Sunday 30 September 2012

Part 3 - official

Hey part 3 is here now.
Leather and chain necklace
This leather and chain necklace is really simple to make as it is basically a leather thong 2.5 times longer than the chain that is woven through the chain and tied off at the ends to make a loop on one end and the other is to a coin with a hole in it, this makes a very nice clasp. Difficulty 2/10
Closeup

Triangular earring

 I cant even remember what prompted me to make earrings but here they are and more are coming. This triangular earring is reminiscent of the modular forms you see in modern day architecture and furniture. Difficulty 3/10

Japanese 12-1 flower earring
 Basically the Japanese 12-1 arrangement to make the flower not at all difficult. 2/10
Woven twisted bracelet
 This bracelet was made by creating three chains joining all three then plaiting them together joining them again every other plait so that the shape would remain as you see it. The clasp was also made by myself and is quite easy. Difficulty 4/10
Closeup
Here you can see the different colour I used for the chains.

Thanks be back soon with the last part, part 4 and then I will be going onto my blacksmithing experience and then onto some patterns and what I think of them!

Friday 28 September 2012

Part 3

Part 3 is here.

Actually not quite as I have three more drawings to do and then I will devote my attention to something more less engineering orientated. Be back in about 4 hours.

Part 3 is still to come.

Tuesday 25 September 2012

Part 2

Here is part 2!
Dragon Maille bracelet
The next thing I moved onto from the Miton was jewelry as you can see in this pic I also started on the difficult stuff and then amazingly found it to be pretty easy compaired to the usual 4-in-1 english maille. The weave used here is standard Dragonmaille and I would rate it a 3 on the difficulty scale. The weave produced is a very close knit almost impenetrable wall of links which considering its solid nature is very flexible. It makes such a wall due to there being two types of links in the weave. All of this will be explained once I have posted the pattern for this weave.

Byzantine bracelet
Closeup of byzantine bracelet






















This bracelet is made of ordinary one sized links and is pretty easy to make, I would rate it as a difficulty of about 2.



Butterfly bracelet
This is more for the Ladies in terms of style and is also very simple I would rate this at about a 1.

Square bracelet
This is just 4-in1 European folded up and joined at the top, also a 1 on my scale.

Part 3 coming soon.

Part 1 of all the things I have made

Like it says this is part 1. Each part will have more of the things I have made, each picture or group of pictures will have a short description of materials and technique used to make them, also I will include a difficulty rating from 1-10 1 being easy as breathing and 10 being as easy as breathing underwater.
Chainmaile Miton (Glove)
This was my first ever project. Only the trees know why I started on a project I would now rate about an 8 but I did. This Miton or glove is made from the English 4-in-1 style as you can see in the picture below.
Closeup of glove to show weave used
Although this weave is the simplest and fastest to make the fact that the glove has so many changes in direction is what made it difficult.
Closeup of glove to show fingers
  The fingers where relatively simple to do but attaching them was a nightmare. I found that I had done the weave the wrong way and instead of having it run vertical like it is here I should have made it run horizontal.

Look out for part 2!!!

What has kept me so busy?

To put everyone up to date from the last time I was here I will create a list of things that I have done and share a few tips as well that I picked up over the past year and a bit.

1. Finished school
2.Started studying
3.Started a facebook group solely dealing with chainmaile and had a wonderfull response go check it out at     https://www.facebook.com/groups/136071543134042/
4.Experimented and played around with many patterns which i will be posting one every week from now as well as developed a few of my own ideas and products.
5.Discovered a miraculous invention to replace my handmade links. Spring washers! Available at any hardware store and very cheap compared to the rings I was making with my mandrel. The only downfall to these washer-links is that I cant make Dragonscale maile with them as their ratios are to tight.
6.Gained an interest in blacksmithing and heavy metal work (the interest was there already but I had never actually pursued it in any way) through a man I met in O-Hagens one night who was a blacksmith himself. He offered me an apprenticeship if i was able to gather the required items 1 being a log the size of me and 2 an anvil (More on these two items later)
7.Found my log still searching high and low for the anvil
8.Found the anvil but alas Chato (the blacksmith) has moved to Sauidi Arabia to work for a Shaik there who has a few hundred horses.
9.Now- Setting up my smithy and trying to save up to buy a blower which is essential to the forge

Monday 24 September 2012

I'm back!

Well friends its been over a year now that I have neglected this poor blog but now I am back again and with even more to display after the time I have been absent. My work has gone from amateur to over the top. I recently came across an old anvil and am currently building up my smithy so as to be able to produce even grander metalwork. In due course I will be publishing a few articles and posts on blacksmithing as well as the main topic of this blog CHAINMAILE!! There are many pictures of recent work I have done that I will be sharing soon as well.