Helmets?

[Julia Wheeler]

Hello, all.
I am researching the armor. One day when I progress in my training, the armored combat will be my goal. What kind of helmets do you recommend and why? Is there an ARMA standard? I am trying to decide whether to go with "easy to see" and "easy to breath" helmet, like sallet or barbute or go with better protection such as bascinet?
Regards,

Julia

[GeorgeHill]

You might want to start out with a grilled visor SCA helmet. Relatively commonly available, and very protective, without being expencive.

Now, you can narrow your options to openface/face protected.

Personally I'm very fond of the burgonet with falling buff. It can be worn, in theory, as either an open or closed faced helmet by adding or removing the buff.

Next you need to say, "What period am I learning/representing?" Armor in 1650 was far more protective then armor in 1390.

After that, you choice narrows, and you can pick something out that reflects your style.

http://www.illusionarmoring.com/

These guys make good armor at excellent prices. The burgonet with falling buff is nice... I'd like to see a higher ridge over the top of the head though.

[Julia Wheeler]

Thank you,
I am looking at the War of Roses primarily. I am not too fond of helmets with grills, I have one <img src="/forum/images/icons/blush.gif" alt="" />
What kind of liner or padding do you recommend?
Julia

[Casper Bradak]

I recommend effective authenticity. An SCA grill will adversely effect what you're doing. There's a reason they didn't use them back then, and the SCA does now.
Shoot for a helmet from the period you wish to study. Any helm with a visor can go without, or have a variety of visor styles, and any helm with a visor or sights and breaths should be able to be made or customized to suit you for visibility and breathability (sights narrower or wider, same with breaths, etc).
There's a big difference between armour and uniforms. Armour was rarely uniform.
Authentic liners are nice, but usually take a lot of effort to make or aquire. Many helms sold with liners have thin ones as they are never expected to really be used.
In the martial arts though, all you really need is effective authenticity. I recommend high impact foam.

[Allen Johnson]

I have gradually been piecing together bit of armour over the last year and a half. I have just barely commisioned someone to make me a steel burgonet for a very reasonable price.

http://members.armourarchive.org/mattmaus/index.html

its the 8th one down- I have asked him to do a perforrated steel face instaid of the bargrill. The top will be 12 g. and the sides 14 g. This is a little on the heavy side but I want to use it for rebated steel play as well as rapier and those type weapons.
Another guy I have got some armour from and have been pleased with is here: http://members.aol.com/knightsarmoury/knightsarmoury_001.htm

both of these guys mainly do SCA stuff but the can do minor changes to things if you want. His helmets are very reasonably priced. http://members.aol.com/knightsarmoury/knightsarmoury_006.htm

Illusion's suff looks amazing- you will just have to wait for quite a while- but from what I've heard its well worth it.
Forth Armory has a few helms but they are priced really well, too: http://www.forth-armoury.com/Product_Catalog/plate.htm

I have purchased a few of the munitions grade pieces of armour from Albion as well and have been fairly pleased with those: http://albion-swords.com/armor/mercenary/tailor.htm

Here are some others that I have no experience with but they look decent:
http://www.ageofarmour.com/index.html
http://www.bestarmour.com/index.htm
http://www.lightlink.com/armory/armory.html
http://www.whitemountainarmoury.com/
http://www.mackenziesmith.com/index.html
http://thadenarmory.com/
http://www.gaa-armouries.com/
http://windrosearmoury.com/

Most of these guys cater to the SCA crowd but most are willing to leave off bargrills and the such.

[GeorgeHill]

How could an SCA grill hurt? It WILL help protect you, and you can 'pretend' it isn't there. Personally, I'd like to see something like a combonation fencing mask/barred grill be manufactured. Also, SCA helms tend to be a bit too heavy compared to peirod helms, but MUCH more protective to blunt impacts. Safty is everyone's friend.

ALSO, an SCA legal helm would be nice, since you could run around to the SCA group and get some extra practise. <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />

As to the old day not using barred faces, I think they would have if they had thought of it, and I 'beleive' I have seen something along the lines of a period helmet with bars, although the bars were differently shaped, but I might just be thinging of that guy in monty python's holy grail.

[Allen Johnson]

I can't answer for Casper but the biggest reason I'd say no to bar grills is 1) I think they are ugly <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />. But more importantly if you plan on using it for waster or steel blunt free play, most grills are wide enough for a waster tip to pass through and hit you. In the SCA chubby rattan club context, bar grills do the job. But with a waster that actually has edges, it can pass through many of the ones out there.
As to period bar grills there are a few that sort of resemble it but not really:
http://www.grimmarmoury.com/gallery/view_photo.php?set_albumName=early17th&amp;id=A_B_115b

the bars on the above are much thicker than the average SCA grill.

http://www.grimmarmoury.com/gallery/view_photo.php?set_albumName=early17th&amp;id=19258_G
another of similar nature, all a far cry from an average SCA helm like this:
http://www.ashcraftbaker.com/helms.htm

see how easily a thrust could get in there?

Now if you go for a sugarloaf helm, SCA or not if it's even close to the originals you should be ok: http://windrosearmoury.com/images/gallery_images/dru_sloaf.jpg

You can get the thicker gauge that will protect a bit more than a period helm (weren't they the equivalent of what is now around 16 ga?- give or take cause of thinning?) and not have to have the grill.

If you have a desire to play SCA everynow and then, I think that the minimum requirement is 14 ga and at least a chin strap. If you get a helm that will protect you from ARMA wasters (ie- no way a tip could get in) then it will be addequate for the SCA clubs.

[philippewillaume]

It really depends what your preference are.
Just to qualify my answer I joust with a 15 cent French Italian import from 1460-1470 (well a repro)

Helmet, as far as harness is concerned, for the war of the rose was usually sallet bevor, armet wrapper or close helmet
The great bassinet was a thing of the past (or used in tournament).

The choice of your helmet will depend of your armour.
An armet cannot work if you do not have pauldrons, unless you want to dispense with the wrapper (which is not a good idea).
For me this is the best combination mobility protection. You wrapper is keeping in place by the pressure of the pauldron so you can turn your head and look down.
(so if you have spaulders you are buggered)
The armet is jammed on your head by the padding, the locking pin and a strap or a chord that tighten the base so that it can not go over you head (and prevent the check pieces to go awol and force them to stay where they are.
There is usually no locking mechanism for the visor as the wrapper protects it.
The wrapper is attached to the armet by a strap going around it.

The bottom of the armet needs to be bellow your jaw line almost on your shoulder.
It needs to cover you standard and rotate around it like a tank turret, you need to hear the noise of the armet on the standard. (i.e. I need to be close but you need to be able to move) .
You need to be able to open and close your visor easily when the warper is on
It needs to be tight enough so that no one can get in between the armet and the wrapper. But you need to be able to look down (if you have several blades at the base of you wrapper it helps) so you visor will come in contact with the wrapper and you need to make sure. The visor does not come up.
It is relatively hot helmet and peple can not hear what you say unless you yell and when it is closed do not even bother talking unless the persone is few metters away.



A sallet and bevor
The bevor is usually attached to the cuirass by points, locks or strap. So pauldrons or spaulders does not matter The sallet is worn on the had and is attached with a strap below the chin.
it need to be jammed on you head as well so the chin strap is there to prevent the forceful removal more that to keep the sallet in place.
It is more confortable to have a visor on the sallet.
If your salet is going to be oustide the bavor you need a locking pon for the visor
If the sallet is going to be inside the bevor you do not need to.

Obvoisly mobility of the head comes from the fact that the bavor and the sallet are not attached together. So make sure you can move yopu head in the bevor.
There is no point of having a bevor if it locks you chin up.

You need to have a good overlap between the bevor and the sallet so that you head movement are not going to expose you.

You will have more movement in a sallet bevor but you nape is more vulnerable because your hed is less supported (It not a massive risk but you can not go for head shot when jousting).


Close helmet (15 cent
Basically this is a helmet where the wrapper/bevor is part of the helmet.
It can be really sallet or armet shaped, the bevor/wrapper is articulated on the helmet itself.
For me it is half way between the salet/bevor and armet wrapper arrengement
More mobility that an armet but less that a sallet, better neck protection that a sallet but less that an armet

If you plan to ride you need the armour to be made for you there is no other option. When riding the Armour need to work perfectly on you. Things that you will not notice on foot will bug you on horse.

My last advice cover you arming doublet, have one made for you it is as important as your armour with out a good one the armour is not going to work well.
With 15 cent armour you do not need padding (may a surlaye to freven shafing). The doublet need to be stiff can act as a corset. Ideally it need to be close to the boddy, and not restrict your move. You will have interlining on the body but not on the arm
Make sure that the arming point (point where you are going to attach the armour to hit are at place that are the least mobile compared to the part they are attached to.

I hope that helped

[Casper Bradak]

Theoretically a bar grill couldn't hurt, but it tends to give people an a-historical false sense of security, an over-estimation of its effectiveness, and is rather pointless given what we do.
It's not that they didn't think of it, it's that it was largely useless. You see things resembling bar grills in late medieval tourneys, which by no coincidence, they were using fat clubs for striking, rather like a mean version of SCA sparring.
For the most part, if you're doing anything involving striking the armour of your opponent, you need to rethink how to kill an adversary in armour, and read the fencing manuals.
A bar grill will generally not stop edges, even from most of our simulators, and it certainly won't stop thrusts, the main thing sent to openings of armour. The face is a hard target, and blows from the lateral portions of weaponry are more likely to strike the helmet; stopping an SCA guy in his tracks with a bonk, but it won't do squat to a real combatant. Even if struck forcefully and squarely to the face, the helmet will likely stop significant penetration (intentionally).
If someone fought for real wearing an SCA style bar grill, it would obviously be seen by the opponent and worked around, likely not even changing the techniques used to that opening anyway.
The visors on the helmets linked by Allen not only have narrower openings, they are intentionally made vertical rather than horizontal to negate most blows, but they have a brim to keep even overhand blows from penetrating, rather than a simple stop rib seen over most horizontal sights. Aside from all that, they were designed in the 17th century for use by mounted pistoleers or lancers, and faced swords far less frequently than medieval helms.

[Shane Smith]

I personally loathe the appearance of a bar-grill but then,there is an image in Fiore that argues in favor of them ;


Note the visors sure seem to be barred.

Also, it's good to hear from a fellow armoured enthusiast.There is a decent introduction to armoured longsword here to help you get started; http://www.thearma.org/essays/armoredlongsword.html

I tend to prefer the pig-face visor with bascinet although I frequently train without the visor as many of the original Masters show. Here is a look at what we are using in VAB(I'm the guy on the back right);

[Ryan Ricks]

that guy on the front left looks like he's got a hauberk that's woven from extremely fine rings, compared to the others.

[Matthew_Anderson]

Hey Shane,

That particular image has caused a lot of heated debates on several different forums! Some argue that it indcates the existance of SCA-style bar-grill visors in the early 15th century. Others say that it actually represents the perforations of a normal "pig nose" visor, just drawn kind of weird. It's hard to say for sure, but my gut feeling is that it is the latter. A bar grill is really not very good protection from a sword blade, spear, dagger, or arrow. They are really only effective protection against weapons uniformly bulky and blunt enough to be unable to fit through the bars (like the rattan sticks used in SCA combat). As you know from our own spirited free-play, even tiny slits and small gaps can be penetrated by steel blades, even when we're trying not too! There were grill visors of a sort used exclusively for tournaments with baton style weapons in the 16th century, but I don't think that's what we're seeing here. I think that, in general, when armoured men wanted better vision, they simply went without a visor. When face protection was desired and practical, a full visor, designed to be difficult to penetrate by weapons of the day, was used.

[Shane Smith]

I agree on the vulnerabiltiy of even a small eye-slot to a sword blade but note that the plays being demonstrated are poleaxe. Only in this section of FOB does this pseudo barred-visor make an appearance. I think it is obvious that the artist that illustrated this work was skilled enough to indicate a perforated pig-face if required but given that there is no evidence of an eye-slot of any kind to be seen and that such a barred visor should work fine against a polearm,I'm afraid we must agree to disagree this time. It sure looks like a barred grill.I cannot believe that the artist was incapable of adding a few dots and an eyeslot if that was what he meant to show us.All that said,I could still be very wrong on this but I think my argument is sound enough. <img src="/forum/images/icons/cool.gif" alt="" />

[Julia Wheeler]

Thanks, guys. All of you have been helpful. It is a good group of people to ask questions. I have a lot of links to look at and also some things to consider. At the moment I am leaning towards barbute. I think I am prepared to sacrifice protection for visibility. Grill has its place, but I will look for a helmet that was commonly used on battlefields. False sense of security is not what I want (based on my previous experience in the eastern martial arts). I have see people who would try to take hits in sparring with no equipment, that they could afford to take having the equipment on during the practice bouts.

Now, another question. I understand high impact foam for padding is a way to go. Any other suggestions? What are your experiences with padding?

[JeffGentry]

Hey Julia

Sallet and Bevor then you can give it a paint job, and it is still historic and it will look cool which is the important thing as long as you look cool. lol

seriously i do like the look of a sallet and bevor i have been looking at a few. I am wanting to get one and do a paint job on it, I have seen a few museum piece with realy awesome paint job's, i did see a Barbute(think i miss spelled that) with a realy nice velvet cover for a parade or some such.

Jeff