chainmail for sale

[Zuloo]

hey guys im going to be selling some chainmail in the next three weeks, its going to be a full hauberk made of 16 guage rings 1/4 inch diameter rings, this is custom chainmail that i make myself, its going to have brass trim and i can even do some inlay designs, i have tested this stuff with a bayonet and hardly a scratch, its belegarth legal and you also have the option of closed front or open front
open front means you can put it on like a coat with belts to hold it closed, with a closed front youll have to pull it over your head, its up to you, i can do plenty

let me know if your interested, this isnt going to be the only one im gonna sell, im thinking of starting up a mild sort of business, making and selling chainmail armor

[Old Horse]

Aye, I'm interested. What would be the price?

[Soo Ma Tai]

I have seen his work , and will vouch for it. Very nicely put together. No problems passing at both the local and national level.

[Zuloo]

for this i would say about $500 to $600, its not going to look like every other hauberk out there though so keep that in mind, most out there that are 16 guage usually use them at 3/8 diameter rings and put no trim on it, this is actually going to have a triangle tapper design on the ends of the sleeves and the bottom of the skirting /\/\/\/\ kinda like that lol
also i will reinforce the neck line as well, cause i know that even with proffesional grade chainmail there is so much weight on the rings for the neck that they will split apart when putting it on and taking it off.
but i will post some pics of what my personal chainmail looks like so you can get an idea of what this will look like and what i mean by the open front

[Todo]

I'm going to vouch for him, too-- his stuff is gorgeous and I've never seen a split ring on it.

[Zuloo]

anyone else out there interested?

[Zuloo]

ok im thinking of only making this one a vest, just a simple chainmail vest, ill put on some sort of strip that comes down from the shoulder strap to give shoulder protection, and again i can make it closed front or open front, the choice is yours, but for this im thinking of charging $200-$250
thats actually pretty cheap, i can hardly find a leather cuirass for less than $250, with this just being a vest it should be pretty light as well so it shouldnt constrict you much more than leather would

heres some pics of my hauberk

[Ingvar Ironside]

Could you do blackened?

[Zuloo]

i might be able to get my hands on some blackened wire, ill have to check first before i can give you a definite answer
what were you looking for besides the black rings, vest? hauberk? shirt?

[Ingvar Ironside]

Full sleeve shirt. Crusader-ish. Just let me know if you can get blackened wire.

[Oisin]

For $500 to $600, you can get a haubergeon of GOOD riveted mail. You have no market at that cost, due to the lower costs of production of mail in India.

If anyone has $600 to spend on mail, go to www.icefalcon.com and buy riveted.

[Zuloo]

kind of a douche move there bud, but that was a rough guess as to how much i would charge, more realistically i would prolly charge about $400 for something like what i already posted pics of.

as for your shirt, i would charge around $300 for it, its going to be 16 guage wire, 1/4 inch diameter rings and one thing that i could do to blacken it since i already started it using standard silver is use a blow torch to blacken the rings when it is finished, then use some methods to keep the black from rubbing off to much on clothing. i know enough about working in a metals shop and with oxy-fuel torches to be able to do a pretty good job on it.
still want to buy a shirt?

[Oisin]

Making mail for sale in America is completely and totally economically infeasible. Fact of life. Sorry if you don't like it, but it's true. Trying to do something that someone in Asia can do for 300% less money isn't smart, and it's not worth wasting your time. If you're into armouring and metalworking, get a forge and learn to make plate armour, because there's at least a bit of a profession in that, even if it's a very hard and uncertain one.

Also, if you're talking about blowtorching galvanized mail, you could seriously injure or even kill yourself. PAY ATTENTION. That is VERY dangerous, zinc poisoning is not fun, and every few years you heard about an experienced blacksmith dying from this.

Don't do something stupid and get hurt. If you want to blacken your steel, you'll need to strip the galvanization first, and in any case, just blowtorching it is not going to give a good finish. There are chemical blackening agents available for not too much money, or you can do an oil finish.

[Zuloo]

yeah i know about zinc poisoning and all that stuff, and plate isnt that hard to make either, you just dont see many people in belegarth that wear plate armor, now if this were darkon it would be a different story, but this isnt darkon, i wasnt really looking to make this into a full business, just something that i can do on the side to make a bit of extra money

[Oisin]

If your labor is worth extremely little to you and you want to try and sell it at that rate, then I guess go for it making mail. And no, you wouldn't want to try and sell plate armour in Belegarth, because almost no one would buy it. Try the SCA if you think you can actually do it well.

You will not be able to make this into a full business, not if you expect to actually support yourself. Maybe a minor second job that eats up three times more than its worth for relatively little return ($300 or so for what likely comes out to about 60+ hours' worth of work (which I think is reasonable given 16 gauge rings at 1/4" inner diameter)? You do the math) on a product that your customers have no financial incentive not to buy infinitely higher quality, aka even cheap riveted, which is available at or near the same price.

If you want to make a living selling mail, you're going to have to make some connections with a producer in Asia and get it wholesale for redistribution here. There certainly is a market in that, although not a very large one so the competition seems to be pretty stiff, with Ebay sellers dominating the crap market and Historic Enterprises and Icefalcon dominating the high end market, which starts at about $400 and goes up to about $1200 for a hauberk.

[Zuloo]

ok dude, like i said before im not looking to make this into a full business, this is just something that i enjoy doing on the side, something to just kinda keep me busy that i just like to do. and i figured i would just sell some of my stuff to other belelgarth members that like mail, why do you need to come in and be an * and completely discourage someone from wanting to do something they enjoy and try to drag business away from someone who is trying to make a start, everyone starts somewhere, thats how people get their connections that your talking about.
that would be like coming in and telling some of the beginer leather workers here that they shouldnt even try and to just give up now because theres others out there that make better leather armor for a cheaper price, with that logic no one should try because theres always going to be someone out there with a better price than what you can do.
thanks for your input on the subject of chainmail but honestly it wasnt really appreciated here, im sure everyone out there that makes things themselves knows that there is someone out there that can probably make it better for less, but thats no reason to come in and completely shut someone down and bash them for trying

[No'Vak]

You forget, Oisin knows everything.

[Beck]

You forget, Oisin thinks he knows everything.

QFT

[Oisin]

You forget, Oisin knows more than you.

QFT

FTFY.

[Poo]

Yeah, how's it going up on that horse oisin?

[Oisin]

Yeah, how's it going up on that horse oisin?

Pays better than the alternative.

Also, your sarcasmeter needs a bit of work.

[Beck]

You forget, Oisin knows more than you.

QFT

FTFY.

I don't argue that in the least. (no sarcasm)

[Oisin]

Then in that case, I won't argue that I know everything . . . I mean, mechanical engineering? **** that, find Arrakis.

[Poo]

i guess, technically, you don't need to know everything, if you're always able to change the topic to something you know everything about

[Oisin]

Exactly! And, considering that there's always some way to make some area of medieval history or archaeology that I'm very knowledgeable about relevant in a game like Belegarth, I pretty much DO know everything.

[No'Vak]

And you're good at sounding like a * almost every time.

[Oisin]

It's the internet. Grow a skin. I'm perfectly nice and courteous in person, so come find me in camp some time and I'll give you a beer and we can laugh about how stupid **** on the boards is.

[Todo]

ok dude, like i said before im not looking to make this into a full business, this is just something that i enjoy doing on the side, something to just kinda keep me busy that i just like to do. and i figured i would just sell some of my stuff to other belelgarth members that like mail, why do you need to come in and be an * and completely discourage someone from wanting to do something they enjoy and try to drag business away from someone who is trying to make a start, everyone starts somewhere, thats how people get their connections that your talking about.
that would be like coming in and telling some of the beginer leather workers here that they shouldnt even try and to just give up now because theres others out there that make better leather armor for a cheaper price, with that logic no one should try because theres always going to be someone out there with a better price than what you can do.
thanks for your input on the subject of chainmail but honestly it wasnt really appreciated here, im sure everyone out there that makes things themselves knows that there is someone out there that can probably make it better for less, but thats no reason to come in and completely shut someone down and bash them for trying

Standard Etiquette to Belegarth Boards Translator:

Shut the hell up, I enjoy this as a hobby and want to make money. I also want to get better, and there is a market for maille in Belegarth.

**** you, Oisin.

(This translation has been brought to you by Todo's E-peen.)

[Oisin]

It's ok, I got the message.

[Todo]

It's ok, I got the message.

It was more for Zu than you.

[Zuloo]

oh lolz to the random bickering on the boards

[Beck]

oh lolz to the random bickering on the boards

It's far from random. Very precise... Like surgery.

[Zuloo]

i just think its kinda funny, and i did kinda over react a bit, but when i wrote that i was in the middle of feeling like ****, i got a three hit combo of sick and have been down this whole month so far, so i was a bit short tempered

[Arrakis]

Zu: Make some plate and show me some pieces. I need some plate.

[Oisin]

Ditto, actually. Know how to articulate lames properly?

[Zuloo]

i could give plate a shot, ill need to get an anvil and few other things again but im sure i could do it, so i can do but i dont have the equipment right now and may be a little bit before i can try.
i never really thought i would ever make plate so i didnt the equipment for it, but i will need to get this stuff anyway so you guys are just giving me an excuse to get it sooner

[Zuloo]

ok so i had to look up "lames" online cause i have heard that term so rarely lol, i know that sounds lame lol
but articulating lames doesnt look to difficult, pretty similar to spaulders or pauldrons, it will take some practice to get it right, but then again everything does

[Oisin]

Do some practice then, and don't try and sell it until you get it right.

And yes, the bottom plates on 14th century spaulders (what you're thinking of) are lames. You'd also get that sort of lamed articulation in other areas including between demi-greave, poleyn and cuisse on the legs or between vambrace, couter and rerebrace on the arms. Also, in many cases (which you never see in modern reproductions because of how precisely fitted it has to be) the spaulder was actually articulated directly to the rerebrace.

[Zuloo]

ok thanks, ill definitally give it some practice and if anything it could also be some practice for blacksmithing too, something i would really like to apprentice for, but i will let you guys know when im good enough at it to sell my work, as far as the shaping i dont think it will be that dificult, just some of the patterns and actually getting it to fit together properly could be the real hard part about it

[Oisin]

Yes, yes you're right. Making it fit together AND making it fit to the person you're making it for is very much the hard part, and let me make clear that while it's probably easy enough to get mediocre at it, armouring is an exceptionally skill-intensive craft to be good at.

Separate spaulders are easy, because they're the part of a harness where proper fitting is least important, but imagine trying to make a complete harness from shoulder to wrist in one section, all articulated to perfectly match the range of motion of the human form without binding or pinching. Then imagine that you have to case and hinge both cannons so that both the inside and outside of the arm is protected by plate metal. Then imagine that it has to fit perfectly, with no more than a milimeter's margin of error, because if it's too long the man wearing it is going to shatter his wrist the first time he breaks a lance and if it's too short he's not going to be able to move right.

And that's just for 14th century harness, which is the easy stuff.

What I'm trying to say is, don't underestimate how hard it is, and do a lot of research if you're actually interested in trying to take up plate armouring. Look at effigies. Go to museums and look at the real stuff. Read books about it. It's an incredible craft with beautiful products, but it's not easy.

[Zuloo]

yeah i figured its pretty hard stuff to do, i attempted to make a leather cuirass and failed at it, although i didnt put much effort into it. but i think, and dont hold it against me if im wrong, i still dont know much about plate, that plate armor patterns are rather simmilar to leather armor patterns, just a different material, im sure there are some parts that are very different, im just comparing my leather pauldrons to some plate pauldrons i have seen, they look almost exactly the same, but ill continue my research

[Tobia Blackthorn]

Sometimes it passes over. I used a metal pattern for my 15th century greaves, though I modified them just slightly for personal tastes.

[Oisin]

A lot of leather armours are made as imitations of actual pieces of plate armour. I mean, there's very little difference in terms of shape from leather to steel greaves, or vambraces, or spaulders, or other such simple pieces, except that pin articulations will almost certainly be replaced with floating articulations.

So yes, a lot of the basic patterns and shapes are the same.

[Ingvar Ironside]

Eh. I found a full-sleeve, butted, blackened, 16-gauge, 1/4" ring diameter shirt for $116. Got it yesterday in the mail. Pretty satisfied. Thanks for the offer, though. If you ever do riveted for cheaper than everyone else does, though, I'm interested hahaha.

Also, if you get into to plate, I'm interested. I really want some metal greaves and bracers.

[Zuloo]

ok ill keep that in mind when working with plate, maybe ill give leather a bigger shot to get used to making the patterns and such, im not much of a leather worker but again everything takes practice. but if you have advice then please throw something out there.

and i am still making the chainmail vest, let me know if your interested in the vest or something more, the vest can be turned into anything. oh and my hauberk that i posted earlyer is an example of an open front design, just put it on like a jacket and close the belts, easy to get on and off

[Ragnar Blackmane]

Hey, Zuloo, i'm just lookin around right now, but how much would you charge for a full set of plate armour?

[Todo]

I don't think he got into plate; sorry bro.