gentlemanfarmer

Thanks for the links. I had ran across a few of them already. Unfortunately there is only one Amish community within driving distance of me and the harness maker there doesn't do collars. I am thinking about buying a bunch of old collars and taking them apart to sort of reverse engineer them. That way I could make patterns and see how they are put together.

I can't believe how hard it is to find information on making collars. For it to be such an important part of the whole harness system, I would think there would be more out there.

I am interested in learning to make horse collars but I can't find any info on the web about how to get started. I know the ultimate way would be to find a collar maker and learn first hand but that is not a possibility around here unless someone on here knows of someone in north Georgia. Are there any books that ya'll know of? I have found several harness making books online but I don't know if they go into detail about collars or not. Any help or suggestions ya'll could give me would be very much appreciated.

The saddle is a collegiate. It seems to be a pretty nice saddle (I'm not an english rider) but it has been ridden in SO much and carried in the back of the truck. It's not dry or cracked or anything but does have some wear from use. She has always used saddle soap and leather new on it and has taken pretty good care of it but it has been treated like any of our old western saddles.

Thank ya'll for the responces. So since dyeing the whole saddle is not a good plan, What about touching up the worn spots with dye either straight, dilluted with alcohol or mixed with neetsfoot? I tried just plain neetsfoot oil but no luck. Or any other thoughts on touching up the worn areas which are alon the back of the cantle the front of the pommel and on the skirts where the stirrup leathers rub.

my suggestion would be to find an old collar at a junk sale and take it apart to make your own patterns.

My girlfriend has an english saddle that is dark brown and has some lighter colored areas from wear. Is it possible to dye this saddle black and it look anything like good? will the dye rub/wear off easy?

The bags will be for my own use. Bruce has the right idea about what I want. Bottle holders on the near side and a normal bag on the off side. I wouldn't have much of a problem building a set from scratch but a pattern makes it a little easier. I like the idea of wrapping the bottles in paper and duct tape.

Anybody know where I can get a pattern for medicine bags? I mean the old type saddle bags made to hold a couple of medicine bottles in an inverted position so you could draw a shot out of the bottle without having to dig the bottle out of a normal saddle bag.

So would a better description help? I would really love to know what this saddle is. I am planning to do some alterations but wanted to know I wasn;t going to ruin a valuable saddle if I did.

Howdy everyone. This is my first post and I hope someone here can help. I have an old endurance saddle that came from a livery stable in or near Cade's Cove in the Great Smokie Mountains National Park. The saddle did not have stirrup leathers on it when I bought it. The rigging hardware for the front girth is a pair of flat brass rings about 4" in diameter and the rear cinch hardwere is a pair of flat brass D rings about 2" across. All the brass hardware is stamped with FPS. Does this stand for Federal Park Service? If not can anyone give me any info about this saddle?