Brass work for Gladius in process.

[Crispvs]

It's looking very good so far - well done.

For the rivet holes, as I said, punching is MUCH easier than drilling through the brass and is what the Romans themselves would have done. If I want to punch a hole through brass plate I place the plate on a piece of wood rather than a piece of metal. I use pine as it is soft and is crushed by the punch at the same time as supporting the rest of the plate.

It would have been easier to punch most of the holes you needed before you bent the plate but it should still not be too hard. As a suggestion, you could punch the holes through the bracing piece first and then, placing the prace onto the gutters of the locket plate (supporting them or course) lightly punch through these holes to indicate the correct places to punch through the top of the gutters (the edges of the plate which you have already bet around). Then punch through the gutters. Doing it this way will ensure that the holes line up with each other properly.

The holes at the bottom for the upper cross hanger need to be approached somewhat differently. Punch holes through the front of the bottoms of the gutters (as shown in the pictures in my article). Once you have done this, put the plate in place on the scabbard body and drill (yes, I do recommend drilling at this point) through the holes you have made and through the wood and leather of the scabbard body (make sure you aim for the drill to hit the back of the gutter in each case). Once I had done this, I pushed a pair of nails through the holes in the plate and scabbard body and tapped them with a hammer to show where to punch through the plate. I then removed the plate from the scabbard body and punched through it at the points indicated.

Next you need to do the cross hanger. If you have not done so already, do a mock up first in card from a cereal box or similar. This should be wrapped around the sheath, beginning at the back of one gutter. Bring it around to the front, allowing enough length to allow for the attachment of the suspension ring and then continue it across the front of the scabbard and around to the back to overlap its other end, again leaving enough length for the other suspension ring. Look at pictures of actual ones to help you get the length right. Make some sort of mark on the card mock-up to show where the holes in the fronts of the gutters are.

Next you need to make the cross hanger itself, using the mock-up as a guide. Make sure you do not emboss the points you intend to rivet through, as these will need to be fairly flat. Emboss the area between these points. You might want to make the first pair of holes before you do the embossing - it's up to you. To make the holes, place the appropriate part of the cross hanger over the appropriate part of the front of the scabbard. It might help to tape it in place. Turn the scabbard over and as before, insert nails through the scabbard and tap them with a medium pressure with a hammer to mark the points for the holes onto the cross hanger. Take the cross hanger off the scabbard and punch the holes through it.

For bending the cross hanger, have a look at how I did it and try to do it the same way. Once you have bent it to the correct shape, put it onto the scabbard body again and tap the nails through again to mark the points to punch through the back of the cross hanger. Take the cross hanger off again and punch the rear pair of holes. You will need to put another hole through the end which overlaps as well. By now, you will have made all the holes you need.

These instructions may seem long winded and time consuming, but you will need to do it right in order to get it right. There aren't really any shortcuts.

Make the lower cross hanger in the same way.

Make sure you do not attach the cross hangers properly until you have inserted the suspension rings.

Sorry to have turned this into such a long post, but I hope it helps.


Crispvs