venthompson

Finally got a whip done. 48 strand horse rawhide handle, 12 strand elk rawhide thong.

Depending on how long the bottom headstall straps are. You can make them shorter and have it take weight off or longer to have the full weight of the nose button on them. I try to have it so the nose button is slightly resting but not the whole weight of the bosal.

Here is the way my dad taught me to build hackamores back in the 60's

I saw something similar on youtube but it was a lot smaller for cutting lace, I just sized it up.

Whip handle I just got done. 40 strands of Horse with 1/2 dyed with coffee. Now I need to find time to braid up the rest of the whip.

I'm fairly lazy and have always hated cutting rawhide from rounds so I built this table that I can cut 1/2 inch strips from rounds. It has a center pivot the round will fit on and it moves towards the blade as I cut. There is a spring loaded metal hand that holds the rawhide down so it doesn't curl up as I'm cutting. Seems to work alright, I can cut up a cow hide into long strips in about 20 minutes. 3 elk and 1 cow hide I cut using the new table.

The horn was a over 2 under 2 eight strand and the cantle was O1 U1 eight strand edge braiding.

Ron, I got to thinking about the 'SF', I guess I really don't know if it stands for slick fork but that is what I learned some 30 odd years ago from somewhere and I never gave it a second thought until now. It would be nice to actually learn the history of the SF Bowman tree but I wouldn't know where to look, or the history of the other styles of trees also. Ven

The SF stands for Slim Fork. The horn was just a 3 inch dally with a 2 inch cap, I added about 2 inches to the horn cap with extra leather and did a couple layers of Leather to build the neck of the horn up. Not sure if I'll find time to do another saddle. I have about a 16 various hides waiting to get made into rawhide for braiding projects. Kids and a job cut into my leather/rawhide time.

It rides good so far, haven't done much yet with it except a couple of brandings. It sits on a horse fairly well if they aren't to fat. Drug a bunch of calves without a breast collar and it stayed in place pretty good. The welt idea on the swells came from Jeremiah Watts web page, I think he called it Marshall welt.

Here are a few pictures of the horn and cantle. The cantle is kind of wavy, I didn't get the strings thickness evened out. I was cutting the strings lengthways from a horse hide and the thickness varied quite a bit and I couldn't get the thick spots thinned down to match without losing all of the strength. But because I was building it for myself I didn't bother cutting other strings to match. I did about 6 inches an hour over a few days.

Decided I needed a new saddle so I hacked one out this spring. 16.5 inch Slim Fork Bowman with 4 inch comfort cantle. Rocket hide braid on the horn and cantle. Mother hubbard style full carved. In skirt rigging. Been 25 years since I've done any Saddle work so there are lots of flaws.

Yeh, might be a little ouchy wearing them right now, Hopefully they'll be finished in a week.

My new boots just about done by my Cousin-In-Law Zack Jay of Hulett Wy. I taught him to make boots this spring and talked him into making me this pair this fall.

I taught my cousin in law to make boots this spring and talked him into making me a pair this fall. Not done yet but getting close. Zack Jay from Hulett Wyoming.