PLANISHING
After the rough depth of the piece is established the form of the piece
is worked out on a flat anvil. During this process every square inch of
the plate is hit firmly and squarely with the hammer against the flat face
of the hard anvil. Never hitting with the edge of the hammer. This accomplishes
several things and is probably the most important phase. First it gives
a small depth to all plates and establishes the final contour. Second and
most important it significantly hardens the metal. The face against the
anvil gets a hard glaze that is only about one quarter of the depth of the
steel. This hard glaze is easily destroyed by abrasive finishing processes.
Many armours had long useful lives with minor working marks and ended up
filed smooth by museum curators hundreds of years later., Some modern armour
smiths specialize in heavy gauge highly finished pieces and this is fine
as a specialty but these reflect the modern machine made look and not that
of the using armours found in arsenals like Graz and Solothurn. The working
finish of a combat armour is its planishing not its polishing. Because this
process significantly hardens the steel it is important to avoid planishing
areas to be reworked. Such as about an inch around the edges for the rolling
and hinge areas. |
