Chianmaile from Coat hangers

U

Unsure

Artisan
I was thinking of making chainmaile from coat hangers for a long time now. I was just wondering if the metal of the coathangers is any good. i.e. can it be wound in a small ID and rivited and hardened?

B~>
 
Back in the early-to-mid 1970's, the folks at the Medieval House at the Univ. of Rochester (NY) who were in SCA would wind welding rod -- it was properly annealed, so it stiffly kept its shape better than any coat hanger would.
 
Welding rods might be made of a different quality of steel than clotheshangers. Do you know if the general wear and tear of this metal was of good quality?

B~>
 
It's welding rod. You blacken it, and keep it clean of rust. It can be work. But it wears well. And it's somewhat heavy.
 
Cheaper than both and just as effective is 14ga galvanized electric fence wire.

Tractor Supply has it for ~4.5 cents per foot, cheaper if you buy longer rolls.
 
you can also get different guages of metal wire that is pre treated for rust and such at Ace, that is where I get the stuff that use for making chainmail, it will hold up much better than a clothes hanger
 
Well the original idea was to use found materials (i.e. free) but upon some inter-webs searches I found that you have to aneal(?) or pre-heat the metal in order to soften it in order to bend it into a coil. Otherwise the bending might split, crack, or break the metal and that wouldn't be good. So I'm rethinking the whole proposition right now.

B~>
 
Annealing isn't required. What I did was find a metal rod to wrap the wire around. I drilled a hole in one end to thread the wire through then began wrapping it that way. Never heated the metal.
 
markusdark said:
Annealing isn't required. What I did was find a metal rod to wrap the wire around. I drilled a hole in one end to thread the wire through then began wrapping it that way. Never heated the metal.
Click to expand...

Yup. I've seen plenty of chainmail (butted, of course) made via galvanized electric fence wire wrapped into a coil around a rod.

Don't use wood, though, as the compression will change the size of your rings over time...
 
Every wire wrap device I have ever seen form making coils to cut for maile links was made with a metal core to wrap around --- now I know the reason why (and not because the wood will more likely break under the tension of torsion).
 
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