Injury question

[Xiloc]

a while back about 3 years ago i was swordfighting with my group i had back before i joined belegarth and it was one on one matches and somehow i got hit in the back of the head with one of the foam padded weapons and there was blood everywhere and the next thing i knew i was laying down and the group medic was putting a wet rag underneath my head now the point to this thread is how on gods earth could a small "27 inch" thouroughly foam padded sword do that much damage to my noggin! the fighters and i have been riddled with this question for ages and i have decided to ask belegarth please reply

[Soo Ma Tai]

Not having been there, it's pretty hard for me to say. It could have been many things. Was the weapon safe, or was there core coming through somewhere. It could have also been the force of the impact. That kind of trauma can cause the skin to split, especially where there is little muscle between the skin and bone. I have gotten them on my shins before from an exceptionally hard shot.

[xiao]

sounds like the sword tip was blown out, someone hit you with the flat, core came through and cut your head.

or..someone sabotaged the weapon.

[Big King Jimmy]

Someone worked double sided razor blades into the blade edge.

[Dr. Kazi]

What type of core was in the sword--wood, pvc, fiberglass? How thick?

[Xiloc]

ya i should have mentioned this earlier all of our weapons i made myself and check before combat and after and that sword was fine no core was showing and the core was pvc i even had stabbing tip on that one and a cap on the pvc underneath however im not sure on how hard the hit was and the skin on the back of my head isnt all that thick lol

[Beergarde]

Head wounds bleed a lot more than you might expect; even if you were grazed by something it could produce a lot of blood.

[Xiloc]

ya that makes sense...there was a lot of blood on that rag being my first injury of that sort it was kinda scarry

[Aegis]

enough force = alot of compression,

heavy compression will relay the hardness of the core into the compressed foam.


i.e. the harder you hit with a weapon, the more likely it is to compress and feel solid

which is why i think reds are approved very incorrectly and are generally unsafe as all bluecamp foam... I can bruise virtually anyone with a 2handed swing against bareskin if im trying to knock someone over with the red..
and thats very legal and not even frowned upon...


i personally think that reds should be a couple blue layers, an open cell layer and then blue layers again...so that its still very solid but the open cell creates a break point for compression that will still relay force without relaying the firmness of the core into the person being hit.

[Xiloc]

red's are pretty bad but i thought that was why they were coded as "red"

[Aegis]

so can i make a new classification called black, its just metal poles, but cause its black you just gotta be careful not to be hit with it, and ill put * glowing spinny neon lights on it so you can see it easily, just dont get hit by it or its your fault....

no everything is supposed to be safe. my concern is weapons that arent safe to be swung at full force being passed anyways cause people dont want to fail alot of weapons....

reds should be tested on the user bare skin on a limb with maximum force....
if you think your weapon is still safe after that... then im game to get hit with it too...

[Xiloc]

good point and well made thats actually how we test our weapons here, if you wouldnt wanna be hit with it then neither do we.

[RedBeard]

I think Soo Ma Tai probably was on to the root cause. It is extremely possible that foam can split skin, even simply caused by friction. This would take some significant force (as Aegis pointed out), but if the throw was at an angle that transferred the energy from the core to foam and was thereby transferred to your head, but your skin was unable to withstand the increased friction caused in the transfer (due to a non-90 degree angle blow), the skin will tear and the bunches of little blood vessels that feed your skin surrounding your skull will burst forth with glory and passion.

Happy head hunting,
RB

[Xiloc]

thank you very much guys the mystery is solved