02-17-2011, 08:22 PM
I've actually had to do this myself - When I made my hamata (Which incidentally started out as a hauberk) I was eighteen or ninteen at the time and it fit just fine. Several years and numerous pull-ups and P.T. sessions later, I was just BARELY fitting into the shirt and had no room for a subarmilis - I guess while a shirt can fit a lot of people, my shoulders grew and so did my chest. A few months ago I decided to enlarge the hamata, and it was a relatively simple process:
I laid the hamata out flat and found the exact center, then split it entirely up the middle and added a few rows of rings (five rows, if I remember correctly; front and back). That fixed my problems with too small of a chest, but I still had to account for wider shoulders. After that, I laid the hamata flat again, found the top of the sleeves (Short sleeves, but sleeves nevertheless...) and split the hamata again all the way to the neck-hole and added more rows of rings (Five rows again; I was working with small adjustments...) After trying it on, the hamata fit once again.
Now I should add that I had several advantages: First, my hamata wasn't edged in leather, so I didn't have to tear that apart and re-stitch it. Secondly, as I'd said before, my hamata started as a hauberk; There was no doubler sized for it yet, and I saved on rings by re-using what was trimmed off. Thirdly (And this is the deal-breaker), mine is made out of 14ga. galvanized (Well, until it met the sand-barrel anyhow...) wire. Butted mail, meaning it was a snap to disassemble and reassemble (Sorry gents, I do NOT have the patience to rivet rings, much less make them). The patch-spots are easy to see at the moment until I re-sand the entire shirt. In your case it's going to be a little more time-consuming to make the adjustments, but with enough spare rings, I think it should come out fine.
-Quintus Claudius Britanicus,
Legionnaire, LEGIIAVG
I laid the hamata out flat and found the exact center, then split it entirely up the middle and added a few rows of rings (five rows, if I remember correctly; front and back). That fixed my problems with too small of a chest, but I still had to account for wider shoulders. After that, I laid the hamata flat again, found the top of the sleeves (Short sleeves, but sleeves nevertheless...) and split the hamata again all the way to the neck-hole and added more rows of rings (Five rows again; I was working with small adjustments...) After trying it on, the hamata fit once again.
Now I should add that I had several advantages: First, my hamata wasn't edged in leather, so I didn't have to tear that apart and re-stitch it. Secondly, as I'd said before, my hamata started as a hauberk; There was no doubler sized for it yet, and I saved on rings by re-using what was trimmed off. Thirdly (And this is the deal-breaker), mine is made out of 14ga. galvanized (Well, until it met the sand-barrel anyhow...) wire. Butted mail, meaning it was a snap to disassemble and reassemble (Sorry gents, I do NOT have the patience to rivet rings, much less make them). The patch-spots are easy to see at the moment until I re-sand the entire shirt. In your case it's going to be a little more time-consuming to make the adjustments, but with enough spare rings, I think it should come out fine.
-Quintus Claudius Britanicus,
Legionnaire, LEGIIAVG
-Ryan
-Cave a sinistra manu utebatur pro bellator.
-Cave a sinistra manu utebatur pro bellator.
