[Leo Todeschini]

HI all,

I have dabbled in film and TV for years, first as a special effects supervisor and now as an Engineering Consultant and supplier of historical goods (no surprise there) and I thought these recent projects may interest you.

I have made an 18th C umbrella of leather for preventing the carriers getting covered with night soil as issued FOC at Versailles (apparently) for the BBC

I also got involved with a Dambusters documentary replicating and reinventing some of Barnes Wallaces experiments with bouncing bombs. This doc is called 'The real dambusters' out early next year and promises to be a very interesting program indeed. I can't sya much about the programme or the angle of approach, but I made a scale bomb launcher for skipping bombs across a lake. The brief was to design a launcher that could propel a 20Kg (44lb) payload spinning at 2000rpm and going at 140mph. This nitrogen powered 30cm/1ft bore gun was the result and it worked very..............sorry can't say more at present. Sort of historical, sort of not.

The really interesting one for you lot was a couple of pieces for a documentary about Talhoffers fight book, probably going to be called 'fight book'.

The premise of the programme is to try to replicate the artefacts from the fightbook as closely as possible and use them to try to determine what they did, how they worked and how well they did what they were meant to do.

I made a 'giant basket' which is basically a 2meter tall 1.2 meter diameter ash lathe basket covered with boiled leather for getting two men close to defences to inspect them. The leather was 6mm/ quarter inch veg tan cow hide, which was hardened and stiched to the frame work. From a sample piece I did it was tough as hell and when I placed a piece loosley against an old straw boss it bounced off a round tipped bolt (all I had at the time) from a 250lb cross bow at point blank with NO through penetration at all.

The other job for them was a pair of judicial duelling sheilds made from 10mm poplar, butt glued and covered inside and out with linen canvas and gesso. They had ash spars ans elm hooks and were glued and rivetted together. They stood 6ft/1.8m tall and 2ft/60cm wide and although a bit 'Klingon', I loved them.

I hope you find them interesting and if you have any questions please ask away, though as none of this has been broadcast yet I have to be very circumspect I am afraid.

Regards


Tod

[Leo Todeschini]

sorry messed up some of the attachments

Tod

[Leo Todeschini]

Sorry another attachment mess up

Here it is


Tod

[Nathan Robinson]

That nitrogen powered gun sounds crazy.

Thanks for sharing this stuff. It's all very interesting to me.

[Rene Bourrat]

Crazy! Funny! Wow! That's why I love re-enactment

I love the "klingon" shields too. Do you use them, are they useful? Don't you need to strengthen the edges?

The "giant basket" also interests me, could you take a picture in situation please? No, I will not ask you to fire on it with "the real dambusters" but I am curious about how this particular shield is used by a troop. Which period it is?

Good continuation with your experimentations, you've got a fun job

Thank you.

[Craig Peters]

Hans Talhoffer wrote during the mid to late 15th century, so that answers your question. If you're curious about the baskets, the best resource is Jeffrey Hull's transcription and translation of Talhoffer's 1457 manual. Besides discussing the section on fighting, he also covers many of the peculiar implements and siege weapons found in the earlier portion of the book. As this is the edition held by Det Kongelige Bibliotek in Copenhagen Denmark, it is the source they used for the making of the documentary. You can find the transcription here: http://www.thearma.org/Fight-Earnestly.htm

[Sam Gordon Campbell]

I now need to see this Hans Talhoffer/Fight book doco.
Sadly, the chances of it ever showing in Australia is slim
Those are awesome... Note to self: Make some!

[Leo Todeschini]

[Sean Flynt]

Ha! I remember "The Dambusters (1955). Great movie, and a very interesting look into the process of invention. I bet you had fun!

[Craig Shackleton]

All of that is really cool. I especially love the shields. I really need to get some of those and start training with them. I really look forward to the fight book documentary.

Thanks for posting this stuff