As somone who has built a couple of curved fiberglass shields, I gotta say that I love 'em! That little bit of wrap-around works wonders for protection, and curved shields are immediately more pleasing to the eye, in my opinion.
But fiberglass involves a whole lot of fumes and other things that I'd rather avoid. There are several sites dedicated to making foam latex weapons, but I'm not finding anything for shields. Which is a shame becuase shields present a great opportunity to represent our characters. But there's, what, maybe 16 popular latex shield designs sold through various vendors? I want to customize. I want to build what represents ME.
But before I do, has there ever been a discussion about allowing these shields? As long as the size is within limits, perhaps adding some pipe foam around the edges. But these shields are made out of the same foam that latex swords are. Is it possible, since they're almost 100% foam, that they wouldn't need additional pipe foam?
I've been searching for a couple hours now (I work the grave shift), and I've found very little info for making foam latex shields, particularly curved ones. All I got is the general idea of injected foam moulds. God only knows how much trouble that would be. If anyone has more information, I'd greatly appreciate whatever you might share.
Also, does anyone have reservations about using latex shields in your chapter. If so, why?
P.S. Hmmm, just occurred to me, but I wonder if a dual-layer of vacu-formed plastic would work well for shields. Has someone here used a vacu-forming table?
But fiberglass involves a whole lot of fumes and other things that I'd rather avoid. There are several sites dedicated to making foam latex weapons, but I'm not finding anything for shields. Which is a shame becuase shields present a great opportunity to represent our characters. But there's, what, maybe 16 popular latex shield designs sold through various vendors? I want to customize. I want to build what represents ME.
But before I do, has there ever been a discussion about allowing these shields? As long as the size is within limits, perhaps adding some pipe foam around the edges. But these shields are made out of the same foam that latex swords are. Is it possible, since they're almost 100% foam, that they wouldn't need additional pipe foam?
I've been searching for a couple hours now (I work the grave shift), and I've found very little info for making foam latex shields, particularly curved ones. All I got is the general idea of injected foam moulds. God only knows how much trouble that would be. If anyone has more information, I'd greatly appreciate whatever you might share.
Also, does anyone have reservations about using latex shields in your chapter. If so, why?
P.S. Hmmm, just occurred to me, but I wonder if a dual-layer of vacu-formed plastic would work well for shields. Has someone here used a vacu-forming table?