot which would cover up all the nice shiny horn I've spent ages polishing. Any idea's? Paul

Thanks for everybodies imput - must admit that apart from the disc I mentioned I have never thought of using the windows back-up software which would come in handy on an external drive - I was more looking at a 150gb drive but going by what you all say that would be considered under what I'd proabaly be best using. I am just guessing, but just like when you re-open doc's in windows then save again, will all data/doc's etc that I re-sent to the hard drive (that has been altered)be automatically updated or will I (like on cd/r disc) have to save it as a seperate copy/file? Also, and I only ask as some of you seem really up on computer stuff, I have been given a short report to do (part of the multimedia course I,m doing)to discuss backup strategys of a company - most like on-line systems and archival I know some about but what is meant by 'bulk-transfer systems' is it any thing to do with zip's or more to do with how all the files/data etc is collectivly sent? cheers for any answers.

I'm in the market for an external drive but have never really tried one before. Looking at various outlets, there are cheap and really expensive one's of various capacities of gb's and was wondering if some one has had experiances with them or could suggest one make over another etc. I will be using it to store thousands of photo's I have littered around on disc's, plus college work and to back up my C drive. cheers Paul

Finally finished the whole armour and had a nice dry day to take some photo's - it would be nice to see what you all think, if it works or looks realistic. Along this particular journey I managed to fix some errors as shown earlier on this thread and many that I could,nt such as the ill fitting boots and plus those upper arm guards could of been wider - all good lessons for a next time! Have also thrown in a sunset photo to show we do sometimes get good midgless weather here in scotland Taken with my trusty Fujipix s7000 with a ND4 filter -

I call this one the odd name of 'Fanorientern'. Mainly because within its materials and design, plus the actual carvings there are elements of both eastern, western and fantasy influences, or maybe I have finally cracking up after a very cold, wet and windy summer!!!! or it may seem so, joining pegasus with a chinese archers figthing a dragon! - the back ground is actually mountains but unfortunatly I sized them wrong and you can't see the tops. The horn ends are from indian or pakistan cows, can't remember which. Plus managed to get a few better photo's of the armour boots (inbetween rain showers).

cheers for your replies tashabear and thorr - don't knew why I did not try 'all types' in google image but have ended up using one I already had. That website you supplied is good, never knew there was so many people doing fantasy armour - nice to know I'm not the only wacky leatherer out there!!!!

here's the finished boots - they do fit my son but other dimension of it are wrong and now know the importance of a 'Last'plus the sort of dimension that should be used to make it by - in the end, it does what it was supposed too and I learnt quite a bit about boot making as well.

on the pattern below, the quiver above is number 1 - the one on the pattern is about 20 inches high I think with a collar of leather that was made to fold back onto the top of the quiver, making a channel through which the strap would go - it was another of my 'lord of the rings' copy idea's. To make the quiver above just leave the collar bit off and cut the top in a curvy line. Number two is for the quiver below - ye another 'lord of the rings' or prince of caspian idea. For the colouring I first applied mahogney stain mixed into neatsfoot oil all over, then dipped the shearling I use for such things into the stain alone and dabbed/streaked here and there. Oh forgot to add - they both took about a day minus fifty odd coffee breaks and in most cases i just used the saddle braid to join there edges.

Started the last piece of this particular puzzle or armor. The boots are kinda fashioned on a pair my neibour had and other idea's - is the first boots I've tried so any advise/critisism would be welcome. First photo shows the foot and neck pieces together (neck piece is to raise above the knee like lower leg armour)I am leaving these to dry then remove the last I made and sew these on to the sole. The second photo shows the side and the top clamp, which I had to attach to string suspended from the curtain rail - to hold the whole thing up while I fiddled with the pattern. Paul

I have been searching the web and other places but seem to come up with very little line drawings in the way of horse archers loike the mongols, turks etc. Does any body have something like this hidden away. I plan to use them on some horn topped quivers I have plans for. One interesting thing I found in my search was the winged cavary of poland - yes they really had metal wings fixed to the backs of their armour. Paul

Just found another pattern i don't need - have never used it, it is a pattern for jeans/trousers from Lola gentry originals. Just pay for postage and it's yours Paul

No mate the bow is a cheapie fibre glass one - I do have the materials to make one with and may at some point start it now that I have something to work from, but don't hold you breathe!!! Paul

Oh just love the handle knot - is it an extended heel knot? have done a few for handle ends with 5 strings but never thought of extending the turns to 2 or 2 1/2 times round the mandrel - must have taken forever to tigthen it up. Thanks for sharing Paul