After cutting your plywood to the dimensions listed on the last page, place your handle and arm attachments on the shield and mark where they will go. Drill holes for your bolts to attach these pieces, but don’t actually bolt them in yet. (You may notice that these pictures don’t show the plywood with holes; my drill had broken when I started this project and I had to drill later. This led to lots of cursing and an extra coat of paint, so please learn from my mistake and check your drill before you start.)
	With the holes drilled, you will now start adding things to your plywood. The first thing to go on is a wrap of 5/8” clear vinyl tubing. You will need about 10 feet of tubing, sliced down the middle so that it will wrap around your plywood. I suggest cutting the tubing slowly and carefully, but if the cut line is irregular, it won’t make any difference to your shield. Once it’s cut, slide the tubing onto the plywood.
	You will notice that the tubing will not stay on the plywood easily. Tape it on securely so the tubing fits snugly on the wood.
	With your hot glue gun, glue the tubing to the plywood, avoiding the tape. Give the glue about five minutes to dry, then flip your shield over and glue the other side.
	Once the glue has dried on both sides, remove the tape and fill in the gaps so the glue forms a continuos seal around the tubing.
	Now you will need to put primer on your shield. I notice that many people will only prime the front of their shields, leaving the back as raw wood. This is a bad idea for several reasons. Primer will increase the life of your shield by helping give the plywood a watertight surface. It will also make your harder to spot at night from behind, as well as just simply looking like you spent the time to make you shield look nice. I suggest using spray-on primer, since it makes an even coat. If you have never used spray-paint before, make sure you paint outside, and hold the can about two feet away from your shield, spraying back and forth in even strokes. Be sure that nothing will blow onto your shield while it dries (which takes about 20 minutes.) I recommend coating each side in two layers of primer, and then painting over that with a layer of Acrylic paint for an almost completely watertight finish.
	At this point, you’ll need to add the hardware to your shield. You will need a handle (garage door handles from the Home Depot work well) something to give your hand more space between the plywood and the handle, arm straps and something to attach the arm straps to the shield with. I make spacers by cutting 1”x2” rectangles of plywood, drilling holes in them, and gluing them together for about 1” to 1.5” of height. Arm strap attachments are made from a 2”x4” piece of plywood. For the actual straps, I use 1” nylon webbing with an adjustable buckle. Yes, the buckle is anachronistic, but it makes the strap adjustable so you can extra layers and still hold your shield comfortably. Some people like to rivet their webbing, but I have found that sewing it with button and carpet thread works better. A note on the webbing, it will fray and become useless, unless you singe the ends with a lighter.
	Now you will need to bolt your hardware to the shield. I prefer to use carriage bolts because of their smooth heads; they will not snag on boffers the way that normal screws would. Be sure to use a bolt cutter once everything is in place to avoid accidentally hurting someone.
	With the base of your shield completed, you will now need to foam the outer edge. I prefer six-foot lengths of foam for padding shields, but if you only have three-foot lengths, it will only mean that you will need to repeat a few steps. The first step to padding a shield is to split the foam down its center seam.
	Next you need to bevel the foam by cutting into it diagonally. When you are done, the foam will look somewhat like the end of a pencil. The picture below shows how the foam looks when it is completely beveled.
	Check the split in the foam.
	I like to mark the center of the foam before I slide it onto the shield, so that the padding will be even.
	In order to make the foam conform to the shield, I cut triangular notches out of the foam on both sides of the shield.
	Sealing the notch with fiberglass strapping tape will make the foam last longer.
	Very sharp corners need to be notched, but more rounded corners are less critical. I left the central corners round to demonstrate taping both corners and curves.
	Now you will need to tape the foam to your shield. The shield is not completely foamed yet, but taping the foam in sections will make it easier to replace the padding on only the lower third of the shield, which will take the most abuse. Place about 8” of tape on the foam so that it just touches the edge of the wood. You will want to leave about a 3” overhang of tape that extends past the slope of the bevel.
	Carefully split the tape into three or four sections. Because it is more difficult to tape a round shield edge than a straight sword, I like to lightly attach the ends of the split tape to another part of the foam.
	Secure the slit sections of tape to the shield itself, overlapping them for added structural support.
	Repeat the taping process for both ends of the foam, making sure to overlap the pieces of tape by about 1/4” to 1/2”.
	Now you will need to tale the corners of the shield. I start my corners by applying two triangles of tape.
	Next a rectangular piece of tape overlaps them.
	Then I add a 2” extension of tape to either side of my overlapping triangles. This insures that the corner is completely covered by tape, so that the rest of the taping is merely infill.
	Fill in the spaces between your corners, making sure to completely cover the edge of the foam next to the wood of the shield.
	With the lower space filled, place a piece of tape at the top of the curve, making sure to cover the corners.
	Slice the tape in around the edges, in the same way as slicing the tape around the bevel.
	Secure the tape one piece at a time, in an overlapping fashion. The overlap of the tape will go from top to bottom, outside to inside, in the same direction as a weapon hitting your shield will travel. This will keep a weapon from snagging your tape and ripping it off.
	If you have any irregularities in your foam, such as a handle overlapping the foam, tape them next.
	With a longer piece of tape, cover the entirety of the curve. Because duct tape does not like to curve evenly, you will need to have it overlap the edge of the foam slightly.
	Slice the tape at 2" intervals, but do not attach it to the foam yet.
	At each slit in the foam, attach a small rectangle of tape.
	Carefully press the tape onto the foam, making sure that no foam shows through the tape.
	The next piece of tape you apply will also need to be cut at 2” intervals, but this time, the tape will overlap. Continue taping until there is no more exposed foam.
	Now you will need to attach the next piece of foam. To do so, you will need to cut a reverse bevel, inside the foam. Only cut one end of the foam this way.
	Split the foam along the seam.
	Slide the reverse bevel onto the shield so that it fits snugly over that other piece of foam. This will prevent a clear cut in the foam, making your shield have fewer weak points to break down at. (This beveling process is also a very good way to repair weapons that have only their tips damaged. It’s one of the few weapon-making techniques that I developed entirely on my own, and I have found it to be very useful.)
	Notch the corners of your foam, measuring carefully so that your next reverse bevel cut will line up precisely with the other bevel.
	Tape the bevels together, then repeat the rest of the taping process until your entire shield is foamed and taped.
	And you’re done!