treeless saddles

[raftert]

Alright everyone,

I asked everyone about flex in a saddle tree and got great info, BUT, my sister in law is a prca barrell chaser and has two treeless saddles. First off they have a tree but the bars must be made of rubber or somthing like it because you can almost bend it in half. The stirrup leathers are connected to the skirt on a small D ring and the skirt and has a rubber or neophrene under the artificial wool.The construction is lacking in true craftsmanship, the tooling is worse than clicker tooling,and the stitching looks like 4 stitches per inch with a very loose bobbin tenision. She gave a substancial amount for these saddles because it is a treeless saddle.

What I would like from my most learned collegues is an opinion on these questions, 1. with this much flex would these saddles cause more sore backs because of a rubbing motion, 2 Is this a fad with salesmanship pushing a inferior product with a price tag of a true saddle, 3 If this saddle is truley inferior how as craftsman how do we educate people that this is a inferior product while promoting a quality without making the customer feel like true moron.

I know that telling the truth is imperative, but some people will not belive it, and I would like to counter ther arguments, or I am wrong and I need education on a better saddle design.

Thanks all of you

Tim

[bruce johnson]

Tim,

Thankfully they are a fad that seems to be going away out here. There are some that ride them, and they will buy every gimmick that comes along, feed every supplement and neutraceutical available, and have a trailer load of bits to run 4D times. I won't address the soring issue because there is at least one person on the forum who knows a whole lot more about this than I do. Regarding the second question - no doubt a fad, and I have yet to see one with any semblance of decent workmanship or structure. There are people who buy saddles based on who endorses them. Most of the endorsers are not riding their endorsed model when the bucks are up. As far as not making the rider feel like a moron. I just refuse to work on them when they start to fall apart. Someone probably has found a way to fix them better than when they are made, but I don't want that liability. Good saddles can almost always be repaired, anything less is disposable.