Unlike most of the pieces I make, these have no one particular inspiration, but are instead a stylization based on several pieces all from around the beginning of the 15th century.
To start with, I made a half pattern for the largest plate which all the other plates are built off.
The plates were cut from 16 gauge mild steel, which seems to be the optimal thickness for arms and legs. I dished it as much a I could using a rubber mallet, then switched to a broad ball pin hammer.
The nest step I called planishing. Here I positioned the plate over a ball stake and flattened all the hammer marks, leaving the piece round and smooth
The upper plate and the lames were cut from metal of the same thickness. The smallest plate allows for the arms to move up and down more freely, while the lower two lames allow the arm to move back and forth while covering the upper arm.
The upper plate and lames were lightly dished, just enough to make the spaulders plates transition smoothly from one to the other. It is important to keep checking and re-checking the sizing and shape.
The next step is preparing to suspend the plates. While I had already drilled holes in the upper and lower plates, I saved the largest for last to make the sizing more precise, something I should have done with the lower plates as well as the outer holes are too close to the edge in the picture above.
To connect them to my arming jacket, I drilled two holes in the top plate of both spaulders. Now that the plates are forms and smoothed the next step is polishing. To do this, I used I tiger abrasive wheel. I then took a scotch-brite wheel to smooth it out. To get the satin finish, I ran over it several time with a wire wheel.
On the back side of the spaulders, I very loosely riveted the back of the plates together. The plates are connected loosely enough that they can move freely but not pull apart from each other.
The final step in assembly was taking straps of leather and riveting them to the plates, suspending them to move freely. To have them move with my arm, I put a strap on the lowest lame that wraps around and buckles so that I can resize it as needed.
These are the patterns I made for the spaulders. They were drawn on 8.5x11 graph paper but the graphing lines didn't scan.
