Full steel formed dished and welded helmet

TD4242

Active Hunter
http://s14.photobucket.com/albums/a331/arsonsmith/Steel Mando/

Been working on this for quite some time. Finally got around to building a press and it has been working better than I expected. This helmet is 12 gage low carbon steel and I should be able to fight in the SCA with it when done.

FINISHED PIC ~7.5lbs:
IMG00024-20090620-1518.jpg


NEW SHOT OF RANGE FINDER:
IMG00035-20090624-1834.jpg


IMG00015-20090613-1911.jpg


And the final look:
IMG00019-20090614-2012.jpg


And the ear, it actually looks a lot cooler than this picture
IMG00021-20090614-2229.jpg


I'm still trying to decide how I want to do the range finder



IMG00025-20090620-1518.jpg
 
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that is rockin! i've been wanting to get a metal helmet for a minute. how difficult would that be to do in a lighter guage sheet metal?
 
The weight is going to be probably 7-9 lbs, or about 3x that of a normal fiberglass or resin one. Typical SCA medieval armor helmets are in this range of 6-11 lbs.

I don't think it would be much easier to do in a thinner gage metal. In fact some parts would probably be harder, like the welding and grinding.

I do plan to do armor as well. It will be Mando inspired but will have to follow a lot of SCA rules in order to cover and protect correctly, so it will have a lot of medieval look to it as well.
 
Photobucket was down, so here are some attached update pics Didn't do much tonight. Will try to get the left cheek by the end of the weekend.

IMG00007-20090610-2303.jpg


IMG00008-20090610-2303.jpg


IMG00009-20090610-2303.jpg
 
You're 50% Bat **** Insane, 45% awesome, and 5% diligent to do a helmet and armor out of steel! This is guna be a raw project... Keep the updates coming... String some El-Wire through that thing too!
 
Awesome project!! Also love the photoshopped pic of the Mandolorians...it looks like it could be a poster or original art....a book cover perhaps....really cool!!!
 
Just out of interest how thick is 12gauge steel,in England 12guage(SWG) is about 2.8 mm
is it the same in the US?
This is realy making me want to start my own helmet(10SWG/3mm aluminium),just want to finnish my back plate first!

FMF
 
I was going to do one in Aluminium, but found that welding aluminium is an art far beyond my ability. Between Lance and I we banged out about 10 sets of aluminium armor for the mandos in the pic above and several others. We have been wanting to do helmets, but never had a real way to dish metal that much. Just beating out a chest plate was a lot of work and that is minimal dishing. By using the 12 ton press I made from a bottle jack and a cast iron ball I am able to do about 16 hours of hammer swinging in about 4-5 hours. My welding skills have always been very minimal but are improving daily. I ran out of gas for my MIG welder last night and just got some more today. Lets see what kind of progress I can get this weekend.
 
updated the photobucket with some structurally complete photos. I still have some cleanup and mainly got to square off the bottom. Will probably do most of that tonight and tomorrow.
 
That's really cool, I like that idea. As a side note, I actually have that second picture of you guys firing hanging on my wall, I liked that picture so much. :)
 
between that one and this one

ARC-Gunner_Clone-Commander.jpg


to of my favorite narcissistic pictures of myself.
 
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You're using a pretty heavy gauge of metal there. My armour is 16-gauge, and I'm planning on doing my helmet in the same. How much would the metal thin being dished for the dome? Should I start with 15? 14? And are you going for the simple hemispherical dome, or the more complex "baseball-helmet" shape of the original helmet?

--Jonah
 
I took patterns off of I a helmet I have, I think an MSH. It has the "baseball-helmet" shape with the bulge in the back right quarter.

I have some of the sheet metal armor that I piced up from someone here. I'm not sure of the gage, but it is really really thin. the stretching will thin it some, but not as much as you'd think. It'll be an almost un-noticeable amount. I sugest dishing it in two halves and welding them together. I started with the plan of doing quarters, but after doing the first to I tried the other half as once pices and it worked out great.
 
between that one and this one
ARC-Gunner_Clone-Commander.jpg
to of my favorite narcissistic pictures of myself.



Which one are you, the heavy gunner or the other ARC Trooper? Either way though, I really like both costumes, especially the Heavy Gunner. :)
 
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