Chainmail Tutorial
• Weaving Chainmail
• The 4 in 1 Chainmail Unit
• Making a Unit Row
• Attaching Rows Together
• Frodo's Orc Armor Chainmail Construction
• Distressing the Chainmail
• Acid-Etching Aluminum Chainmail
• Spraypainting Chainmail for that Nasty Beat-up Look
• Attaching the Chainmail to the Underlayer

I bought rings from Ring Lord, rather than buying wire and going through the pain of making springs, cutting them, and doing everything from scratch. This site sells aluminum, steel, copper, brass, and other sorts of rings in different sizes - all ready to go! This made a lot more sense to me than doing it all from the ground up.

I chose aluminum rings, because I knew the rest of the costume was going to be heavyweight and hot, so I tried to cut down on the suffering I'd go through, wearing it (and also creating it, as aluminum is softer and easy to bend open and closed with pliers than steel)! However, aluminum rings are bright and shiny - which became a problem to overcome later!

Weaving Chainmail

The orc armor Frodo wears is the most basic of the European chainmail weaves - the 4 in 1, so named because every ring in the mail has four other rings going through it. Sounds simple, but learning it can be confusing at first. Fortunately, I had a mentor (thanks, Jeff!), who has made armor in the SCA, and taught me the basics. After that, I also did web research and modified the technique he taught me - not because the technique was wrong (it wasn't!) but because I needed a way to weave the chainmail that I was able to better wrap my hands and brain around. (All the techniques give you the same result in the end, it's just how you organize your work.)

In order to weave chainmail, all you really need are the chainmail links, and two pairs of pliers - one small normal pair of pliers, and one small needle-nosed pair. The normal pliers are used to hold a chainmail link, while the needlenosed are used to grasp the link and either bend it open or shut as you weave. Once you get more adept, you'll find ways to minimize setting down the pliers, working with them in your hands at nearly all times. That makes things go a lot faster. But while you're learning, if you have to set them down, nobody is going to give you points off for style!

The 4 in 1 Chainmail Unit

The first step is to make a bunch of "units." So, first off, take four rings and made sure they are completely closed, with the cut edges of the ring opening firmly butted together - this will be important all the way through the construction of the mail, because if the cut edges aren't as flush together as possible, the rings can catch on skin, clothing, etc., and even pull open over time. After closing the four rings, take a fifth ring, and open it wide enough to insert the other rings onto it. These five rings will form your base-level 4 in 1 chainmail unit.

Holding the open ring with the heavier pliers, put the 4 closed rings through the opening of the open ring, then use the two sets of pliers to close the open ring. Again, be sure to close the ring completely, so there are no rough edges at the join. You should now have something that looks like this:

Next, place the unit down on a flat surface, and spread it out so you end up with this configuration (note the orientation of the middle ring, in which the downward arc is on top of everything else.  You'll want all your units facing this direction - and believe me, at first, it's sometimes hard to see if they are, or if they aren't!):

Note: Sometimes people go about making units by opening and closing a bunch of links and working from two separate piles (with the closed link pile out-numbering the open link pile four to one, obviously!). Other times people just open and close links as they go. I determined how many units I needed per row of chainmail (how long the row has to be to make, for instance, a sleeve that went from my shoulder to just below my elbow), and opened and closed the correct amount for each row, then built from there.

Making a Unit Row

By a "unit row," I mean a row of those 4 in 1 units joined together to make a chain. Just to specify. Anyway. You can either add to a row each time you make a new unit, or make a bunch of units and then attach them all at once.  It's just a matter of personal style. Personally, I ended up making all of the units first, then attached them all at once, just because I kept better track of where I was going that way. But, it really doesn't matter.  Either way, you need to attach them top to bottom.  So, first, arrange two units like so:

Then, open a ring, and thread it through the bottom two of the top unit, and the top two of the bottom unit.  Make sure that this new center ring matches the orientation of the two that form the center of the top and bottom units.  (Note how the yellow ring matches the two red rings.  You'll know if you get it wrong, because the row will hang all funny.)  Close the ring. Ta da!  That's the beginning of your first row!  Make it as long as you need  (you can hold it up to your arm, or body, or whatever as you go to determine the length required), and then…make another one!

Note: I try to work on rows while leaving the row flat on my work surface, rather than picking it up in my hands. Why? Because I get easily confused when the links aren't lying flat, and find it hard sometimes to get them all spread out again. I know lots of people who don't have this problem, but in case you do…you can learn to get really good at holding the pliers at different angles to open and close links without disrupting the chainmail as you go.

Attaching Rows Together

Ok, so now you have two rows of chainmail, like so: Now comes the fun part - weaving them together!  That's when you start actually making chainmail that looks like something, and not just these weird lengths of chainmail units. Put the two rows side by side, making sure that those pesky middle rings of each row are facing the same direction - look at the gold ring in the earlier graphic for reference, if you're wondering what the heck I'm talking about!  (Again, you'll know once you start hooking things together, if you've got it wrong. Basically, what you're going to do is to make a third row of those "gold rings" joining these two you've already made together. Does that make sense? I hope so. But I'll try to show it in the next graphic.

Yeesh, the colors on my graphics aren't consistent. Oh well. Anyway, take an open ring (gold in the graphic), and thread it through the bottom units of both rows. The rings you need to join together to make the new unit are shown in red.  This creates the beginning of a THIRD row that will join the first two rows you've just put side-by-side. Once you complete this third row, you have a real hunk of chainmail! Now, in order to keep expanding the chainmail, you can either just keep creating rows and adding it, or you can make several pieces like this, and then join them all together. Whatever works the best for you. It all comes out to the same in the end. Take a bow!

Distressing the Chainmail

Well, my first thought was to spray-paint the finished pieces. So, I got Rustoleum spray-paint in Textured Finish Black, Dark Pewter, and in Rust Primer. I painted them all (more on this later) and allowed the mail to dry overnight. They looked great! The next day, I ran my thumbnail over the links and the paint SCRAPED RIGHT OFF! ARGH!

Fortunately, Leah - who was doing Sam in orc armor in our group - had talked to our good friend and chainmail consultant Jeff. He suggested acid-etching the chain with hydrochloric acid first! This ended up being an adventure and a half (and I don't necessarily recommend it, although it worked)!

Acid-Etching Aluminum Chainmail

DISCLAIMER: Ok, first off - if you are a minor, do NOT try this without supervision (or, preferably, at all)! If you are ANYBODY, do NOT try this without a breathing filter, heavy rubber gloves, protective clothing you don't mind getting potentially ruined, a hose, and baking powder for spills. Seriously. Also, don't do this using glass - only Pyrex, which won't shatter in the heat of the reaction - and don't do it inside!!!! I do not portray this tutorial as a thorough one. I do not claim that this method is without risk. I assume no liability whatsoever for any damage to your clothing, property, or person. Seriously. This is nasty nasty stuff, and it's dangerous! Ok, that being said:

Tools Needed:
• Your chainmail (duh)
• 1 or 2 Pyrex lasagna pans (if you have more, you can do more chainmail sections at a time, that's all)
• Several plastic buckets of water, for washing off the chainmail when you want to stop the acid reaction
• A jug of the acid (can't buy this at the hardware store, by the way, so research your source ahead of time!)
• Heavy rubber gloves
• Eye protection
• Breath mask
• Wooden spoons for stirring
• A ready source of water, like a hose, both to rinse stuff off, and in case of a bubble-over, to dilute the acid down!

Leah and I did this on a concrete porch, and put flattened cardboard boxes underneath all the areas we thought might get splashed. First, fill the lasagna pans partway with water, and also fill your rinse buckets with water. Put on all your protective gear before doing anything with the acid.

Hydrochloric acid, reacting with aluminum, creates aluminum chloride, hydrogen gas, and heat (it's an exothermic reaction). Do NOT have an open flame or spark ANYWHERE near your work area. Do NOT smoke, for god's sake, or you'll be in big trouble. Hydrogen is extremely flammable. Ever hear of the Hindenburg? Yeah. That was hydrogen gas going up. The sun is a big ball of burning hydrogen. Enough said.

Put a piece of your finished chainmail in the water-filled pan, and open the jug of acid. Slowly pour acid into the pan.	As soon as you see bubbles, STOP.
The reaction will slowly build in magnitude, so better to stop early, let things bubble for a while, and evaluate, than to put too much acid in at once. We did that the first time, and had a boil-over that cracked a pan (it was glass, not Pyrex like we thought) and spewed a flood of extremely acidic water all over the place. We managed to dilute it, but it didn't do the garden plants any good!	If, after watching the reaction for about 5 minutes, nothing much is going on, you can add more acid - but do it slowly and carefully. What should eventually happen is the water will begin to bubble and slowly become a dirty gray color from the aluminum chloride by-product. You can poke at the mail with the wooden spoon to expose it to the air and see if it's become duller and less shiny-looking.