Quite a newbie question here, but I was wondering what the rules were for weapon cores;
Reading up on it many have suggested fiberglass cores, though the only places that I have found to sell them are certain LARP shops online, sometimes for as much as £10 a pop. Most guides to making your own LARP weapon, however, suggest using PVC tubing but binding it tight, capping the ends and of course covering it all in foam tubing - would this be acceptable? Because I would hate to go through all the trouble of making staves, wands, and axes only to find that my crew and I can’t actually use them!
I believe PVC would be likely to fail at Empire.
Making your own LRP weapons is a fairly complex process (at least for UK style foam-and-latex ones - boffers are much easier), and has a number of subtle pitfalls. I wouldn’t advise it without someone who has practical experience on hand.
But roughly:
For cores, you want fibreglass or carbon fibre, rod or tube. Tube is lighter, but more brittle. Rod more durable, but heavier.
I tend to buy my cores from Woolmer Forest Composites, but there’s a lot of potential suppliers out there. Skian Mhor sells good stuff in the LRP market, and will probably be able to give you advice on its suitability for your projects.
Then you build a sandwich or wrap of LD45 Plastazote foam (I tend to buy from Thames Valley Supplies, again there’s plenty of options including Skian Mhor) around the core, making sure to reinforce the ends (silk is ideal, linen or leather can do) and to get the foam properly adhered to the core (sanding the core is a critical step here).
Glues tend to be potent. Evo-Stik impact adhesive (the red stuff, with solvents) is a popular hobbyist choice, most of the pros use stuff that’s even nastier (but stronger). Make sure you experiment a bit with how impact adhesives work, and how to get maximum stick out of them (thin layer, let it dry for several minutes before joining surfaces).
Once you’ve glued up the foam, you carve it into shape. Very sharp blades and either being good at sharpening, or having them be disposable, is your friend here. Make sure you leave enough (12mm on striking surfaces, 6mm otherwise, is a good minimum guideline) that it will sensibly pad the core.
Then paint it, using a mix of latex (I buy it from East Coast Fibreglass in 5l tubs, sold for mould making) and acrylic paint. Avoid paints which contain copper like the plague.
Finally, go buy a tin of “Isoflex Special Primer” from your local B&Q, and varnish the weapon with it. Do this outdoors, it’s horrific stuff.
As you can see, it’s quite an involved process. If you skip or skimp on these steps, your weapon will probably fail weapons check. I really recommend buying your first few weapons, or seeing if you can borrow any or something, and chatting with the maker you buy from to get some advice. It will save you a lot of pain.
[quote=“Shevek”]Quite a newbie question here, but I was wondering what the rules were for weapon cores;
Reading up on it many have suggested fiberglass cores, though the only places that I have found to sell them are certain LARP shops online, sometimes for as much as £10 a pop. Most guides to making your own LARP weapon, however, suggest using PVC tubing but binding it tight, capping the ends and of course covering it all in foam tubing - would this be acceptable? Because I would hate to go through all the trouble of making staves, wands, and axes only to find that my crew and I can’t actually use them!
[/quote]
Right. You must understand that there is another style of LARP, popular in America, where a weapon is a PVC pipe covered in pipe lagging, or ‘boffer’:
http://prime.gushi.org/~typhon/store/boffer/classic/longsword.jpg
Whereas Empire’s weapons look more like real weapons:
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/lQwQVU8Tbnc/maxresdefault.jpg
You can make a boffer very easily at home. It is not a weapon by Empire standards.