Tosei Gusoku project

[Kozure Okami]

Konnichi wa mina-san,

I just recently discovered this forum when I was looking for image material to deepen my understanding of Effingham-sensei's instructions. Since then, I really enjoy reading about the armours y'all built and being inspired by your experiences.


Coming to the point:
I am planning to make a suit of armour, most likely starting with the do. I want to use iyo zane scales, but there are some details I am unsure about and that you are hopefully able to help me with:

1. I am 5'6" tall, so I am guessing that the 2.5" x 0.75" pattern that Effingham-sensei provided here should be right for me? In the "Making a Do"-chapter, he wrote that the patterns there fit people between 5'6" and 6', does this also apply for the iyo zane pattern?

2. The armour is planned for display and dress, not for combat, which means it doesn't need to be able to take a good beating My focus is on authenticity, with nods to availability and, of course, the omnipresent financial issue. That being said, if I make the scales out of metal, how thick should they be? Leather scales are recommended to be over 1/8" and plastic ones almost 1/4" thick, but I couldn't find a number for metal.

3. Effingham-sensei wrote in the paragraph about the iyo zane:

Don't punch the holes for the lacing until the boards have been assembled by the shitagarami.

Additionally:

[...] not much attention was paid to lining up the scales. Indeed, the randomness of the pattern is part of the appeal.

I don't get what exactly this is supposed to mean, but is one of the consequences that having the same hole pattern for the lacing on all iyo zane scales would not work? I'm asking because a coworker recommended a company to me that offers laser-cutting of sheet metal according to CAD-files that you provide. That way, I would be able to have a large amount of scales produced in basically no time and for not too much money, if I do the post-processing work (like removing burs from the sharp edges) myself. I would prefer this method because I don't have a drill press to do all of the lacing holes - however, that doesn't help me if they turn out to be in the wrong places after assembling the boards... any insights on that matter?

4. One more thing about the provided pattern is the fact that Effingham-sensei posted somewhere on this forum that in order to shape a board of iyo zane scales around your body, you need to have some scales in a trapezoid rather than a rectangular shape. I guess that this wouldn't be as much of a problem as holes being in the wrong place, but at the same time, I have no idea how much I would need to shave off of those scales to create the curve. Is this a trial and error issue or are there patterns available?

5. A question about the difference between hon and iyo zane. It is obvious that the shape is different and that the scales overlap in a different manner. But why is it that a board of iyo zane is covered with leather after completing the shitagarami? Is it to make up for the reduced stability due to the lack of overlap, compared to a hon kozane board? Or is it just a matter of period...?


Lastly, I have to admit that I am still in the process of reading and rereading Effingham-sensei's instructions, so some of my questions might be answered by gathering a better understanding. I hope you forgive me for my lack of patience, I am itching to order those scales!

Ja mata!

[Kozure Okami]

Update on question 3:
I think I have created a workaround for that issue: by slightly altering the iyo zane pattern from Effingham-sensei's .pdf-file, I placed the vertical rows of odoshi holes a wee bit closer together, namely a little less than 5/16" (that's about 7.9mm; it tended more to like 1/3" ~= 8.4mm before...). This way, and by using 1/5" (5mm; it is a little more than the recommended 5/16") wide shitagarami through 1/6" (4mm) wide holes, the spacing between rows of odoshi holes becomes practically the same both on a single scale and between two adjacent scales.

This gives me the advantage that, after covering a board of scales with leather, I don't need to exactly measure where the odoshi holes need to sit and drill through the whole width of the board. Instead, I merely punch the leather where the scales already have holes, which for sugake odoshi means roughly 2.5" apart, according to the "The Okegawa/Yokohagi Dô"-paragraph in the "Making a Dô"-chapter. The pairs of holes, that is.


Still, any thoughts on my other questions above...?

[Kozure Okami]

More updates, I got almost all of my questions figured out:

I have left Effingham-sensei's iyo zane pattern behind and made my own. The reason for this is that a posterboard mockup that I made using the 2.5"x0.75" scales turned out too be much too long. In order to fix this, I would have needed to cheat on the tomegawa placing and also engage a rather large overlap of 1", so instead I went and redesigned the whole scale.
My iyo zane are now 51mm x 17mm (equals 2" x 2/3") and the shita garami holes are only 3mm in diameter, as I decided to go with 3mm leather strings instead of 5mm nylon rope after all. Thus, question number 1) is olved.

2) Real samurai armour from back then has steel that is between 0.7 and 0.9mm (9/32" and 11/32") thick, so I'm going with 0.75mm for the scales and the kanagu mawari. You wouldn't want it as thin for combat, but that's not what I am making it for

3) see post above

4) still needs solving, does anyone know anything about scale shaping...?

5) Kind of solved. I have read somewhere that one purpose of the leather cover was to hide the odoshi holes that you did not use for sugake odoshi. This is certainly why I am gonna do it, but I'm not sure if that is the original purpose. After all, several layers of lacquer were applied whether there was leather underneath or not - which in itself gave some structural benefit. In conclusion: I don't have an answer that I am satisfied with, but I'm gonna do it because it seems like a good thing to do.


I will also post a picture of the front tateage, in the way that I have assembled it in CAD, later today. In addition, I hope to find some time this weekend to get the parts of my first mockup cut down and reassembled, so that I know how my new iyo zane patterns works.

Edit:
The promised picture:


I'm thinking about changing the topmost crosslaces to yellow, to match the mimi ito. The hishinui will be "hi", orange. What do you guys think?

[Kozure Okami]

As schua posted photos of his mockup, I decided I needed to get mine into shape as well. Here it is:



I know I cheated on the takahimo here. Please forgive me for now


There were no piano hinges at hand, so I improvised. I will try to avoid the gap between the waki ita on the real thing...


The black strings are 1mm kangaroo leather by the way


I had told my wife not to tie the laces too tight, the gap could be smaller...

First of all: I have the feeling that the front tateage and muna ita are too wide, clapping with streched out arms works - but that's because it's cardboard... Please let me know what you guys think apart from that. 


Furthermore, I have played around some more in CAD, this is the result:



The sode, although too narrow by two scales, should look like this:


... minus the kanmuri ita, of course.


Looking forward to some feedback!

[chedomir]

Looking good, here are few details that i would do differently (not to say that it should be like that)
- front looks good, I would make front wakiita a bit longer, to the end of top-most tateage or even a bit longer.
- front nagagawa could be made longer (and back shorter) so that point where front and back meet go more under arm.
- would make back bit longer on the upper section
- and your back seems bit wide but again if you tighten two laces it could fit.

And can't wait to see it in steel, especially because of iyo zane and how its done. Cheers

PS. pardon if any mistakes in armour part names, still learning.

[Kozure Okami]

Thank you so much for your feedback!
- About the wakiita: those are cut according to Effingham-sensei's pattern (just shortened horizontally so they fit) and I haven't given them much thought until now. But thinking about it, I do agree with you, they could really be a little higher
- the problem about the length of the nagagawa sections is that I have designed them to be multiples of 9 scales. This is done so that I can attach the 7 kusazuri - which are 9 scales wide in the top row - without having the yurugi ito overlap the hinges. That makes the lowest nagagawa row sections 18 (back left), 27 (front) and 18 scales (back right) wide. In order to change the length of the sections, I'd have to do some serious tricks on the yurugi ito - but I'm gonna think about if it is possible.
- do you mean so that the oshitsuke no ita come to sit higher up on my shoulder blades? I don't think I can achieve this other than by changing the size of the oshitsuke no ita... and I wonder how high up the back tateage reaches in other armours, I'll try to find out.
- my thoughts exactly, but I didn't want to put too much stress on the posterboard

I'm pretty excited too Next week I'm gonna go and get prices for the laser cutting from the two companies that offer it here in my town, so that things start moving with the speed of light! (pun intended)

[chedomir]

Actually on second view i think its all good. Its just that i made my comments based on my okegawa do experience and armouring for bohurt. From there comes concern for upper back part, but having viewed some pics of similar dou i see that you're all good, because it differs from okegawa significantly and since its not combat armour there are no safety issues. Once again i think its good, and only choice of front wakiita height remains although i consider it to be more aesthetic and its just fine if you leave it the way it is.

Thanks for clearing up those things, ill follow closely your progress so I might dare to attempt something similar one day. Cheers

[Kozure Okami]

Still, I do consider your feedback to be useful. Sometimes you are so strictly set on doing something in a certain way that you don't even think about if another way could be better. Tomorrow I'll probably do some more CAD-simulation and figure out if the nagagawa sections can be made longer without changing the lacing pattern too much. I'll let you know

And thank you for your interest in my project!

[schua]

Your mockup looks good.

Your back Tateage looks as high as mine and I get as well the feedback that it is a bit to low. I hope I can fix it by making the Oshitsuke-no-ita and each rear Tateage lame a bit higher. Maybe that works for you as well.
I'm looking foreward to see the laser cut pieces!

Edit: I wonder what kind of do your project is. Is it a san-mai haramaki do? Is it intended that the do hasn't the typical "belly" shape?
Maybe that's a silly question, so please forgive me, I'm a beginner 

[Kozure Okami]

Hey schua, you're right, I want to make a sanmai haramaki do I'm not exactly sure what you mean by belly shape though, I had to look at some pictures to get an idea of it. Do you mean that the front section of the nagagawa should not be flat, but instead look like a little "round"? I hope to get that effect when I assemble the real scales anyway, and if not, I will try to apply the slight S-shape to the iyo zane that Effingham-sensei had described.

I still need to look at pictures of other haramaki do and see how high their oshitsuke no ita is. Can't really do anything about the height of the tateage lames, as they are dependent of the scale height...

[schua]

Mar 9, 2015 3:43:09 GMT -5 Kozure Okami said:

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by belly shape though, I had to look at some pictures to get an idea of it. Do you mean that the front section of the nagagawa should not be flat, but instead look like a little "round"?

Yes, that is what I mean. Your 5 front Nagagawa lames seem to have all more or less the same rectangular shape, what leads to a more tube-like shape of the do. If you apply the Nagagawa pattern provided by Effingham-sensei (e.g. NewDoFrPattern.PDF), you get a more tailored silhouette and a tapered waist. In my understanding that should apply to your san-mai haramaki. 

[Kozure Okami]

Ah yes, true enough. Until now, I was like "yeah, I can't even do that with scales", but now I think it comes down to how you do the shita garami, so I will try and see if I can get it right. Thanks for reminding me - repeatedly

[schua]

After reading your initial post again, I realized that you are planning iyo zane and not Kiritsuke zane (pseudo scales). I'm not sure, if my concerns about the shape of the do are correct for a do made by iyo zane. Maybe an expert can anwer this?

[Kozure Okami]

I'm not sure either, but I think it can't hurt to try After all, Effingham-sensei mentioned shaping the waist of a do made of scales by tapering the zane (not sure if it was ko- or iyo zane, or if that even makes a difference in this regard), so there should be a way to achieve even a little difference from a tube

[Kozure Okami]

Hey guys,
just a quick update on the laser cutting: turns out it isn't as cheap as I hoped - at least if I want them to make all the holes. Here's the math: my estimate is that I'll need around 1080 scales for all of the armour [minus shikoro or tare, as the scales for those are likely to be smaller]. To be on the safe side, I'd make that a round total of 1200 scales, each with 14 holes in it. BOOM, now we're at 16800 holes, which makes for A LOT of cutting time. Thus their offer read 0,98€/piece - yes, I was shocked when I read this as well - or 0,17€/piece (!!) if they don't do the holes. Now guess what I consider doing...


... that's right: I'm gonna make some kind of jig and buy a decent hole punch that can take on 0.75mm of steel.
Now I know why people make solid lame armour or buy Effingham plates rather than using iyo zane


On a different note, here's the front section of the do with narrower tateage:


And the older version for comparison: