Chain Mail Coif Tutorial Bikini Duck Creations By: www.BikiniDuck.com

Chain Mail Coif Tutorial
By:
Bikini Duck Creations
Bikini Duck Creations
www.BikiniDuck.com
© & ™ 2001-07
MTL Studios, Inc.
POBox 580692, Minneapolis, MN 55458
This here is considered a
“raw” ring. These are of
little use on their own.
This is an open ring. These are the rings
that are used to weave all chainmail.
This is a raw ring that has been twisted
to make the ends more open.
This is a closed ring. After you are done assembling everything, this is what all rings should look
like. This is a raw ring that has been twisted to
make the ends touch each other, and stay closed.
Step 1
Measure the circumference of your forehead. This will be the
widest part of this coif. For the example coif being built in this
tutorial I am going with the figure of 13.5 inches. Once you have
that figure you need to multiply it by 4*. That will give you the
total number of rings that will be going around your forehead. In
this case 54. Now we take that number and divide it by 6. We get
9. The next step is to make 6 triangles that look like the one to
the right. The bottom “rung” of the triangle needs to have as
many rings as the number we just found. In this case 9. Be sure
all 6 triangles are exactly the same. If not the next steps wont
work.
Step 2
Now we have to connect the 6 triangles
together to form the top of the coif. Line up
the 6 triangles like so.
Kit and instructions © by: www.BikiniDuck.com
*See F.A.Q on last page.
Step 3
Now we connect the triangles together. Below
is a zoom-in of the picture to the left.
Be sure to line the two triangles up so that
each row leans the same way as the corresponding row on the other triangle.
Start at the top. The first ring you add will connect to two rings on the second row down (one
on each piece). Now close that ring.
Step 4
Add a ring on the second row down. This ring will connect
to two rings on the third row down (one on each piece) and
one ring on the top row (the ring you added in the last
step).
Step 5
Add a ring on the third row down. This ring will connect to
two rings on the fourth row down (one on each piece) and
one ring on the second row up (the ring added in the last
step).
Step 6
Continue adding rings one at a time on each
of the additional rows. Always remember the
ring you add will connect to two rings on the
row below and one ring on the row above.
Next add one more ring to the bottom row.
This ring will connect to one ring on the row
above.
One you are done connecting all
the triangles together you should
get something that looks like this.
On to the next page!
Kit and instructions © by:
www.BikiniDuck.com
Now we have to close that hole in the
center of the sheet. You need to pass
one open ring through three of the rings.
Like in the picture to the left.
Step 7
The next step is to continue all the way around. With
one ring going through three. If you get confused look
at the picture to the right as to how to place the rings.
Once all the way around you should have used six
rings in total. What used to be a hole should now
look like this.
The next step is to add a center ring through all six
of the rings you added in the last step. Warning,
sometimes this can get frustrating. But once done it
should look like this.
Depending on
the ring size you
are using this
may not work. If
that is the case
you will need to
use a larger ring
size in the center.
Now you should have something that looks like this.
Congratulations, you have now completed the hard
part. The rest now is easy, although time consuming.
Kit and instructions © by: www.BikiniDuck.com
Step 8
Now we have to start building downward so we can
lengthen the coif. Right now we only want to go as
far as our eyebrows. You’ll see why later on.
To expand the piece we take one open ring and
pass it through two closed one. We close it, and
repeat all the way around the piece. Once you have
gone around all the way, you have completed one
row. Now on to the second one.
Step 9
Simple really, all you do is repeat step 8. Although
if you notice in the picture, the rings are going in
the opposite direction from the last step. Go all the
way around adding rings like this until you have
completed another full row.
Step 10
Continue steps 8 and 9 until the chainmail reaches
to your eyebrows. This usually means trying the
piece on after the completion of each row. You
should start to get something that looks like this.
Step 11
Now you are tasked with finding a mirror. You have
to wear the semi done coif and look at yourself in
the mirror. Don’t laugh too hard though. Everyone
else already thinks you are mad at attempting this,
cackling laughter will only make them think doubly
so. Plus it will take you a long time to finish this
step.
You need to measure your face. In other words you
need to figure out how wide to leave the space in
coif that your face comes out of. In this coif I found
13 rings made for a nice gap. Dependong on the
ring size you use it may be more, or less.
You could leave no gap at all, but that is not suggested. Find a suitable distance and mark it with
two rings. Now move on to
the next step.
Kit and instructions © by:
www.BikiniDuck.com
Step 12
Now for the really time consuming part. Its not all that hard,
it just takes a long time. Continue steps 8 and 9 all the way
around the coif. Making sure to skip the section that you
measured out in step 11. The edges of this section should
look like the pictures on this page. That means that on one
of the two steps you will be adding one ring through only
one other ring, and not two like the rest of the pattern. Kind
of like so.
The spot you left unmade for your face should come out
like this picture.
Anyways, you should continue adding rows like so until you
reach a desirable length, or run out of rings, your choice. In
this example I added 20 extra rows. (Extra as counting
from step 11)
Kit and instructions © by: www.BikiniDuck.com
And there you go, all done! If you would like to purchase rings to make coifs, or other kits for more cool
items check out www.BikiniDuck.com or feel free to
write to us. We would greatly appreciate any and all
feedback on this tutorial. Please let us know what you
think!
Thanks and enjoy! 
Martin@BikiniDuck.com
MTL Studios, Inc.
POBox 580692, Minneapolis, MN 55458
Frequently Asked Questions
I have your chain mail coif kit and i want to thuroughly understand it.-in the first step when
calculating the number of rings involved in making the coif,why multiply the circumference
of the head by 4!-why not 2,3,or even 5-i want to understsnd this so i can do calculations in
the future that involve diferent guages and ring diameters-please respond
"Step 1
Measure the circumference of your forehead. This will be the widest part of this coif. For the exam ple coif being built in this tutorial I am going with the figure of 13.5 inches. Once you have that fig ure you need to multiply it by 4. That will give you the total number of rings that will be going
around your forehead. In this case 54. "
The number 4 is used to figure out how many rings you need in order to get an smooth fit on your
head. For the ring size used in the pictures of this tutorial it takes 4 rings per inch. So a strip of this
weave in this size will have 4 rings per inch. For other ring sizes you just replace the 4 with however many rings there are in one inch of that weave. For 16g 1/4 rings, thats 5 rings per inch. For
18g 5/32 rings, that 8 rings per inch. And so on.
What size are the rings that you used in these instuctions?
The ring size that I used was 14g 3/8ths. Thats 14g (0.080”) wire with an inner diameter of 3/8 of
an inch. This tutorial is pretty generic though so you should be able to use it with almost any ring
size.
Coments? Questions? Suggestions?
Feel free to contact me:
Martin@BikiniDuck.com
MTL Studios, Inc.
POBox 580692, Minneapolis, MN 55458