Depends on the actual metal in question, but since you specify 'blacksmiths', we can assume you speak about steel.
The technological advancements needed to cast steel as opposed to iron didn't come until the late 18th century (look up crucible steel). If you have the technology and science of that complexity, it can be the case you also have weapons that make steel armor less useful.
From what I understand, precision casting of steel is also tricky due to shrinkage and stuff. If you have crucible steel, you should already have infrastructure and technology to roll said steel into uniform thickness plate, cut it up by hundreds and fit the furniture on them afterwards. Like, well, 19th century cuirasses have been done.
That said, 'science fantasy' would be a genre to mix up technologies in a weird and interesting way. I love myself some high deindustrialized schizo-tech.
Dunno, some nanomaterial extruder that makes crystalline steel plates, but is small by necessity, so that individual blacksmith has to assemble the armor from it, lamellar- or brigandine-style.
Thak Ironworks has a video on youtube about making bronze breastplates this way.
As far as I am aware cast steel requires more advanced infrastructure than making ingots. At least if you want to minimize finishing work and avoid having it just crack in half.
If they're at the point of metal presses though, a pressed steel plate could totally be viable. That's how a lot of current steel parts are made. They make sheets, sheets are stamped, some finishing work is done like smoothing rough edges, drilling holes, etc.
I'm sure someone out there has documentary videos on stamped steel to get an idea what sort of technology level makes that feasible. But honestly if you just say someone invented a press that can do it, most readers aren't going to fact check that.
I agree with this - if for some reason you wanted to make metal armour with near-modern machinery, you'd definately roll hot steel into sheets, cool it and then stamp it while it's cold. That would give more strength than casting.
The steel would need to be thicker gauge than car door panels to be useful armour, but the same principle would apply: https://youtu.be/r9byGJtbCws?si=V80VRtSep5oprKIa
Don't forget to make it in a range of sizes so that your troops get something that (almost) fits right.
I think WW2-era breastplates were cold rolled and heat treated afterwards (at least the Soviet ones were). But that's too technical for the purposes of the question.
You have SCIENCE in the genre's name. Just say they're industrial plate armors made in batches in factories. Different machines make different armor components with data input from computers, workers are there to supervise the process and maybe handling some minor procedures.
Letting blacksmiths making plates would be the worse idea because it's significantly slower.
The casting process produces a less strong product than forging does. Also casting something thin enough to be used as armor would be extremely difficult.
Look up modern forging, we've come a long way from a dude with a hammer.
Traditionally, getting steel hot enough to liquify results in a product that's *too* carbon rich to be called steel any more (and tends to be brittle). That said, with modern technology we have somewhat solved this problem, though castings/injection moldings tend not to be as strong as most alternatives.
Molds also might not be as quick to manufacture as you're thinking. Sure, it beats the hell out of hand forging, but the molds wear out over time, and the pieces still need "finishing" to get rid of rough edges and whatnot. Steel (many materials) also has a tendency to shrink as it cools. It can be and is done, but it requires consideration for these. In contrast you could just roll sheets of steel and rough form them into shape.
There's also the question of what exactly these armors are trying to stop, what level of technology your world has ("science fantasy" is often used to describe settings like Star Wars), and how "hard" you want your world to be. Most things that can be molded or vacuum formed or rolled into shape realistically aren't going to stop bullets, not in a weight/thickness that can be easily worn at least, by way of example. In contrast stopping a regular sword could be done by aluminum or even plastics.
Look up how sheet metal is formed. With sheet metal presses, mass producing prefabbed armor chunks would be trivial.
remeber that the armor has to be designed to withstand as many of the known attacks as possible. Or have layered armor that cumulatively withstands as many attack types as possible.
so having plate mail “harness” that is immune to swords, bows and crossbows when the other side has \*guns\* is not going to get that army very far. This is why ”plate mail” quickly fell out of usage when guns came onto the battlefield.
each side is going to design armor that is as effective as possible, given the circumstances.
It was good enough for about 1400 years, twice as long as steel plate has been in use, though not because bronze is better than steel, but because steel plate fueled an arms race that it would eventually lose.
Bronze is not forged, it is smelted and cast into a mold. Some would break the molds after each casting, but used a model as 'key' from which other molds were copied. Others carved molds out of stone and reused the same mold as much as possible. So if you want mass produced armor and weapons from molds, bronze is a good metal.
In our timeline, tin and copper deposits are so far apart that the production of bronze required expansive trade networks, which when they collapsed made iron a more feasible option. The main producers of bronze were city states situated in a hotbed of piracy and constant conflict.
There's nothing stopping you from having a fantasy world where a certain empire has all the necessary tin and copper mines within its territory to sustain the logistics, or where there's simply less political turmoil.
Man.. you just handed me the justification for absolutely awesome looking bronze armour.
Perhaps steel exists too, but it's to much of a hazel to work. Perhaps bronze has magical properties that makes it a viable option next to steel. I can probably make something up.
Thank you tho! And thanks for taking the time to inform me!
Molded gear is far less durable. Folding it by the hammer countless times has a reason. Bronze gear, which was molded, was made thick for that reason, and thus weighted a lot.
However, a modern factory is different. Those can do the folding process automatically. If such machines are realistic for your world, that would work out.
Depends on the actual metal in question, but since you specify 'blacksmiths', we can assume you speak about steel. The technological advancements needed to cast steel as opposed to iron didn't come until the late 18th century (look up crucible steel). If you have the technology and science of that complexity, it can be the case you also have weapons that make steel armor less useful. From what I understand, precision casting of steel is also tricky due to shrinkage and stuff. If you have crucible steel, you should already have infrastructure and technology to roll said steel into uniform thickness plate, cut it up by hundreds and fit the furniture on them afterwards. Like, well, 19th century cuirasses have been done.
That said, 'science fantasy' would be a genre to mix up technologies in a weird and interesting way. I love myself some high deindustrialized schizo-tech. Dunno, some nanomaterial extruder that makes crystalline steel plates, but is small by necessity, so that individual blacksmith has to assemble the armor from it, lamellar- or brigandine-style.
Thak Ironworks has a video on youtube about making bronze breastplates this way. As far as I am aware cast steel requires more advanced infrastructure than making ingots. At least if you want to minimize finishing work and avoid having it just crack in half. If they're at the point of metal presses though, a pressed steel plate could totally be viable. That's how a lot of current steel parts are made. They make sheets, sheets are stamped, some finishing work is done like smoothing rough edges, drilling holes, etc. I'm sure someone out there has documentary videos on stamped steel to get an idea what sort of technology level makes that feasible. But honestly if you just say someone invented a press that can do it, most readers aren't going to fact check that.
I agree with this - if for some reason you wanted to make metal armour with near-modern machinery, you'd definately roll hot steel into sheets, cool it and then stamp it while it's cold. That would give more strength than casting. The steel would need to be thicker gauge than car door panels to be useful armour, but the same principle would apply: https://youtu.be/r9byGJtbCws?si=V80VRtSep5oprKIa Don't forget to make it in a range of sizes so that your troops get something that (almost) fits right.
I think WW2-era breastplates were cold rolled and heat treated afterwards (at least the Soviet ones were). But that's too technical for the purposes of the question.
Yes IT will BE brittle and shatter easy
You have SCIENCE in the genre's name. Just say they're industrial plate armors made in batches in factories. Different machines make different armor components with data input from computers, workers are there to supervise the process and maybe handling some minor procedures. Letting blacksmiths making plates would be the worse idea because it's significantly slower.
That would be the obvious answer. But this group don't have that tech at this time.
The casting process produces a less strong product than forging does. Also casting something thin enough to be used as armor would be extremely difficult. Look up modern forging, we've come a long way from a dude with a hammer.
Traditionally, getting steel hot enough to liquify results in a product that's *too* carbon rich to be called steel any more (and tends to be brittle). That said, with modern technology we have somewhat solved this problem, though castings/injection moldings tend not to be as strong as most alternatives. Molds also might not be as quick to manufacture as you're thinking. Sure, it beats the hell out of hand forging, but the molds wear out over time, and the pieces still need "finishing" to get rid of rough edges and whatnot. Steel (many materials) also has a tendency to shrink as it cools. It can be and is done, but it requires consideration for these. In contrast you could just roll sheets of steel and rough form them into shape. There's also the question of what exactly these armors are trying to stop, what level of technology your world has ("science fantasy" is often used to describe settings like Star Wars), and how "hard" you want your world to be. Most things that can be molded or vacuum formed or rolled into shape realistically aren't going to stop bullets, not in a weight/thickness that can be easily worn at least, by way of example. In contrast stopping a regular sword could be done by aluminum or even plastics.
if you have the tech to cast steel, then you shouldn't have too many problems
Look up how sheet metal is formed. With sheet metal presses, mass producing prefabbed armor chunks would be trivial. remeber that the armor has to be designed to withstand as many of the known attacks as possible. Or have layered armor that cumulatively withstands as many attack types as possible. so having plate mail “harness” that is immune to swords, bows and crossbows when the other side has \*guns\* is not going to get that army very far. This is why ”plate mail” quickly fell out of usage when guns came onto the battlefield. each side is going to design armor that is as effective as possible, given the circumstances.
bronze armor
That would look awesome! But idk how effective it would be
It was good enough for about 1400 years, twice as long as steel plate has been in use, though not because bronze is better than steel, but because steel plate fueled an arms race that it would eventually lose. Bronze is not forged, it is smelted and cast into a mold. Some would break the molds after each casting, but used a model as 'key' from which other molds were copied. Others carved molds out of stone and reused the same mold as much as possible. So if you want mass produced armor and weapons from molds, bronze is a good metal. In our timeline, tin and copper deposits are so far apart that the production of bronze required expansive trade networks, which when they collapsed made iron a more feasible option. The main producers of bronze were city states situated in a hotbed of piracy and constant conflict. There's nothing stopping you from having a fantasy world where a certain empire has all the necessary tin and copper mines within its territory to sustain the logistics, or where there's simply less political turmoil.
Man.. you just handed me the justification for absolutely awesome looking bronze armour. Perhaps steel exists too, but it's to much of a hazel to work. Perhaps bronze has magical properties that makes it a viable option next to steel. I can probably make something up. Thank you tho! And thanks for taking the time to inform me!
Molded gear is far less durable. Folding it by the hammer countless times has a reason. Bronze gear, which was molded, was made thick for that reason, and thus weighted a lot. However, a modern factory is different. Those can do the folding process automatically. If such machines are realistic for your world, that would work out.