Saddle holders

Some of the products our little company makes are what is generally known as eventing inventory.

The idea behind this description is something you can use at any type of horse event where you will keep your horse(s) in a competition stable such as a giant tent stable. This will mean that you suddenly haven't got the access to the stuff you normally have at home such as holders for the halters and bridles, holders for the saddle blankets or for the saddle itself.

Generally people bring a saddle cabinet which is sort of a transportable cabinet on wheels with room for a saddle and other stuff. But in addition to this a lot of people like to have the stuff ready at hand and that is where our products excel.

For some time we have offered a saddle holder for two saddles. A lot of people like those because you can have the saddle on the upper peg and the saddle blanket in use on the lower peg. The spare saddle blankets are kept on a saddle blanket holder.

But we have had some inquiries for a saddle holder for one saddle. One of the ideas is that it takes up less space when you need to pack the trailer and your car, and some people keep the saddle blanket under the saddle even when it is stored during an event. 

This time at home I made one horse saddle holder. It is 20" high, and on the back of it there are two sheet metal hooks that are each 1.52" wide. These are used to hang the holder over the edge of the box where your horse is kept during the event.

The board is made of first grade pine, the edges are routed to look nice. The wood is then stained using some mahogany stain and finally it receives a double coat of spar varnish. That makes the stuff easy to wipe over with a damp cloth to remove all the dust that inevitably comes from being in a stable.

Saddle holders mounted on a pallet.

Single saddle holder.

A halter for Mette's horse

Last time I was out here, I ordered a reprint of an old German book on leatherwork. It is written in 1908 by a master saddler and covers everything you could wish to know about leatherwork including how to set up your own business with suggestions for various types of letters that you could be interested in sending out to e.g. customers, people who owe you money, newspapers etc. 

In that book there are some suggestions on how to make halters. And I thought that t would be interesting to make something from a set of plans instead of just copying one of the old halters like I have done previously. 

The measurements are pretty close to what I have made before (I guess the size of a horse's head hasn't changed much) but these plans also suggest that you make a head band. And that is new to me. I have only seen that on regular bridles. So before leaving for sea, I cut some leather straps and loaded my small box of leatherworking tools with me determined to try to make such a halter. I also ordered some hardware so I could make something that looked nice, instead of simply cannibalizing an old halter for cheap steel parts. So this time it is new cast brass parts.

It is funny that I can easily feel that I am not that accustomed to working in leather compared to working in wood. So my initial rough calculations on how much leather I would need is off. I had brought enough leather with me to be able to make two halters (I thought), but I only have material for one and a half. 
Also despite trying to think ahead, I make small mistakes. It is not that these are deal breakers, but I am pretty sure that they are avoidable if I had more experience. The good thing is that I am able to recognize some of them, and I have corrected a few along the way, so I still try to only make the same mistake once or twice.

At the moment we are sailing across the Atlantic, following the north east trade winds (Passat). We passed Cap Verde the other day, and the temperature of the sea water is 28 dgC, and the air temperature is the same during the night, but a lot higher during the day due to the sun. So it is nice to have a project that I can do outside instead of having to work in a super hot shop. At the moment I am working on the headband itself, so that is not yet in the pictures.

My work station on the poop deck.

The view is quite nice.

Halter hanging on the emergency steering wheel. (also on the poop deck)

Anatomic breastplate for Caj (Gustav's horse) glamour shots

 In February when I had to sign on the ship, the Covid 19 restrictions required that I had to go to Norway and sit for 10 days in a quarantine hotel before flying with the rest of the crew down to Tenerife to meet the ship.  As you might remember, I made a breastplate of leather instead of sitting idle all the time.

When I came back, Gustav tested it and found that a few of the pieces were a bit too long. This time while at home I found the time to fix those small things, and I snapped a couple of glamour shots of the breastplate mounted on Caj.

For some reason my inadequate camera skills have made it look like Caj is a small horse. That is not the case! He measures 1.72 m above the shoulders (17 hands).

Gustav and Caj

Anatomic breastplate 

Could I come outside please?

Making an anatomic breastplate for Gustavs horse

I like to work a bit in leather occasionally, and leatherwork gear is even easier than woodworking gear to bring onboard a ship. From before my dad got really ill, I had purchased some leather meant for making a breastplate that I had seen, and Gustav and I had measured his horse to get an idea of the size of the piece. I had made a sketch and sort of left it all due to making a coffin and all that followed.

This time due to the pandemic, I have had to stay 10 days in quarantine in a hotel in Norway. I have a hard time expressing how much I dislike sitting idle in a hotel room, so before heading out, I had made a bunch of leather straps ready and found my sketch so I could sit in the hotel room and do a bit of leatherwork. 

I had brought some basic tools with me, and a piece of 1/4" plywood, so I had a place to do cutting without damaging the hotel furniture.

A thing that I didn't bring was something to polish the edges of the leather after assembly, so I'll make some sort of polishing disc when I get onboard and then make the edges look really nice too. At the moment they look a bit dull.

All of it mounted and laid out on the bed.

Repair of leather halter for Bent

While I am at home, I like to go to the forest for a walk with Bertha. The best days are the Thursdays, because Mette has got that day off. We have started kind of a tradition where I walk Bertha and Mette brings Bent (her horse).
I go for one "round", and Mette and Bent moving faster takes two rounds, Then we meet up and go for a walk in a small group with Bertha in the lad, I follow her and Bent follows exactly in my footsteps, so Mette can loosen the reins of him.

The Thursday before I went back to work, and Despite Mettes warnings, I tried to tie Bent to the side of the trailer while I helped to put on his saddle.
Bent is a very calm horse, but he doesn't like to be tied to a trailer, and he demonstrated that very clearly by jerking his head forcefully - and breaking the leather halter.

Mette got a bit irritated, since she had told me this, but I calmed her down by promising her that I would repair the damage. After all I made the halter myself about a year ago, so I knew that I could do it.

As it can be seen in the pictures, Bent broke a piece of hardware and snapped a piece of the leather.

I guess it took something like half an hour to repair the halter, and it was an easy job to do on board. I had brought a few leather working tools with me, and a strip of leather in the correct width.

Broken piece of hardware.

Snapped leather.

What's the magic word?

Well, the magic word will surely depend on the situation.
Quite often the correct answer will be please.

But sometimes please just doesn't do it. A stronger more magic word is required.

Back in 1992 I spent some months in Minnesota, and I had the privilege of being allowed to help out at auctions held by the then oldest auctioneer company in Minnesota: "Fred Radde and sons, auctioneers and realtors"
Fred the main auctioneer knew the magic word for Minnesotan auctions was "Fish house". If an old crappy sofa or chair was unsaleable, calling it a fish house chair would instantly spark the interest in the crowd and someone would buy it for their fish house for the coming winter season of ice fishing (a great sport by the way). Fred's next comment would usually be in line with: "buy it now and leave it on the ice, in the spring it will be gone".
He really knew how to make a good atmosphere and that stimulated people to buy, and all in all it contributed to a nice event with lots of laughter and good deals.

Now in my case "fish house" wont do it. "Please" works sometimes, but "HORSE" works every single time.

If I need to start a new project:
"Honey, I'll go mill some wood to make some saw dust to spread in the stable for the horses to sleep in".
Such an approach will be greatly appreciated, in contrast to e.g.:
"Honey, I'll start building a new workbench"

There are a number of situations where you can use the magic word, tool purchases, classes etc. the imagination is the limit.

In reality you want to say: While I don't really need this tool, I am sure it would impress someone reading my blog.
Chances are that my request will be frowned upon and quickly be discarded as not essential for the household.
If I on the other hand say something like this:
"If I buy this tool, I could make a really nice cupboard for the saddle room, so you can easily organize the tendon boots for the horses."

I am sure you get the idea.

So I am thinking that a lot of the advice offered for aspiring woodworkers start in the wrong place such as:
Advice for a beginners tool kit.
What planes to buy and when.
The first saw you should get.
And so on....

A much better place to start would be by finding the magic word. The very word that will allow you to invest time and money in your hobby and being thanked for it. Now that is something that isn't described in a lot of "how to posts" for people wanting to get into woodworking.

We are not talking complicated psychology here, a good look at your wife's hobbies will most likely give an idea of what the magic word could be, Here are a couple of suggestions that might work, but remember like in Harry Potter, there is always the risk of a magic spell backfiring on you, so be careful!

Sewing room.
Interior decoration.
Gardening (this one is dangerous because you could end up using a shovel all day long instead).
Bespoke baking supplies.
Wickerwork
Shoe cabinets
Doll house (this one might make it difficult to justify getting a portable saw mill)
Art supplies.

Finally, you shouldn't feel bad about using a magic word, because I am fairly certain that we are under their spell most of the time anyway.

Carved name sign for Milo

Gustav or middle son was offered to ride a pony by a breeder. This is an excellent pony that is capable of jumping far higher than our old pony.
Our old pony was sold due to the fact that Gustav wanted to move on to new challenges and I was very proud that someone thought that highly of his skills as to offer him a pony to ride.

The deal is that he can ride the pony, and we'll feed him and pay the farrier etc.
A pony of this caliber would be out of the question if we would have had to pay for it ourselves. And I know that one day the breeder might choose to sell the pony which is perfectly OK, because she will probably have another pony ready at that time that he will then hopefully be offered instead.

With Milo now in our stable I felt obliged to carve a name sign for him like I have done for our other horses and ponies so far.

I didn't have any nice boards left from the pilot ladder that I used for the last name sign, so I had to settle for a spruce board from a pallet.
The carving turned out OK, but the difference in color of the grain makes it hard to see the outline of the horse. I think this will improve if the sign is painted or maybe just varnished. I will discuss it with Gustav and then let him decide.

I used my usual technique for the letters, but instead of carving the logo of the New Forest ponies I opted for a silhouette of a horse that is jumping. The logo of the NF ponies looks kind of like an atomic cloud to me, so that's why I didn't choose it.
For some reason there is a larger distance between the L and the O than with the rest of the letters. I think the problem is that the L has sort of an open side and the O can't "intrude" that space. But It is how the name came out of the printer.

The layout.

The third board from the left looked fine to me.

Tools used for the carving.

The completed sign.

Close up of the horse silhouette.

Japanese end joint (Kanawa tsugi)

Inspired by a comment from Sylvain yesterday I found out that I had actually earlier installed a Japanese joint the "wrong" way.
According to the book "The complete Japanese joinery), most of the end joints are supposed to be mounted with the scarfed part vertically. This makes a lot of sense to me, but traditionally in Denmark and it seems also in the USA, those joints are positioned to the scarfed joint is horizontal.

No matter which way you orient it, it is still a pretty cool looking joint in my eyes.

The Kanawa tsugi is translated in the book as a: Half blind tenoned, dadoed and rabbeted scarf joint.

I made four of those in 2011 when I built the interior of the stable. I needed a beam of 14.2 m length out of some 6x6" timber. It doesn't hold any load, but it had to look sturdy to blend in.
The beam holds the upper ends of the posts that form the front corners of the boxes for the horses and also the door openings for the boxes (stalls).

Back when I made the joints, I didn't take any pictures of them, since I hadn't started blogging. But here are a couple of pictures that shows them installed.

Complete joint with cobwebs and dust on 6x6" timber.

The upper beam is made out of four individual

 lengths each joined with Kanawa tsugi end joints.

A peg board for rugs (for horses)

The local horse club have arranged an event. It is in essence a competition, but with the small difference is that it will be possible to discuss the result with the judges after the class, so you can get an idea of what could be improved upon, and most importantly how you should improve on it yourself.
At normal events you get a critique, but you can't discuss it with the judges to get some tips to help you move on.

I have told my wife that I would like to sponsor a prize. Due to the time restraint (the event will take place Saturday), I have decided to make a peg board for rugs.

Organizing rugs is a well known challenge for people with horses in climates such as ours. A horse is expected to have the same amount of rugs as a modern city woman has got pairs of shoes..
A couple of years ago I made two peg boards for our rugs, and it is by far the most efficient solution I have seen. If the peg board is placed high enough on the wall, the rug can just hang like a normal persons coat without touching the floor. It makes it easy to see the different rugs and find the one you need.

The pegs were turned on the lathe from ash. Each peg is around 7" long and ends in a turned tenon of 1" in diameter.
A kerf is sawn in the tenon to accommodate a wedge.

The board itself is a 5" board with a thickness of 1.25". I have used one of my newly rehabbed moulding planes on the edge to make it look nice.
First I start by planing the moulding on the ends. To avoid the grain from tearing out, I mount a piece of scrap board of the same height behind the area I am planing. That way the plane starts in the actual board, and ends in a sacrificial board and tear out is avoided.
There is still a bit of tear out, since the plane is not designed to cut across the grain. But looks OK.

6 holes were drilled in the board to receive the tenons of the pegs.
The pegs were glued in and secured with a wedge.

I didn't make any holes in the board for mounting it, because those will need to be established on site.

Peg board for horse rugs.

Moulding on the end and close up of a peg.

Length 6' 

Carved name sign for Bernie

I found a piece of wood from an old pilot ladder that was broken, and since the name of the horse is of an appropriate length, the piece of wood was just the right size.

At first I ripped the plank to the desired width, then it was re sawed to a thickness of around 5/8"

I flattened the stock with my plane and squared the edges.

As usual, I taped on a print out of the name to be carved, and I also taped on two logos for the Danish Warmblood horse.

Transferring the outline of the letters to the wood is done by following the outline with a hobby knife. Just a bit more pressure than what is needed to cut through the paper results in a thin line on the wood that I use while carving.

The carving was done in my normal way i.e. with a hobby knife. For the rounded parts of the B and the R, I used a small scalpel like carving tool intended for carving linoleum. It was a bit easier for me to make the rounding look nice with the smaller tool.

The logos were also carved by means of the small scalpel.

When I get home, I plan on painting the name sign. It will be red background with white letters and white logos.

The carved name sign.

The broken step from a pilot ladder.

Layout of the name sign.

Yet another name sign for a horse.

We have had the newest horse for almost three quarter of a year now, and I have to admit that I have never taken the time to make a decent name sign for him. He too deserves a nice sign to hang outside his box in the stable, so visitors can see that he is a cherished member of our family on line with the other horses.

I will use my standard method of a hobby knife aided by my cheap linoleum cutting gouges.
His full name is Forum's Bernie, but I'll just make a sign saying Bernie.

He is not a pure bred horse, but something called: Danish Warmblood. It is a breeding federation where all kinds of horses and breeds are accepted, as long as they are warm blooded horses. So you can mix other warmblooded horses that you might like, and get the foal listed in this register. The main idea is to make a ride-able horse with fine qualities in various situations (as far as I have understood)

As far as I remember, some of his pedigree is Hannoveran and Trakehner, but there is also some Danish Warmblood in the lines too.
It is a very popular breed of horses in Denmark, and they are doing all right in various International competitions, with dressage as the main focus as far as I have been able to tell.

Danish Warmblood has got their own logo which is pretty simple to carve. It is a crown with a wavy line beneath it.

All I have to do now is to pull myself together and start the project by finding a suitable piece of wood and plane it flat. Well, maybe tomorrow will be the starting day for that.

Logo of Danish Warmblood horses

Portable wooden tack box

Before leaving for the sea last time, Gustav started making a tack box for his grooming supplies for the horse.
He wanted to try his hands out on dovetailing, so the design is like a small dovetailed chest with a skirt and there will be a hinged lid.

We wanted to keep the weight as low as possible, so I found some of boards I made out of Sitka spruce a some years ago. I had a single 12" board left, so we used that for the sides.
The bottom is made out of ship-lapped larch boards, since larch is harder and more rot resistant than spruce. I figured that since the box will sit on the floor in a stable for most of the time, this was a sensible choice.

I showed Gustav how to make the dovetails, and the sides were made with tails first, and a small rabbet on the inside.
It was nice to see him being so serious about it, and he quickly became used to using the dovetail saw and a chisel.

Today we helped each other making the skirt, but due to the temperature in the workshop we moved it inside for the glue up.

Gustav still has to decide on the design of the interior of the box. he has talked about some tills for the smaller stuff, so that will probably be the way we go.

boards for the sides and ends.

Concentration.

Chopping out waste.

More chopping. 

End view.

Tack box before mounting the skirt.

Sawing a part for the skirt to the correct length.

Carving a name sign with a utility knife, part 2

A couple of hours of work was all that required to complete the letters. There are a few tool marks left behind, but after all it is also a hand made sign, so it shouldn't necessarily look like it was moulded in plastic.

The profiles of horses at the ends of the board are my first attempt on carving something that elaborate. One of the challenges compared to letters is the fact that there aren't that many straight lines on a horse.

My first idea was to carve the horse in the same way as the letters, so the shape would be a depression. After looking at the horse I ruled that idea out. The ears and legs are pretty thin, so I think it would have looked strange to carve it that way.

Instead I decided to carve around the horse, so the horse itself will stand proud of the surrounding area.

For this part of the carving I had to stray away from the notion of using inly a utility knife.
This spring at the annual flea market held by the local shop in the village, I was given a small set of carving chisels that looks like they were intended to be used for carving linoleum .
They were far from sharp, and looked pretty cheaply made.
I guess they are from the 70'ies or the 80'ies, based on that they are made in Japan. Newer chisels of that sort would most likely be made in China or India.

I sharpened a pointed scalpel shaped chisel and a small gouge.

I traced the outline of the horse with the scalpel shaped chisel, and removed the material around the horse using the small gouge. This was actually easier that I had imagined, and I think the end result looks OK.

If I was going to paint the sign, I would paint the background red, the depressions should be white. That would give white letters and two red horses on a white background. I think that would look good. But it will be up to my friend if she wants to paint it or not.

The completed name sign.

My Linoleum carving chisels used for carving the horse profiles.

Carving a name sign with a hobby knife.

One of my good friends had to have her old horse put down due to old age. I had carved a name sign for that horse, and she asked me if I would make her another one in case she got herself a new horse.
I told her that I would be happy to make her a new sign for her future horse. About half a year ago, she told me that she had bought herself a new horse.

I was excited, and also a bit scared, because some horses have incredible long names, and I would hate having to carve a name like  "Vognmandsgårdens Marli" (An actual name of a pony that we once looked at).
Luckily my friend's new horse didn't have quite such a fancy name. Even though it isn't exactly short either.
Some breeds of horses have their own "symbol", and I have previously carved the symbol of Danish warm-blood horses, which is fairly straight forward: A crown and a wavy line below it.

Since her new horse is a mix of two different breeds, I opted for the logo of one of them: the logo of the PRE (Pura Raza Española) It is a horse seen in profile, and I think I'll be able to make it look OK.

I write the name I am going to carve in a Word document, and for my name previous carving projects I have used the font: Clarendon bold. But since it is not available on this computer, I have found another font that is OK for carving too: Mongolian Baiti size 160.

After printing out a document with the name, I tape it to the board I am going to carve. In this instance the board is made out of the longest step from the salvaged pilot ladder. This wood is rather soft, so it should be fine for my type of carving.
I measure the distance from the top and bottom of the letters to the edges of the board to make sure they are in the middle.

The next step is to take a hobby knife with a new blade. If it is of the break of type, I break of one piece of the blade to have a fresh edge.

Using a light cut, the letters are carved out of the paper. The trick is to use just enough pressure to leave a very fine line in the surface of the wood. Sometimes the letters are very close to each others, on this sign the lower part of the I and the X are almost touching. In that case I just move the line a bit so there will be a small space between the individual letters.
Once that is done, I remove the remains of the paper.

I start by cutting in the middle of the fat line on one of the letters. I try to hold the knife at an angle of approximately 60 degrees sideways.
Once I have obtained a small V shaped ditch, I gradually make it wider and deeper, taking care to maintain the centre of the V shaped ditch in the middle.

To get into the rhythm of carving again, I normally start on some of the easier letters. I.e. all the ones that are not round or curved. In this name the only difficult letter is the S.

I have decided to leave the horse profiles on for a little bit longer while I try to muster the courage to try carving them.

A good source of light will greatly aid the work.

The sign with taped on templates.

Carving out the letters of the templates.

Hard to see, but there are faint lines of the letters.

The approximate side angle  while carving.

The first steps of carving.

The painted door in the stable.

Today it wasn't raining, so I decided to move swiftly and paint the door.

I normally like to use oil base paint, since I haven't got much faith in latex /acrylic paints.
The colour is called Swedish red. It is a Danish produced paint from Esbjerg Paints. The label of this paint is called Arsinol, it is intended for outdoor use.

The paint has got some added thickener (I think it is called thixotropic), so it doesn't drip very much. It covers really well, so all in all I find it an OK paint.

The handle is placed high up on the door, but since the holding arrangement for the latch is also embedded in the brick work, I had to stay with that position.

The outside.

The inside.