jonwatsabaugh

I would agree with Bruce that this tree would be unusable. I think that anything over 3/32" will throw the angles front and rear out of alignment to much. Two things I do to keep everything as stable as possible is to laminate all parts, including the bars, and to encase the structure in epoxy resin with at least one layer of fiberglass cloth on the top of the tree before it is rawhided. To my knowledge I'm the only maker laminating bars, and yup it takes much more time, but I believe it is well worth it. Jon

Hey Justin, glad to know you're still kickin'! Good lookin' rig there! Jon

Margaux, Some makers choose to put a convex profile the entire length of the bar, a little or alot. Some are convex in the front pad and flat in the back pad. I've seen some old Hamley trees that were slightly concave on the back pad with quite a bit of convex on the front. In my experience with horses here in the midwest and on down through Texas, people tend to breed horses with a little more muscle, thus resulting in a cross section that is sometimes more convex than flat and also require a flatter angle to the bars in the front. Because of this, I make the front pads nearly flat in that crossection, with the rear pads perfectly flat, radiusing all edges. Properly blocked skirts will add extra radius to keep the bar edges away from the horse. Steve's drawing is a pretty good representation of a whither more pronounced that will accept a more convex profile in front. Every maker though, does this a little different based on their experience and philosophy in fit. Jon

Margaux, I see what you mean by your drawing, however your illustration representing the tree bar is incorrect. The front bar pad can never be concave. It is always slightly convex to flat, depending on the maker. Making the front bar pad concave would violate Rod & Denise's rule #1. Even with heavily muscled shoulders that are convex, you will never be successful in mating this profile with an opposing concave one. Greg is correct in his statement when considering a more standard whither type. This has been a good discusion! Jon

I can't speak for all custom makers, but I know as a tree maker, I'm interested in a very specific group of horses. All horses can be custom fitted, but many have conformation defects that will never allow them to carry a saddle and rider and distribute the weight properly. Many custom makers hesitate to fit what I would call the "out of spec" back because then you have an "out of spec "saddle. What are the chances you will find another horse to fit your custom saddle if Old Nellie steps in a hole and breaks a leg two days after getting your new saddle? You have a fair size investment in a piece of equipment that has just obtained decoration statis. I sure wouldn't want this rig ending up sittin' atop a good horse that's got a real job! Chances are the original owner is going to want to recoop their money and will take greenbacks from the first real offer they get, regardless of where it will end up and what it will be cinched to. I get pretty stiff-necked about the irresponsible breeding practices I see. I believe in all cases that conformation, mind, and athletic ability should be incorporated in all breeding programs. I'm primarily interested in good Quarter and Thouroughbred types with proper structure. I understand many use their horses purely for pleasure, and thats great, but buy and breed good stock. If you gotta feed'em, you might as well be feeding a good one! Jon

The first Wade on the list is sold. Jon

way cool Andy, I really like the shape of your taps! Jon

Mort, Like GH stated, there's nothing like experience. However, if you are really interested in learning how to make trees, there is no better place to start than to secure some time with a good tree maker and learn the basics of hand made trees. Even if down the road you wanted to make trees from duplicator parts, learning the handmade process I believe is vital. This would give you the basis you need to start, a very grounded knowledge of the craft, and the education would provide information you need to test the viability of your ideas. If we can at all help direct you Mort, we sure will! David, This might shock many of you here who have read some of my earlier posts, but I will concede and agree with you David, that rawhide does put much more "life" in the tree. Even though I like my epoxy/glassed trees, there are certain qualities and features you just don't get with fiberglass encased trees. At present, I still cover more trees with rawhide than I do fiberglass. I've seen rawhide and fiberglass trees both though, that I wouldn't give you a plug nickel for. Believe me, there are no short cuts to either process... they both require an aquired skill and much time. Jon

In the past, I have built saddles on trees from both of these manufacturers. Randy at Timberline, and Sonny at Quality have been around a long time. Both have vast experience in manufacturing duplicator built trees. However if you put them side by side, Sonny's trees stand out as a superior machine built structure. Sonny's rawhiding is the standard by which all others are measured. I have seen many inconsistancies in the bar patterns from both though. That being said, I still prefer a hand made tree. Jon

David, Get on John Willemsa's web sight and take a look at the saddle he got into the TCAA with. The saddle is actually a little lighter in person than in the photos. I know this was achieved by applying a light coat of olive oil each day for five days, then a top coat of Neat-Lac to finish it. In person the finish was very striking, and the color was magnificent! As a side note, I had the priviledge of building the tree for that saddle! Jon

These are the trees in the wood as listed #2 #3 #4 #5 Matt, here's a BW cutter in the glass. Sorry, I still haven't bought a good camera.

Matt, I'll post some pix in the mornig. I don't have any ranch cutters built right now, but I'll post a standard glassed BW. I learned the basics from Keith Gertch followed with vast amounts of R&D time. Jon

Elton, The hand hole measures 4" on 4 of them (the rpoer is 4 1/4) and they would equate to a 93 degree angle at front. Jon

I have a few stock trees in my shop I need to move. Shop space is getting tight here. These are trees I've built to show other makers and all have the same rock, twist, and bar angles with the exception of the roper tree which has an additional 1/4” of bar spread front and back. These work very well on mature, conditioned, foundation quarter types. The two Wades listed are rawhide covered with fiberglass reinforcement beneath. The Wade pictured is one I delivered a couple of weeks ago and is identical to #1 offered for sale. The other 3 listed below are in the wood waiting to be covered with either your choice of epoxy/fiberglass or rawhide with fiberglass reinforcement. The rawhide trees sell for $550 and the epoxy/fiberglass trees are $465. With this selection of trees I will pay shipping on all prepaid orders within the continental states. I accept Visa, Mastercard, check, or money order. If interested, you can e-mail me or call me at the shop at 515-285-0799. If I don't answer, leave a message and I'll call you right back. These are not seconds or rejects, they are my premium handmade trees. I'll take pix of all in the wood and get 'em up pretty soon. Jon Wade, 5” stock, 3”x 4” guadalahara horn, 16 1/4” seat, 4 1/2”x 12” cantle, 7 1/2” high gullet Wade, 4 1/2” stock, 3”x 3 1/2” post horn, 15 3/4” seat, 4 1/2”x 12” cantle, 7 1/2” high gullet BW cutter, horn of your choice, 16 1/2” seat, 3 1/4”x 12 1/2” cantle, 8” high gullet roper, 13” association w/leg cut, #6 horn 1 3/4” cap 3 1/4” high, 15 1/4” seat, 7 1/4” high gullet 14” association, #6 horn 2 1/2” cap 3 1/2” high, 16 1/4” seat, 4”x 12” cantle, 8” high gullet (will make a really nice cowboy rig!)

J.W. Since I don't have a large splitter, I always keep 10-11 oz. strap for flat plates. I always take them out of the butts and use the rest for saddle bags and such. This makes a nice thin plate with plenty of strength. I like that idea of using a piece of Kevlar sandwiched between the two pieces! Great minds at work here! If you are going to look at splitters down the road, look for a 16" Camoga or Fortuna band knife. Keep in mind though, these are all 3 phase machines and can't be converted. Jon

Thanks all for the advise! Since I make my own trees, I think I'll make my own version of a formfitter with a little less undercut. I'll post a pic when I get it done. Jon

Hey all, I was wondering if any of you have built a saddle on a Hamley formfitter tree. I'm taking an order from a guy who wants big swells and I'm trying to talk him in to one. I've always wanted to build a saddle on this tree. If you have, post some pix if you like...love to see em! Jon

Doug, I agree with Troy, it appears the crown across the seat is quite sharp. You want a slit bit of crown but it should be very gradual. Also, the low point of the seat should be a couple of inches ahead of the cantle corners. Get on Steve Mason's blog site and look through the archives within. If I remember, he has good photos of ground seats in progress. These are good toutorials to study for construction and shape. I know there are others also that have great pix...maybe they would share. Jon

Welcome Jeli! Stillwater is an incredibly beautiful part of Minnesota! My daughter and son-in-law live in White Bear Lake. Brandon, my son-in-law hunts a lot over around Stillwater. Diane and I love to visit them...the scenery is always an added bonus. Good luck on your leather crafting, this is a wonderful forum! Jon

Well, I'm going to throw in my two cents for what it's worth. After getting my cards out and making a comparison, there is a huge difference between the steepest, s6, and the flattest, d7. Roughly speaking, about 15 degrees. I would ask, as David did, about the consistency of the dry spots. With this difference in angle, I imagine they would appear at varying distances off the centerline of the spine, given the angle variation from horse s6 to horsed7. David, please correct me if I'm interpreting these improperly. As was mentioned in the original post, the concern of possibly excessive “crown” or convex profile across the pad of the bar is a valid one. I've seen a lot of production trees, and some customs, that couldn't possibly have any more than 2 to 3 square inches of contact given the profile. Mate this with an opposing convex shape and you get a very severe point of pressure. These broader, more heavily muscled horses typically need more flair out the front of the bars also. By flair out I'm considering the length of the bar from the back of the gullet forward, which is actually a part of the rock. I'm not sure how other tree makers define flair. These horses tend to be over-cinched to stabilize the saddle position because of the reduction of the "wedge" effect across the withers, and an ill-fitting tree really accentuates the problem. They need as much bar surface contacting properly as possible. I'm assuming from your post, STPENNER, that you didn't build this guys saddle so you're unaware of the tree that's in his saddle. I would see if he would let you drop the skirts to evaluate the bare tree. Even going a step further and snapping some pix and posting them up here...hopefully we could be of additional help. Jon

Steve, I know what you mean concerning those rawhide binds. Besides the fact that they are very time consuming and tedious to install, the wear factor that you detailed is the major consideration. All of my saddles I build with rawhide bindings are ones I do for another company. They just give me the order and I fill it. I am definately at the point where turning down orders with rawhide trim is going to have to be considered. In my part of the country though, most of the time I take the orders I can get. Again Steve, thanks for your seasoned advise! Rick J., The finish is achieved by first applying two light coats of Tan Kote, then antiquing with Tandy's Hi-Lite coffee brown ,then a final light coat of Tan Kote. Allow the first two coats of Tan Kote to dry for a whole day so the antique doesn't stain the initial finish. I prefer not to even use anything but neatsfoot oil, but alot of customers like that initial "flash" of color and contrast. Jon

Greg, It had never occured to me to flow everything from the bottom up. Makes perfect sense to do just that! I guarentee everything will be growing up on my saddles from here on out. Thanks much Greg for your seasoned observation! Jon

Hey all! Didn't know if this was the right place to post this, but I'll do it anyway. Was wondering if any of you were going to make it Whichita Falls Oct. 3-4. I'm hoping to go and will be bringing some trees to show and sell if all works out. I hope to get the priveledge of meeting some of you there! Jon

Here's a post horn swell fork rig I finished up recently. All critique welcome and much appreciated! Jon

Bruce, I've got remnants of some of those old saddles myself. Had a couple given to me and a couple I traded some other junk for. They always tell a great story don't they? When I was a kid we used to play in barns alot and every one of them had old saddles and harness hanging that had been long forgotten. Some of the old farmers would have given them away just to get rid of them, others held great sentimental value toward them and wouldn't think of parting with their treasures. We always got a colorfull story of their ancestors frontier exploits though. My dad would never let me drag this stuff home, or I would have had a barn full of it myself. Never seen that makers mark on a tree but there were some books published several years ago and the authors compiled a huge list of saddle makers, tree makers, and bit and spur makers from past to present. Mine came up missing some time back or I would look it up for ya. I'm sure somebody else reading this will have one of those books. Saw an old tree a few years back that actually had little hardwood pegs nailing the rawhide down. It still had the makers stamp on a piece of paper sandwiched between the wood and rawhide and traced in the book to a maker in San Francisco back in the 1880's. Happy hunt'n! Jon