Tips On Making Some Japanese Style Armor

[Gequinn]

Hello, I am pondering on making some Nuinobe Dô style armor and I was wondering if any of you have any kind of tips or suggestions. These are traditionally made of steel plates, but I of course want to make it out of leather! The Nuinobe Dô is roughly half-way down the page here: http://www.sengokudaimyo.com/katchu/katchu.ch06.html

The biggest part I need help with I suppose, is the lacing and knotting of it. I am not planning on making several separate lames and lacing them together, rather just cutting some 6x24in-ish strips and then just using a drive punch to make the holes and if all else fails I suppose I will just rivet them together.

Another question I have is how would I produce the bend that you would see in this particular style of armor? By bend I mean the way that it wraps around the torso to conform to the wearer's shape.

I have included the picture from the sengokudaimyo.com site listed above and a much clearer representation of what I am wanting to make in the form of Tom Cruise in The Last Samurai.

Any and all tips will be greatly appreciated.

[Ladykahu]

Get yourself some sort of dress makers dummy, or make a duct tape model of whomever the armour is for, that way you have something to wet form the leather over for the rounded shape, and also something to hang it on to check it looks ok on.

Natalie

[hivemind]

Yeah, you're going to want to wet mold the individual lames. I don't think you need a dummy for it, just soak them for a couple minutes each in hot water, then stand them on edge, bend them around and let them dry 24 hours. They'll keep their shape, but not be too hard that you can't bend them in or out a little to fit them on.

[Gequinn]

Thank you both for the advice. I thought about doing the duct tape model but decided against it.

As for the bending after a soak in hot water goes, how hot are we talking and when you say bend them around, do you mean bend them into a circle or just close to the shape I would like to end up with?

I have also been doing some calculations regarding the amount of leather I will need to make this. I am definitely wanting to go with 15/16 oz leather here. i was told by a Tandy representative that "The [armor] bends will average about 33" wide and 55" long; about 12-14 feet"

So just allowing for a bit of extra, let's say that I will need 10-12 strips of leather measuring 24.25 inches x 6. Each strip would then be about 1.1 (rounded up) square feet. This would pretty much max out that particular bend, right? And I'm pretty sure that not all of that will be useable to make so many large strips. Would you think that I would need to order an additional bend?

Edited April 5, 2011 by Gequinn

[hivemind]

Well, here's the deal. What Tandy sells as "Armor and Shield Bends" isn't necessarily what you're looking for. To recommend the "correct" leather, we need to know what you're wearing it for. Are you using it at a tap-LARP, or something with heavy boffer combat, or the SCA, or just to ren faires and such? Does your game system have a thickness or weight requirement for leather armor?

As for the water forming, hot tap water is fine, you don't need to boil it. Hell, if it's warm where you are just room temperature water is fine. It's not the heat that's important so much as the water. You should be forming them to about the shape you want, maybe a little smaller.

[Gequinn]

It's going to be for a tap LARP, so just a simple point based system with boffer combat. You are correct about me not necessarily needing that particular type of leather. In our rulebook, the armor I am wanting to make needs to be at least 3/16 of an inch, which as I understand it, is about a 12 oz weight, right? I suppose the 15/16 oz is more of a want than a need. I was also thinking about going with some Saddle Skirting instead of the armor leather. I will defer to your experience and knowledge though on what you think I need. Everybody in my LARP organization has told me this is a big first step and I should do something a bit smaller, and I am, but I'll be starting this within a week or so.

Thank you very much for the forming tip as well. I'm getting all of my tools in tomorrow afternoon so I'll be able to put that to some practice before I move on to my armor.

Edited April 6, 2011 by Gequinn

[hivemind]

3/16ths inch leather is 12oz, yes. That's the leather I mostly work in; it's legal as armor for Dagorhir, Kingdoms of Novitas and Belegarth. Definitely go with some saddle skirting, but look for 13-14 oz if you can find it. If you buy 12oz you're running the risk that some will be a bit thinner than that. Tandy's "armor and shield bends" are very stiff leather. They're sole bends, meaning it's very thick hard leather meant for the soles of shoes.

I think if you're careful and thoughtful with your work you'll do fine on this type of armor. It's all about the cordage, really, and you can always pull that out and re-lace if it's not right the first time. As far as how exactly to do that part, all I can do is show you a few pictures from some Japanese armor and kabuto we took apart a while ago: https://picasaweb.google.com/david.haldenwang/DrewSArmor#

That's all steel armor, but lacing is lacing.

[Gequinn]

Thanks for your help! I've got a side on its way and I'm looking forward to this. Thanks for all of your help. I'll try to post some pictures of it when I'm done.

[hivemind]

Yeah I'd like to see it. You'll have to get used to wearing armor though, it's going to be harder to feel your hits in Amtgard with those little 6 ounce pixie sticks you guys call swords.

[ChiefFilipino]

Hey Gequinn, you started this post 4 years ago so I don't even know if this would be relevant anymore but I recommend picking up the book Arms And Armor Of The Samurai by I. Bottomley & A.P. Hopson (http://www.amazon.com/Arms-Armor-Samurai-History-Weaponry/dp/0517103184). I used that when making some armor out of papier mache with cotton as well. I found that book extremely helpful and a good read!

One day I want to make another suit out of leather.