VanHornSaddlery Report post Posted February 11, 2009 Hello, I really enjoy this forum and have learned a lot. I have another question. What does everybody use to hold the seat into the cantle when you are installing the seat? I use shot bags to hold the seat down while the glue is setting up. Is there a better way to do it? Like a clamp or something that could be used in the seat dish to hold the seat back? In the Stohlman books they use a fairly wide drawdown strap. I tried that but still have to throw the shot bags in there to hold everything down. Any other ideas? Thanks. Jake Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
D.A. Kabatoff Report post Posted February 11, 2009 Jake, When I initially fit a seat, I make sure it is sunk well enough into the dish of the cantle that there is no movement when you push the leather in the cantle area... I do this with my bouncer. When I go to glue my seat to the tree, I have no need at all for weights. I usually put a coat of glue on the seat and one on the tree and let them set up for a few hours. Next, I take a spray bottle to the whole seat to get a little moisture in it, especially at the top of the seat that will be covered by the binding. I then put a heavier second coat of glue on both the seat and tree and while the glue is still wet I fit the seat onto the tree; the wet glue allows me to move the seat around to the exact position I want it to be when dry. I use my draw down strap to pull the seat down tight; this will naturally pull the leather away from the cantle and allows air to circulate between the leather and the tree in the cantle area so the glue can set up. After about an hour I remove the drawdown strap and simply press the seat into the cantle area and if the seat has no tooling I will use my bouncer again to make sure it is really pressed down. If there is carving of stamping in the cantle area I protect it by placing an old piece of belly leather over the cantle face and then rub on top of the belly leather. A couple of times I have had to remove seats after I glued them in this fashion and basically destroyed them trying to get them off because they were stuck down a little too well. I'm fitting a seat today so I took a couple of photos. In the first photo you should be able to see how the leather sits right into the dish of the cantle; in this photo there is no tension on the drawdown strap so the leather in the cantle area is sitting tight against the tree. The second photo shows how the seat moves away from the tree in the cantle area when tension is put on the drawdown strap. Not all straps will do this but because of the shape of my strap, it puts more tension up into the dish of the cantle. hope this helps, Darc Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
VanHornSaddlery Report post Posted February 11, 2009 Thanks for the reply and the pictures. I think I am going to reengineer my drawdown strap with more of the belly and the contour back into the seat that yours has. I have a seat to put in here shortly and I think I'll try your gluing process too. Thanks again for the info, I really appreciate it. Jake Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Gregg Report post Posted February 12, 2009 Darc, Just wondering how much of a bevel you put on the edges on your strap? You have a good design and thanks for sharing the pictures. Gregg Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
D.A. Kabatoff Report post Posted February 12, 2009 Gregg, My strap is about 14 oz leather and has about a 1 1/4" bevel. The edges of the leather are about 2oz... if you take them too thin the strap will tear in areas that have alot of tension. The bottom side of the strap (side that goes against the seat) was edged with a very fine edger so that it doesn't leave an outline of the strap on your seat. Darc Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Gregg Report post Posted February 13, 2009 Darc, Thanks, I'm getting the edges to thin. I'll try that with the edger. Gregg Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
