Got a Real-World Weapon or Armour Question? Mk. XV

[fusilier]

Well, it'll work as padding for most of your torso. Padding generally covers everywhere the mail does, so you probably will need to supplement it.

Then perhaps it doesn't matter too much whether or not it's worn under or over, from a comfort standpoint. Are you worried about people cutting holes in the bullet proof vest, and then shooting you, or people shooting holes in the mail, then stabbing?

I think I would lean toward the bulletproof vest over the mail -- the enemy will probably shoot first before closing to hand-to-hand. Although there could be other factors to consider.

[AgentPaper]

Then perhaps it doesn't matter too much whether or not it's worn under or over, from a comfort standpoint. Are you worried about people cutting holes in the bullet proof vest, and then shooting you, or people shooting holes in the mail, then stabbing?

I think I would lean toward the bulletproof vest over the mail -- the enemy will probably shoot first before closing to hand-to-hand. Although there could be other factors to consider.

I'd be more worried about making an already heavy and hot mail/vest combo even heavier and hotter by putting an extra layer of padding beneath it. I suspect you're more likely to die due to heat exhaustion (directly or indirectly) than you are to die because someone shot your five times and then stabbed you through the hole he made.

[Mr. Mask]

Depending on the vest and the melee weaponry in use, you might need more padding anyway.

With a plain kevlar vest, it stands a chance of getting cut to bits (even if they just stab straight, the mail could deflect the blade so it cut through much kevlar).

[Mike_G]

Mail plus a standard vest will be very heavy, and pretty bulky, regardless of which you wear on the outside. The tactical vest the military wears now (IOTV or MTV with inserts) is around 30 pounds (14 kg), not including helmet, or arm and leg protection, and then if you put mail with it, you are lugging a lot of weight, and it's not fitted like a full plate harness would be, so no forward rolls.

I would think a good quality modern ballistic armor reinforced with plates where necessary, like military armor, and maybe mail over the joints would work best.

The most important thing about armor is you need to be able to function in it.

Also, it makes a big difference what the weather is like. In a hot climate, you will obviously worry more about dehydration and hyperthermia.

[Mr. Mask]

Figuring on handguns and maybe SMGs, just because it sounded more like urban crime would be your enemy than battlefield combat. So, you could probably manage with a lighter vest.

If you needed to stop rifle fire, a level 3 or 4 would be necessary. You could probably incorporate some added knife-mesh if necessary, and could add some light mail to other parts of your body if you didn't mind the weight (depending on the threat, if it's just small swords and knives, you can go pretty light).

One thing I forgot. Normally you need padding, but with the technology for rifles and ballistic vests, you could just go with high quality mail without padding. The blows you take will sting like heck, but high quality metal mail won't break without padding to swords or knives.

If you have to deal with axes, armour piercing spikes, and polearms... you'd need to incorporate some kind of titanium full-plate harness, I guess.

[Brother Oni]

If you have to deal with axes, armour piercing spikes, and polearms... you'd need to incorporate some kind of titanium full-plate harness, I guess.

While titanium has a better strength to weight ratio than steel, the high carbon tempered steels are much tougher, so I'm still dubious on full plate made out of titanium being inherently better.

Eventually you reach a point where it's better just to kill the enemy first than to worry about protecting from his attacks and given that we have modern firearms in the equation, it makes closing with melee weapon hazardous at best.

This isn't including specialised AP ammunition which would drastically reduce the effectiveness of body armour.

[Mr. Mask]

I don't have a good list of materials and their properties on hand, so I can't comment on which modern material would give the best balance of density, tensile strength and hardness (if you know a good list, I'd be grateful).

If the setting is urban crime, knives still see an amount of use, just because of they're concealable. Polearms are harder to bring into a setting with modern ballistic vests available.

[Storm_Of_Snow]

I don't have a good list of materials and their properties on hand, so I can't comment on which modern material would give the best balance of density, tensile strength and hardness (if you know a good list, I'd be grateful).

Carbon nanotubes?

You're probably looking at layering as the best kind of armour (like modern AFV armour, particularly the British Chobham and Dorchester types) - padding closest to the body to absorb impact forces, with layers of Kevlar and/or ceramic or metal plates on top (IIRC, the military have steel for the troops and ceramics like Alumina for officers, but Silicon Carbide and Silicon Nitride fibres, once woven, heat treated to turn into a ceramic, and placed in a suitable matrix as a composite material, could possibly be even more effective).

You could also potentially have cells of non-Newtonian liquids as well, especially around points of movement (e.g., to extend torso armour up over the neck and down over and around the upper thighs and groin and thus extend protection to the carotid and femoral arteries - especially where the latter runs close to the surface of the skin on the inside of the thigh), so you can move fairly freely, but still get some protection.

The issue then really becomes around cost and processing - atomic deposition could potentially give you single perfect crystals of nanocrystalline diamond that would be nearly impossible to penetrate, but it would cost so much and take so long to manufacture that it's not worth it.

[Knaight]

I don't have a good list of materials and their properties on hand, so I can't comment on which modern material would give the best balance of density, tensile strength and hardness (if you know a good list, I'd be grateful).

Steel is actually extremely good for this, though exactly which alloy gets used is up in the air, and there's a huge amount even if you restrict the list to commonly used commercial alloys.

[Mr. Mask]

With carbon nanotubes, I heard they actually make a poor material for armour in the tests they've done. Maybe they just can't weave them right or something.

[Knaight]

With carbon nanotubes, is I heard they actually make a poor material for armour in the tests they've done. Maybe they just can't weave them right or something.

Carbon nanotubes have great tensile strength. The shear strength is a different matter entirely.

[Mr. Mask]

Knaight: That's probably the reason. Thanks.


Archery question. How much do you use your legs in archery? I was pondering how creatures with non-human lower halves would do as archers, as they are popular in mythology and are regularly portrayed as using bows.

[Storm Bringer]

Archery question. How much do you use your legs in archery? I was pondering how creatures with non-human lower halves would do as archers, as they are popular in mythology and are regularly portrayed as using bows. .

since a human can quite easily use a bow either kneeling or on horseback, I think (but do not know) that the legs are not that important (beyond creating a stable firing platform)

IIRC, the military have steel for the troops and ceramics like Alumina for officers, but Silicon Carbide and Silicon Nitride fibres, once woven, heat treated to turn into a ceramic, and placed in a suitable matrix as a composite material, could possibly be even more effective)

right, speaking only for the british military, everybody uses the same plates, as that simpliflies logistics, which appear to be a ceramic type (not sure what they are made out of, but ceramics seems the best fit. they have a green cloth materails that glued on to cover the whole plate, which i think is to help hold the plate together if it cracks when shot.)

as far as i know, the US armour is simmilar, and i think most other nations use ceramic plates as well.

[Brother Oni]

Archery question. How much do you use your legs in archery? I was pondering how creatures with non-human lower halves would do as archers, as they are popular in mythology and are regularly portrayed as using bows.

Depends on the draw weight. For very heavy draws, the entire body is used as the archer leans into it: 170lb draw longbow, 105lb draw.

There's also an apparently historical technique where the bow is drawn and shot in a constant rolling fashion: keep your eye on the guys in the background.
Edit: I remember seeing a better quality video, but I can't find it at the moment.

For lighter poundages (anything less than ~75lbs), you can get away with just using your back to draw, but this is very dependent on the individual's strength and technique. As an example, my technique is fairly poor so I compensate with strength thus I tend to get tired after about 10 ends - there's a lady at my club with a higher poundage bow than me, probably 3 or 4 stone lighter, but can shoot for longer and more accurately as her technique is much better.

If the higher poundage methods look more inaccurate, then you're right. The expected accuracy for combat was hitting a 12"x12" target at 100 yards, while target archery is much more exacting.

With regard to non-human archers, I'd say it would depend on their physical proportions - something with proportionally longer arms would find it easier. Centaurs are typically bigger and stronger than humans, so I don't think they would be affected by their different legs. In my opinion, a naga-style archer like Medusa from Clash of the Titans would have issues with higher poundage bows since I can't really see her being able to use anything else than her back to draw (she can't shift her weight forward and back like a human can).

[Durkoala]

I was not expecting this big a response...

Thank you all for your input. I see I'm going to need to do some research on armour...
I completely failed to consider overheating, but the local weather has recently reminded me of why that is a problem.

Whoops, misread part of that. Thought the question was whether to wear the mail over a breastplate. In the case of a ballistic vest with no knife mesh, you probably want to wear the mail over it. Some links will get busted if you get shot, but a lucky slash across the ballistic vest could cut it nearly in two. The ballistic vest can also function as padding for the mail.

Surcoats were for the big part to show your heraldry, and to keep the sun from heating your armour, yes. However, if the surcoat has a little thickness, it also takes the punch out of arrows and blows more than would be expected (still not huge, but for the weight it's pretty good).

Ah, I didn't know that bullet-proofing was that vunerable to blades. I assumed that it would be fairly easy to cut, but still hold together. About coats, how thick would 'a little thickness' be?

I'd be more worried about making an already heavy and hot mail/vest combo even heavier and hotter by putting an extra layer of padding beneath it. I suspect you're more likely to die due to heat exhaustion (directly or indirectly) than you are to die because someone shot your five times and then stabbed you through the hole he made.

This looks like a good reason to not have a coat, as it would make things even hotter. So, mail over armour seems to be the better option?

Then perhaps it doesn't matter too much whether or not it's worn under or over, from a comfort standpoint. Are you worried about people cutting holes in the bullet proof vest, and then shooting you, or people shooting holes in the mail, then stabbing?

The reason I asked was because I wanted to know which was the one to be more worried about, so I'm afraid I can't help you.

I think I would lean toward the bulletproof vest over the mail -- the enemy will probably shoot first before closing to hand-to-hand. Although there could be other factors to consider.

This is the biggest arguement for vest-over-mail: most people with a ranged option will use it before closing in for melee. There's also the fact that the character has few resources and will want to preserve his gear as much possible. Torn mail looks very hard to repair, but would it be possible to tape the vest back together and have still be functional?

A bit more information: the character is a former soldier from a collapsed state with stong USSR themes. He now wanders with no real aim, but his experiences have left him with a bitter hatred of dictatorship, often leading him to sabotage any would-tyrants or similar figures he runs across. At present, I'm thinking of calling him Ben, as that's easier to type than "that character".

I imagine the vest was taken from the army supplies. It's as good as it will need to be: there probably won't be anything good given to the rank-and-file, but he could have found a rich and paranoid officer's stockpile. Alternately, he could have taken it from some unfortunate he met on the road.

The mail probably came from a museum, although it may have been seized by the deperate army before he came across it.

Atm, I'm thinking of vest over mail. Thanks for all your help

Edit: is there any way to add quotes in while editing? I missed a couple.

[Mr. Mask]

Archery: Thanks for the help, guys :).


Durkola: Knifes go pretty cleanly through plain kevlar. It's not to say it's likely to get slashed in two like I described, just that with swords there would be a chance of the armour getting damaged.

As for surcoat thickness... well, it's not like padded cloth armour which looks like a bloated life-jacket. It's more like thick clothing, I think. Someone else will hopefully verify some actual thicknesses.


Mail is actually one of the easiest armours to repair. Doesn't require much skill, and not too much time if the damage isn't extensive. get some new rings to place the broken ones, and connect them with the others.

Kevlar would be a problem to repair. If you just sew it together, the stitching will tear apart as soon as a bullet anywhere on the vest.

Not sure when the game is set, but the USSR had some nice level 4 bodyarmour, last I checked. Heavier than the US stuff, but not necessarily better. I'm pretty sure it's standard for the infantry, and I'm uncertain of any supply issues that may have prevented it being common. There are some soft kevlar layers mixed in with the heavier military vests, so your character might be able to scavenge some if you don't want heavier duty stuff.

Note that it's not too hard to make your own mail. It take a lot of hours, but a drill and a roll of thick wire and some wire cutters and pliers are all you need.

[Thiel]

Modern body armour, especially the level III and IV stuff are way tougher than you're making it out to be. In both cases you've got complete chest and back plates of plastic cased ceramics up to 10mm thick. Good luck trying to stab through that. It's true that kevlar isn't exactly the greatest thing on earth when it comes to stopping blades, but the entire thing is covered by extremely durable webbing, not to mention al the buckles, pouches and gear that's usually attacked to it as well.

[snowblizz]

Durkola: Knifes go pretty cleanly through plain kevlar. It's not to say it's likely to get slashed in two like I described, just that with swords there would be a chance of the armour getting damaged.

Huh. So what exactly is cut/puncture resistant gloves (eg) (proof being impossible apparently) made out of? Anyone have a general idea? Friend of mine have a pair and I thought it contained kevlar. Looking online I can unsurprisingly only find brand named stuff.

Also I'm curious as to how something can be bullet proof but not knife resistance. If I make a pointy enough bullet wouldn't it then defeat the armour same as a knife?

[Thiel]

Huh. So what exactly is cut/puncture resistant gloves (eg) (proof being impossible apparently) made out of? Anyone have a general idea? Friend of mine have a pair and I thought it contained kevlar. Looking online I can unsurprisingly only find brand named stuff.

Also I'm curious as to how something can be bullet proof but not knife resistance. If I make a pointy enough bullet wouldn't it then defeat the armour same as a knife?

As in butchers gloves/mitts?
They usually incorporate woven stainless steel wire or outright mail.

[snowblizz]

As in butchers gloves/mitts?
They usually incorporate woven stainless steel wire or outright mail.

No as in leather gloves. The main ones it seems is "police gloves". They looked perfectly normal (I guess low profile is the point) but are resistant to cutting and piercing. Didn't seem to include steel thread like the butcher stuff.

https://www.turtleskin.com/webstore/police-gloves

[Thiel]

No as in leather gloves. The main ones it seems is "police gloves". They looked perfectly normal (I guess low profile is the point) but are resistant to cutting and piercing. Didn't seem to include steel thread like the butcher stuff.

https://www.turtleskin.com/webstore/police-gloves

Well, TurtleSkin appears to be some sort of tightly woven para-aramid and leather in and of itself is pretty decent at preventing stuff like glass cuts.
Para-aramids (Kevlar etc) as you know has an extremely high tensile strength for its weight and it doesn't stretch. I'm guessing it's the latter quality they're going for.
Hypodermic needles are small enough that they'll try to push through the gaps in the fabric. If you use a sufficiently inelastic material and enough layers of it you can basically trap the point within it.
Bear in mind that these gloves are only meant to protect against accidentally cutting or pricking yourself. They're not going to stop a blade or even a needle if someone is actively trying to force it through the glove.

Also, it's not as if Kevlar just falls apart if you stick a knife in it. At the end of the day it's still a really tough material and any ballistic vest worth the name is going to include at least a dozen layers of it. Which is why stab-proof vests tends to use it as well. They just include a couple of layers of woven steel cloth as well.

[Brother Oni]

Note that it's not too hard to make your own mail. It take a lot of hours, but a drill and a roll of thick wire and some wire cutters and pliers are all you need.

For butted mail, yes. Riveted mail takes more training and some specialised equipment.

[Galloglaich]

For butted mail, yes. Riveted mail takes more training and some specialised equipment.

and only riveted mail really works. Butted mail also has to be a lot heavier to even hold together sufficiently for a costume. Riveted mail can be quite light. I've handled some antique mail shirts and they aren't heavy at all.

G

[Durkoala]

Archery: Thanks for the help, guys :).


Durkoala: Knives go pretty cleanly through plain kevlar. It's not to say it's likely to get slashed in two like I described, just that with swords there would be a chance of the armour getting damaged.

As for surcoat thickness... well, it's not like padded cloth armour which looks like a bloated life-jacket. It's more like thick clothing, I think. Someone else will hopefully verify some actual thicknesses.


Mail is actually one of the easiest armours to repair. Doesn't require much skill, and not too much time if the damage isn't extensive. get some new rings to place the broken ones, and connect them with the others.

Kevlar would be a problem to repair. If you just sew it together, the stitching will tear apart as soon as a bullet anywhere on the vest.

Not sure when the game is set, but the USSR had some nice level 4 bodyarmour, last I checked. Heavier than the US stuff, but not necessarily better. I'm pretty sure it's standard for the infantry, and I'm uncertain of any supply issues that may have prevented it being common. There are some soft kevlar layers mixed in with the heavier military vests, so your character might be able to scavenge some if you don't want heavier duty stuff.

Note that it's not too hard to make your own mail. It take a lot of hours, but a drill and a roll of thick wire and some wire cutters and pliers are all you need.

Thanks for the info! When I suggested taping it together again, I meant covering it in duct tape where appropriate. Would that improve the durability?

Being able to fix mail easily is going to make a big difference, but according to Gallogliach it would be inferior to professional mail.
Also, could I have a link to these armour levels you keep quoting?

and only riveted mail really works.

Bugger.
This is close to my original vision of having to walk around with holes in your anti-sword shirt until you found a decent metalworker and enough money. I suppose you could patch it with DIY'd mail: bad protection being better than no protection.

Bear in mind that these gloves are only meant to protect against accidentally cutting or pricking yourself. They're not going to stop a blade or even a needle if someone is actively trying to force it through the glove.

Now this I can comment on. When we were little, my brother attacked me with a garden saw. It wasn't very big, or very heavy, or very sharp, but it went right through the leather gloves I was wearing. Granted, these probably weren't top-quality leather, but my brother was seven at the time. So, untreated leather isn't very good at resisting sharpened metal.

[Mr. Mask]

Why do I keep misspelling names?


Riveted mail isn't so hard to make. You need some narrower wire, and something to work as a press (pliers could work, with the right set-up). Even if you weren't skilled with garage work, trial and error would be a decent teacher if you knew the basic concepts.

I really don't think duct tape would be helpful with flexible kevlar. With non-flexible bodyarmours, it's even less likely to work (when the American level 3 stuff breaks, you can only replace it).

Let's see, armour levels link... http://www.tote.com.au/threatlevel.htm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulletp...ance_standards

Honestly, if you could get some high quality metal wire, even simple butted stuff would probably make decent knife protection.

[Aedilred]

Also I'm curious as to how something can be bullet proof but not knife resistance. If I make a pointy enough bullet wouldn't it then defeat the armour same as a knife?

In theory, yes, but there are practical problems. Bullets basically cause damage through percussive force: you hit someone with a piece of metal and it causes injury. You hit someone with a piece of metal hard enough and it will break the skin and possibly bone. The deeper a bullet penetrates, the more trauma it will cause, especially since they push an expanding cone in front of them. Body armour therefore aims to react to that force and stop the bullet before it enters the body. Knives tend to be made of a harder metal and spread the damage over an area that armour designed to stop bullets is less efficient at repelling. So the layers of armour designed to repel the bullet might not stop a knife. Knives can also inflict slash damage, which probably won't penetrate the armour but will damage it and make it less effective against other types of impact.

A bullet designed for the purpose could penetrate body armour, if it were made of a hard enough metal and fired fast enough, and potentially if it had a sharper tip, although the last is less important, since the point of impact will still be small. Indeed, there are bullets designed to penetrate armour, after all, although they aren't always sharp-tipped. There are also issues with getting metals hard enough to penetrate armour to interact well with the gun you're firing from: the hard penetrator will be encased in a softer (but still "hard") metal anyway to prevent fouling, so the shape of the exterior casing is less important. Such bullets however are less effective against flesh, because the same properties that make them better at penetrating armour also cause them to penetrate the body more efficiently and cause less damage.

[Knaight]

Any comments about this? Some of it is pretty familiar: The huge focus on sieges, the militarization of large groups (e.g. urban militias), some of the specifics of the tactics in use, but parts of it seem a bit more radical, and it seems to be ignoring another big aspect of medieval warfare - namely, raids of agricultural areas, supply trains, et. all.

[Mr. Mask]

Aedilred: A marine I know decided to have a go at at one of the vests with a knife. He penetrated it with one good stab. Plain cloth kevlar is a lot less resistant. I don't know how it is with the level IV vests.

[Brother Oni]

and only riveted mail really works. Butted mail also has to be a lot heavier to even hold together sufficiently for a costume. Riveted mail can be quite light. I've handled some antique mail shirts and they aren't heavy at all.

I've been doing some digging, but I can't find a weight for the odd split links that some Japanese mail used (the ones that used overlapped split links much like a key chain). I can see those working just as well as riveted mail, but be heavier.

Riveted mail isn't so hard to make. You need some narrower wire, and something to work as a press (pliers could work, with the right set-up). Even if you weren't skilled with garage work, trial and error would be a decent teacher if you knew the basic concepts.

And an anvil, hammer, drill press and vice: link. In medieval times, they had a die to flatten and punch holes in the links before riveting.

While I agree it's not hard, it's still a lot more tricky than just bending split links together with two pairs of pliers.

[Mr. Mask]

You're only making one suit here, not starting a factory. An anvil is useful, but a second hammer or other surfaces can work. One guy would flatten the rings with a hammer on his lap. Having the right tools for it and the knowhow wil lcertianly make it go faster, and the mail will end up nicer (some of the really fine mails require skilled labour).