Padding an SCA Helmet
It's obvious that the shape of the top of your head does not match the shape of your helmet. Every fighter has a different way of making up the difference. Here's mine.
There are three parts to the padding in my helmet. Two of the parts are shown in the pattern diagram on this page. The third is a stack of ovals that fills the gap between the inner and outer layers of padding.
The upper pattern, which I call the liner, comes together to make a hemisphere that matches the inside of my helmet. Click on image 1 to display a larger version that makes the following notes make sense.
All the measurements in the liner are from the inside of the helmet. Measurement 1 is 1/2 the circumference at the browline. 2 is the distance from the hightest point of the helmet to the browline. 3, 4, and 5 add up to the distance from the browline in front to the browline in back of the helm. The liner is put together by closing up the two gaps between 3 and 4, and 4 and 5. I use duct tape to close up the seams.
Image 3 shows half of one of my older liners. You might notice that there are two extra cuts in the old liner. I've found that they're not necessary for my current helmet.
The lower pattern, which I call the crown, looks a little more complicated, but comes together easily. Measurement 9 is 1/2 the circumference of my head at the brow. 8 is 1/2 the distance over my head, from browline to browline. the sum of the 6's, and 7 is the distance from front to back. It's a little harder to figure out what lengths each of these should be, but there's an easy way to make it work.
First, cut out two copies the basic pattern with extra long 6's. Make a paper crown by taping the two together along the front and back seams. Then tape the two 7's together.
Finally, put the crown on your head, and overlap and tape together the front and back tabs created by the 6's. You should have something that resembles a hat Jughead (from the Archie comic) would wear.
Cut the front to back band created by the 6's so the band becomes two tabs that butt up to the sideways band that the 7's make. The inside view of the helmet padding (image 2) shows what pattern 2 (crown) should look like when it's put together. Once you've cut the two halves apart by cutting the tape that holds the crown together, you've got a crown pattern that matches your head.
Once you have the foam versions cut,use duct tape to put the crown together. I keep the tape on the side that is away from my head. It looks better that way, and in the event that I wear the helmet without a coif, I don't get duct tape in my hair.
Here's a little point of complexity: Depending on the size of your helmet, there may still be a gap between the browline of the crown and the liner. You have a few options. You can make another crown that fills the space, or make your crown out of thicker closed cell foam.
There is a third choice, which I utilize. Since I wear a chain coif and cloth under coif, I just make the crown's circumfernce match the inside circumference of the liner. This gives me enough space to fit chain links and cloth under the padding.
There is also a gap between the top of the crown and the liner. I fill this space with a stack of ovals of diminishing sizes. This ensures that the crown won't split at the top, and makes the fit much more comfortable, since the weight of the helmet is distributed over all of my head, rather than in a ring with no support in the middle. The ovals are duct taped together, then taped to the liner.
Finally, I stitch the crown to the liner to make sure they stay together as a unit. Images 4 and 5 show the stitching. You'll note that there is some deformity (denting in the liner) at the front of and back. This is because the stitches are pulling the liner and crown together where there would normally be a gap in front of and behind the stack of oval foam. It's a cosmetic issue I could fix by not stitching so high, or by filling the space with foam. In any case it's not important enough to fix.
You may also have noticed the rectangle of foam hanging off of one end of the padding. It's not a nasal, it's just a little bit of padding for the base of my skull. I've never actually had the back of my helmet hit my skull, but the padding is there anyway.
My chin strap is built in such a way that my helmet does not slide around on my head, so I get away with less padding around the lower half of the helmet. If your helmet is loose enough that you get contact with the lower portions, you'll need to pad them or fix your strapping.
An addendum:
I found that the crown and liner needed a more secure connection between them. Previously, I had been using gaffer's tape to bind the two edges together, and found that over time, the adhesive wore out, and the tape started to slide off the foam, causing all sorts of problems with vision and odd sticky spots on my brow. In the article above, I used a couple of stitch points to hold the two pieces together. Since then, I've determined that a cross stitch, or two whip stitches going in opposite directions along the edge of butted foam sheets holds them together quite well.
Also, the stip of foam I use at the back of my helmet needed some structural reinforcement, as it tended to curl up as I put my head into the helmet. The pervious version was much thicker than this new one. To reinforce the new one, I simply cut some card stock into a rectangle and stitched it to the foam strip. I made sure the top of the card stock extended past the rim of the liner.
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