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Old 02-07-2018, 02:53 PM   #15
mlangsdorf
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Austin, TX
Default Re: [Cutting-Edge Armor Design] Real World SCA-legal Armour and Ballistics Armour

Poking at this some more:

I wanted to link in a nice HTML table of the material cost and weight per point of DR by armor type, but the HTML isn't working. So linking here:
http://westmarchsaga.wikia.com/wiki/GURPS_CEAD

The key take-away is that for up to DR 11, polymer composite scale is 60% lighter than steel plate but only 10% more expensive: 0.24 lbs and $7.7 per DR per sqft, versus 0.4 lbs and $7 per DR per sqft.

So if you don't mind going for more of a Japanese samurai aesthetic than European knight, you can make your own armor out of resin-bonded kevlar scales. Mythbusters showed this is tedious but not hugely difficult*: buy sheets of resin-bonded kevlar, cut them into scales, drill holes into them, string them together with kevlar yarn. Assuming you can cut through 1/2" sheets of resin-bonded kevlar with a band saw (I think this is a safe assumption; we cut through steel pipe with a band saw in high school 20 years ago), this entire operation can be done with a high school machine shop.

Anyway, a DR 5 poly composite scale suit is roughly 26 lbs, $830. Plenty of cash and weight left over for a kevlar undersuit, which could be as simple as the best commercial vest you can buy and some home made leggings and sleeves.

As far as working thick sheets of kevlar goes, I don't think it requires radically specialized equipment. Powerful sheers and a sewing machine with a long needle and a lot of torque driving it through the fabric should do the job. There are a lot of companies that make kevlar vests, after all, and I don't think that they're buying crazy exotic equipment that only the US DoD sells. Find one that's going out of business and buy up their gear.

* The episode on paper armor which basically did the above process but with paper.
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