Mulesaw

@Klara Thanks. When I made the breast plate, I used a different type of leather, and I found those edges were more difficult to polish. I guess I'll just have to see if it becomes a problem with the missing carabiner, and if it does I'll just install one. That shouldn't take long. The top of the N in his name bothers me a little, it is not completely in line with the rest of the letters, but honestly I don't think that Bent will mind.

I completed the halter this Sunday. I decided to give polishing the edges a new try. I haven't had much success in that previously, but this leather seems to take a nice polish, and that came as a surprise for me. I just did used a it of sand paper followed by some beeswax and a rubbing of a piece of canvas. I would like to try some Tokonole, but I haven't got any out here. I really hope that it will fit the horse, otherwise I guess I'll just have to call it an experiment. All in all a nice doable project with minimal tools and equipment required. The biggest obstacle was to make the round throat latch due to me bringing too narrow a strip of leather for that. I am also amazed with the length of leather required to sew a halter. I had hoped to make two and I was pretty sure that I had brought plenty of leather with me for that, but I soon realized that I would only have enough to make one. Prior to polishing the edges, but with the head band installed. The name embroidering. Polished nose band. Headband and neck band both polished now.

Hi Frodo My little brother lives in Japan, and I have forwarded your post to him. He sent me a link to a Japanese dealer, and explained me which Kanji sign I should look under. But there were only regular Sam Browne buttons. No backing plates. He'll try to ask in some leather shops if they know of it, So I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a positive reply from him at some point.

Good to hear :-) Good luck with the project. (I am sadly too far away from you geographically to be of much help)

The rusted rivets and the missing buckles for closing could be dealt with. My suggestion is to clean it first with some saddle soap, then once it is dry again, give it a try with some neatsfoot oil or some other oil. The worst thing that can happen is that you have spent a bit of money on the oil and used a bit of time. It probably won't ever be as soft as the day it was made, but if it becomes usable with a bit of scars to reflect its age - well then I think it is worth doing it. I don't think it looks all that bad, but getting the grime of and giving it some oil will let you assess whether the leather is too brittle to continue with. Replacing the rusted rivets shouldn't be much of a problem, To me it looks like there is missing a strap to carry the satchel over the shoulder, and there's also missing two buckles to closing the front. The front "pocket" seems to need some stitching in the lower part, but that's about it as far as I can see. Sentimental value is hard to valuate, but I would guess that a school boy satchel sees a lot more rough handling than the satchel of an elderly gentleman, so it might not need to be 100% as sturdy for your father to use now as it was 50 years ago. If you write in your profile where you are located, it makes it a bit easier if anyone is living near you that might have a chance of vetting the piece in real life. Brgds Jonas

I guess it depends a bit on where in the world you are situated? http://www.kaufmanshoe.com/backup/shoemakingsupplies.html https://www.frankfordleather.com/prodcat/shoe-repair.asp These two came up from Googling shoe repair supplies USA. I was actually searching for a different supplier that I once visited. That place looked like it stocked EVERYTHING you would ever need for repairing or making shoes. But I forgot the name of the place.

Hi Klara I was taught to do a similar thing with the halter when putting on the bridle, except just throwing putting it all over the head of the horse, like a giant necklace. If the horse is calm I prefer to do it without it, but inside a stable or in the box he can't run off anyway :-) I can see on some of the pictures that the author does describe carabiners, so they must have been commonplace too, but maybe they were just more expensive? I guess that you are right actually about a well cared for strap being fast too. I think I am going to try it out, just for the experience. There is no mention of why a headband should be added, but practically all the halters are shown with a headband. My guess is that the halter sits a bit more securely, but that is just a guess. It is a bit interesting with the anti fly fringe. Cause I haven't seen those mentioned anywhere in the book - and for comparison, he devotes half a page and 3 illustrations on different types of hats for the horses to protect against the sun. As far as I can see, none of the halters are designed to be transformed into bridles. The author distinguish between halters and bridles, so I guess it was just the norm at that time. One of the halters he calls a marching halter, and that one seems to be more adjustable so that it would sit neatly to the head of the horse and I guess allowing it to be lead without a risk for the halter to come of by accident. The upper halter on this page is the one I am trying to make. It looks just like a modern halter - but with a head band. (save for the missing carabiner)

@Klara Hi Klara, the headband was the part I was working on when I took the pictures, so it isn't attached yet :-) But it will be just like a headstall with a headband in front of the ears going across the forehead of the horse. I am technically still working on it, since the halter is mostly a Sunday project out here. During the day so much is happening, but Sunday is not a full working day for us, so I try to take some time to do a bit of work that is not related to the ship. So maybe I'll get around to install the headband this weekend. It is an interesting subject when a snap hook or carabiner became popular. I would guess that the time issue was the most important thing here. When you have a dedicated stable boy, it wouldn't mean much if he had to do it the slow way. Also when we drive the horses in the trailer to e.g. the forest for a ride, it is really nice that releasing and mounting the halter is as fast as possible, to avoid having the horse without any headgear in the shortest amount of time. I know that you can also do it inside the trailer, but that is also a risky business since there is not much space, and if the horse jerks its head you can be injured, or it could step on your feet etc. So at least for Mettes horse we tend to do it outside the trailer, because the horse is much more calm when it can see the surroundings. But I guess that I could try to make the halter without a carabiner. If it proves that it is more troublesome to use it that way - I could always install a carabiner later on. Brgds Jonas

@chuck123wapati 6700 ft sounds a bit mountainous :-) And truth be told, right now I wouldn't mind trading for a bit of snow. We are heading to Curacao in the Caribbean, so it is going to be even warmer when we get there. The freight company managed to mess up a shipment of some extra plates for a cooler when we were in port in the Canary Islands, and since that cooler is vital for the air condition plant I can't do much more about the temperature on board though I would like to. Hopefully the extra capacity will help us when it finally arrives on board. But is is nice to watch a movie on Saturday night, where the picture is projected onto one of the sails. And just sit outside in shorts and t-shirt and still be comfortable. And there are quite a few stars out here at night too. But I would guess that you got a spectacular sky at night too in Wyoming!

@fivewayswelshcobs But being far from the sea must mean that you are either near some mountains or some other pretty scenery :-) Though I have to admit that it is kind of nice sitting in the afternoon sun after the temperature has dropped a bit and sewing an gazing at the ocean. The temperature is a bit too hot for sitting in the sun during the day. With 30 dgC seawater and some 30 dgC in the shade. @chuck123wapati hahahahaha, That was actually a really good suggestion :-) And thanks for the kind words Brgds Jonas

I have only padded halters, and I don't put anything under the soft leather. it seems to still offer a bit of cushion effect due to the folded parts. TomE (on this forum) uses neoprene as padding.

The other leather halters I have made were all basically copied from a standard nylon halter, but with a round cheek piece instead of a flat one. During my reading of the old German book on saddlery, I came across a couple of plans for some halters. Naturally they look a lot like regular halters, but there are a few variations on some of them. The measurements fit pretty well with the measurements that I took on the halter of my wife's horse, so I decided to try and make one and then I'll see how it will fit once I get back home. The most notable thing is that there is a headband which is something I have never seen on a halter. Also the shown halter is made without a carabiner to close the cheek piece. So it is intended to be opened and closed solely from the buckle on the neck strap. We remove the halters as soon as the horses are in their boxes, and a carabiner is just a really fast way of unbuckling a halter, so that is one place where I'll stray from the original plans. At the moment I am working on the headband, so that's why it is not yet on the halter. I bought some grease tanned leather on a sale while I was home, and I made some straps that I have brought with me. Actually I was certain that I had brought enough to make two halters, but somehow it takes more than I imagined to sew just a single one. I am fairly sure that my miscalculations are because I forgot to add all the places where the leather needs to be folded for attaching of hardware. The first halter will as mentioned be for my wife's horse, and the idea was that it could also serve as kind of an experimental piece. The next one was going to be for Cajou (Gustav's horse), and since that horse is shown off a lot more I would like that halter to be the nicest one. Notable f... ups so far: Sewing some of the straps a bit too tight to the rings. Forgetting to mount the D-ring, hence needing to incorporate it after stitching holes were made, plus it is mounted in a bit of a weird position now. Forgetting that to make a decent round cheek piece, the strap should be wider than 1" (I managed to make a somewhat decent job with the help of a lot of water). Forgetting to subtract the length of the carabiner from the cheek piece. So this is now technically 3" too long. Not bringing any correct square ring for assembling the lower part of the nose band. (I ended up modifying a conway buckle by means of a hacksaw and some silver soldering). Experimenting with chain stitches for embroidering the name of the horse on the headband. Not really taking into account that the headband should be lined, so the aforementioned letters are a bit too high. But at least the weather out here is nice... Sunday sitting in the afternoon sun. With my little toolbox. The leatherwork might not be the prettiest, but at least there's a fine view from the work station. Hanging on the emergency steering wheel.

@GrampaJoel OK, good luck with the sales :-) @fredk Sounds like a good idea.

@GrampaJoel Hi, is the Encyclopedia of Saddle making still for sale? Also how much do you want for the halter making book? And finally, I am based outside US, so would you be willing to ship them to Denmark? I'll pay the shipping off course. Brgds Jonas

I agree that the oval brass piece with 4 rivets look great! There was an Indian company that advertised on this forum about a week ago that could make just about anything. And they have a store in the US. I can only find one of his posts now. There was a fairly active discussion on the same posting in "saddle tack ressource" (If I remember correctly). I think he removed that post because the discussion turned a bit against his company. Long story short, they manufacture in India and showed pictures of workers with less than acceptable (by western standards) of PPE, drilling, machining, casting etc. just in flip flops and no safety gear whatsoever. Anyway, he can probably make the needed pieces for you. disclaimer: I am not affiliated with the globalmetalco etc. https://leatherworker.net/forum/topic/97280-brass-buckles-for-leather-belts-small-buckles-for-watch-straps-saddlery-and-hardware/?tab=comments#comment-660325

@Klara That is a little consolation indeed, but I would still like to learn how to make a Western saddle, just because it seems like an interesting and satisfying project :-) @TomE Thanks, I wrote Tandy yesterday, so unless they revert to me Monday that they are able to get the book, I'll try to contact Springfield Leather. I would prefer to get it from Tandy Europe because the Danish government has enforced some ridiculously strict policies regarding stuff sent from the rest of the world. If I buy a book from USA, there will be a 10% import duty, on top of that 25% VAT, and on top of that a handling fee of 30 US $... So it is not that I prefer Tandy above other suppliers, but I prefer to keep my own hard earned money instead of paying them in weird taxes

@OLESKIVER Thanks for the suggestion, I'll try to check out Tandy or one of the other stores you mentioned again. The information about how the saddle should fit the horse is very interesting since that seems to be a topic where there is a lot of confusion and generally not that much real knowledge. I know that I won't be an expert by reading a book, but it should hopefully make me a bit more knowledgeable about what to look for. I can't offer you love for your book, but I would have offered you money in the rare hope that you had decided that you didn't need the book anyway (not gonna happen I suppose ) Just before going back to sea, I had someone asking me if I could change the girth strap on a saddle. I have to admit that I felt a bit nervous when I had to cut open part of the old stitching to get to the steel part of the tree. It was the forward strap that was damaged, and that one is riveted to the steel, so I had to take that saddle apart and then sew it back together. The saddle ended up better than when I got it, and my sewing wasn't in any way worse than what was on it before. Just out of curiosity, what is the special tool that you are mentioning? Brgds Jonas

@OLESKIVER I wanted to buy that book, but it is sold out from Tandy, and I have never tried to buy anything from ebay where it might be possible to find it. (I might be a bit weird in that respect). I would love to get my hands on it, but so far I haven't found a copy for sale. There was one on this forum for sale I thin two years ago, but it seems as those who got the book holds on to it - which I see as a sign of a good book. I would guess that there is a bit of difference between a Western saddle and a European saddle, but how much it is in terms of the actual leather parts I don't know. The design is different of course, but I would guess that a method of draping leather over a curved surface would work equally well regardless if the book was aimed at one or another type of saddle. The German book that I have bought covers saddle making in 48 pages, and I haven't read all of the chapter yet, but it seems pretty thorough. It covers regular saddles, saddles made with pig skin leather, army saddles, side saddles and saddles for circus horses It even specifically mentions the American Army saddle, which is a bit different to the German Army saddle.

@Klara I agree that most of the book is just of historical interest, but still some of the points are still valid but I wouldn't use it as a textbook for someone wanting to build a saddle. (well yes, actually I might ) I would suspect that the book would work really well as sort of a reference book if you had completed a classic saddler education. Last time we had a saddler around I never thought about asking him, I was simply awestruck by watching him work. Not that he did any direct work with his hands, but he just looked at Gustav riding a few rounds on the court, then Gustav was told to stop and he explained what he had seen. I initially thought that "come on, you have only seen the horse and rider trotting a little so you can't possible have an opinion already". I was SO wrong. He said that the width of the saddle was too wide and that could be seen due to this and this. He then showed med exactly what he could see, and then I was able to see it too. The iron in this particular saddle is of a type that you can't alter which he also knew just from looking at the saddle. So his advice was to get a specific lamb skin pad where we should ad some extra padding to make up for the slightly too wide iron. So all in all I was so impressed that I never thought about asking him about any books. etc. The funny thing is that we have had a lot of really good horse trainers looking at the equipage and they haven't been able to see that something was not 100% correct. Not that I am blaming them, since they did the best they could. I'm probably more blaming the general culture where people lure themselves into believing that having a friend looking at your saddle fit is just as good as having a trained saddler doing so. Though a good friend with knowledge can probably see more than you yourself if you are someone who is just starting in horses. But for us, the 100 Euro (I think it was) for a saddle check was all worth the money. without a doubt. sorry for the long answer, but I got a bit carried away On another note, I still think that I'll try to see if I can build a saddle based on the book, but my plan is to completely refurbish a couple of old pony saddles first that I have acquired. That way I hope to recognize the things that I have read in the book. And I can see if I was right or wrong in how I deciphered the text instructions.

@fredk I just checked those. I think they are the paperback versions that Fines Mundi sells. well at least they sell them on amazon. I already got the deluxe book :-) I was just trying to explain my "problems" with electronic books Translating a book like that seems to be a colossal task, but it sure would make for a fine book that could reach a broader audience if it was translated into English, and at the same time was written with normal letters.

@nickbor34 Thanks for the nice comment :-) I could see that fredk managed to find a seller who has it as a pdf file. So that could be a solution. But personally I like a nice bound book where I can smell and feel the paper. But again, the language is German and the letters are of the gothic version, so it isn't the easiest thing to read. Brgds Jonas

Beautiful work!

Ditto to what the others have said. My comment is mainly on the stitch length. The way the stitch length is adjusted in the moment form the pictures, it should do very fine stitches. maybe like 20 stitches per inch. And it looks more like 4 stitches per inch to me. I think that either the needle is not the correct length, or there could be some issues with the timing gears for the bobbin. From what I have read on this forum, the gears for those patchers aren't replaceable with the gears for the newer 29K71 series. And the original gears are very hard to find (I could be wrong here though). Also the absence of the cast iron table and the foot operation would stop me from buying it. A little bit of practice, and the foot operation seems natural - and makes for both hands to be free to help steer stuff around. Depending on what you want to make, I think that those small patchers are great machines. I have found a niche market in replacing zippers in riding boots using one like this machine. Not too difficult to do, and it provides a bit of money to pay for the hobby. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. Welcome to the forum :-)

That is one fine looking stallion! We didn't breed Cajou ourselves, I would like to but I have to accept the fact that there are people out there who has got more idea about breeding than I have :-) At the moment we have two gildings, Cajou (nicknamed Caj) and my wifes Danish warmblood Bernie (shortened to Bent). We used to have an old Dansih Warmblood mare a couple of years ago, but we had to have her put down due to old age. Gustav goes to our local stallion station Katrinelund once a week for lessons in jumping. They sure have some good looking horses out there. After the owner of the stallion station found out that I do a bit of leatherwork I have gotten a bunch of work from their side. Mending horse blankets, changing zippers in the boots of all the riders out there etc. When I get back home he has asked me to do a repair job on the "phantom". One of the stallions got a bit carried away after doing his thing, and bit the side of the phantom and tore the side up on it. Personally I have always liked Trakehners and I would love to get one. But being a seaman and away for half the time doesn't correspond well with having a horse with a bit of temper. So I am happy to just have a ride in the forest once in a while on my wife's horse.

@TomE Thanks for the nice words on the stitching. I think that Caj is pretty big too, but he needs to be to fit Gustav. Having a harmonic looking equipage is fairly important I think. Caj is a thoroughbred Holsteiner horse, and his line was bred for jumping, which is what Gustav competes in. They are doing pretty well considering that Gustav is not a pro rider, (he's training to become a carpenter). They mostly compete in regional classes and once in a while in some national classes as well. Bergen is a really nice place - but... there is a bit too much rain if I have to be completely honest :-) I hope that you had the chance to see the city in fine weather, cause that makes for a much better experience.