Villain Costumes Medieval – DIY Chain Mail

Medieval Villain Costumes – DIY Chain Mail
http://villaincostumes.propertyimselling.com
Compiled By Andrew McFayden

Antagonists of medieval times spent numerous amounts of coin to have their armor created.

Today you can create your own Chain Mail Villain Costumes if you know how to do so.

When making your own Chain Mail Villain Costumes, you must consider what type of metal and ring size you want to work with.

The thickness of wire is usually measured by a wire gauge system. To make things even more complicated, there are different wire gauge systems used for different types of metals.
EG:, copper-based metals normally use the Brown & Sharpe (AWG) wire gauge system, while steel is normally uses the standard wire gauge system (SWG).

When shopping for, or ordering wire, make sure you know what size you are getting as some wire suppliers will state the wire using of thousandths of an inch thickness. eg: 16 gauge wire is “.063” or 63 thousandths of an inch using the standard wire gauge system.

As different wire suppliers use different systems to avoid confusion, it is best to stick to one of the systems of actual measurement. Either the metric system (using millimetres) or the imperial system (using decimal inches) can be used for measuring wire size.

A good rule of thumb is to use the same system to measure wire size as you would use to measure ring size. This comes into play when you are measuring from aspect ratios.

Your Chain Mail Villain Costumes can be created from many different types of metal. Galvanized steel is probably the most popular wire to use. A bit of research will pay you dividends as you will need to balance cost to use to money you spend.

When creating your your own Chain Mai Villain Costumes, use a mandrel system to make the metal rings. It is simply a rod to wrap the wire around in order to form the rings. This can be done by hand but it does get very tiring.  The mandrel setup is a tool which accommodates a mandrel. There are basically two types of mandrel setups, the most basic style accomodates hand winding.  The other style is the setup that accomodates power winding, which requires the use of a drill or motor to wind the mandrels.

The mandrel holder can be easily constructed with one piece of 2×8 wood about 16″ – 24″ long, and two pieces of 1×8 wood about 8″ long. Screw the 1×8 boards to the 2×8 board, one on each end. Holes must be drilled in each of the 1×8 pieces of wood. The holes must be large enough to fit the mandrel, and also must line up properly with each other.

It is said that weaving your chain mail Villain Costumes parts is the easiest part of making chain mail. Once the rings are formed and cut, all you have to do is choose a weaving pattern. However, it is time consuming and repetitive. You must open a ring, join it to the rings you want it linked to, then close the ring.

You will need at least two good quality pairs of pliers. Your pliers will need to be in scale to match the piece you’re working on. If you are making actual chainmail armor, you’re probably using 14 gauge wire, so you’ll want average sized pliers.

Your Villain Costumes Chainmail is made up of thousands of rings, and you will either need to make them yourself out of your chosen metal, or buy them as most Villains do. Remember how most villains state, during their demise, that they should have done it themselves??. That applies here but if time is a factor you can contact Villain Costumes to find out the cost to get one premade to your size sent to you remember that this is time consuming but if you want to look great at your next Cosplay or re-enactment this is the way to go. Villain Costumes can also have rings created in bulk and sent to you so you can save time in creating and cutting the rings.

If you would like to work with steel, you can get it very cheaply at a farm supply store, in the form of electric fence wire. This is galvanized steel, usually in 14 gauge, and you can get a large spool of it for $10 to $20 and that will make many, many, many links. This is how i did it. Now I have moved house a couple of times and now I cant find it. *SOB*

The first step is to make ring assemblies from the basic rings. The second step is to make chains from the ring assemblies. The third step is to join the chains to make basic sections of mail. With the basic sections of mail, most any item can be made by attaching enough sections and subtracting the extra; kind of like laying a tile floor. The purpose of organizing the assembly steps into three parts is to simplify and speed up an otherwise tedious process. This system will allow the those starting to mass produce the component assemblies and avoid eye strain.  Before you know it your chain mail Villain Costumes parts will be coming together nicely.

It can be worth while purchasing a manequin so that you can gauge it as you work.

The first pattern presented for those starting out is the four-in-one pattern. Logically, four rings pass through each ring in a symmetrical interlocking pattern. You are advised to master this pattern before moving on to the more detailed six-in-one pattern. Mastering the basics will enable the you to spot mistakes more readily and increase your appreciation of the art.

The six-in-one pattern uses almost twice as many rings to make the same size area as the four-in-one, and is more time consuming to assemble. When you consider the cost of the 6 in 1 patterl, it is easy to understand the four-in-one pattern is so popular.

With that said excellent effects can be achieved with The six-in-one pattern placed in different parts of the four-in-one pattern with out much trouble along the shoulders  or Pectorals for a nice effect. Feel free to send in pictures of your work to Villain Costumes and I will be happy to put it up on the site for all to admire.

Below are some great links (pun intended) that I have some very helpful images that I referenced when compiling this information.

Some great sites on how to make Chain mail.
http://www.chainmailbasket.com/making_maille.php
http://www.ehow.com/how_4677628_make-chainmail.html?ref=Track2&utm_source=ask
http://realbeer.com/jjpalmer/HowtoChain.html

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