Cheap saddles and why you should avoid them

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Redequus

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A very false economy. Bear in mind that your horse can feel a fly on his back, so no amount of padding will make a badly fitting saddle feel ok, even if they put up with it. Somebody gave me a cheap saddle, after trying it on my horse and saying it fitted him (a little knowledge being a dangerous thing). I took it home and took a knife to it, inside was this;

Rusty, asymmetrical, cheap untreated wood, twisted metal, studs not in properly, 'flocking' is carpet wool - in balls of varying sizes, gappy, uneven, bits of paper & string included. Bargain.

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Yikes!

Was this cheap as cheap to buy new, or cheap as in it was once a decent saddle but has now been reduced to this as a second hand job?
 
This was brand new!! :(

Metalmare, even if it was 30 years old it would have never been any good because it's not made right at all. Bloody cheapskates!
How many decent, good intentioned people are unwittingly putting this crap on their horses without knowing?
 
Unreal.

Hmmm, I was asking because I want to buy my horse a new saddle and I wanted to choose a respectable English brand, made in England, but perhaps get a second hand one. Something that cost in the 1000 pound mark new, but is now say 300-400 from a respected saddler.

Do I still risk this?
 
Bl**dy hell !! That is scary. I doubt it had a brand of any kind. More likely a cheap ebay saddle, new for £100 from eastern Europe.
 
metalmare said:
Unreal.

Hmmm, I was asking because I want to buy my horse a new saddle and I wanted to choose a respectable English brand, made in England, but perhaps get a second hand one. Something that cost in the 1000 pound mark new, but is now say 300-400 from a respected saddler.

Do I still risk this?
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It is exactly what I do. You can't go wrong with a decent English made saddle. I like Ideals myself, horses love them and they last for ever., there is one advertised on our local horse group on FB, £350 I think and immaculate, they are £1,000 new.
 
No you're right it wasn't a named make... although I have heard one of the more reputable British brands aren't as good quality as they have us believe..

Second hand well made saddles are fine, I'd get it reflocked if possible and checked properly for fit, as they will 'mould' to others to an extent. :)
The (unqualified) person who 'fitted' mine didn't even see it was bridging so badly you could have rolled a penny under it!!
 
Yeah, definitely regular re-flocks. I'm planning to buy from a saddler, so I'm would hope they would select the most suitable saddle for his shape then tailor it in the first instance.
 
Redequus said:
No you're right it wasn't a named make... although I have heard one of the more reputable British brands aren't as good quality as they have us believe..

Second hand well made saddles are fine, I'd get it reflocked if possible and checked properly for fit, as they will 'mould' to others to an extent. :)
The (unqualified) person who 'fitted' mine didn't even see it was bridging so badly you could have rolled a penny under it!!
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Did you get your money back? Or at least send them the pictures, these people probably wouldn't know how to check for a broken tree. Which is something to be aware of when buying saddles.

Well done for posting.
 
No I didn't pay for it, it was given to me. It's the second saddle I've ripped up, I could have sold both but my conscience would never let me inflict such a device on some poor horse who's owner wouldn't know what it was like. So many behavioural problems are our horses trying to tell us they're uncomfortable or in pain, and we just don't realise.
 
metalmare said:
Unreal.

Hmmm, I was asking because I want to buy my horse a new saddle and I wanted to choose a respectable English brand, made in England, but perhaps get a second hand one. Something that cost in the 1000 pound mark new, but is now say 300-400 from a respected saddler.

Do I still risk this?
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siennamum said:
It is exactly what I do. You can't go wrong with a decent English made saddle. I like Ideals myself, horses love them and they last for ever., there is one advertised on our local horse group on FB, £350 I think and immaculate, they are £1,000 new.
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I have three trees which I use for teaching, all of which came out of 2nd hand (20 years old and younger) named brand saddles , all of which look very similar to the pictures above - instruments of torture which people unwittingly use on their horses every day :mad:
 
OMG .....do you have any before pictures...???!!

Also the comment about used swabs and bandages inside one made me feel quite ill....!! :eek:
 
I ride day to day in a rather cheap saddle. Wasn't off eBay and was from a reputable well-known tack shop. Must say this has worried me slightly. It fits the ned like a glove and she's happy in it, it's just the safety aspect that's dawned on me.
 
That is quite horrifying.
I had a conversation with my saddler the other day, I need a new saddle as mine doesn't fit anymore (it's a decent well made frank Baines saddle, not like the one pictured here) but like I said to her and she totally agreed, a lot of horse owners have no clue as to how well their saddle fits, myself being included in this and unluckily for me I have a VERY tollerent horse who shows NO signs of discomfort with anything including pain from injury and the likes.
I really do think there should be courses similar to those that teach horse care for example to make people more aware of what they are doing when it comes to saddles.
I have also decided to get a new saddle fitted to my horse as I just don't want to risk 'not knowing' if my saddle fits or not with a horse like mine. I think there would be a lot less horses with saddle related issues if this help was out there for the everyday owner.
 
That's pretty standard or rhinegolds, gallop and other cheap brands.

Shame you didn't show the wooden tree at the back: one of the ones I took to bits still had the transport companies stamp on the wood, from the pallet it was made of. I know someone who you and coke can patching the tree.
 
Quite right about the cheap saddles, I've even found newsparer and ladies tights used as flocking in them before now!
BUT on the other hand, just because the saddle is expensive or English doesn't mean it's good, you can't always tell from the outside.
There's a few stripped down expensive saddles made in Walsall in my "chamber of horrors" in my workshop.
Fooled me too until I stripped them down, one a well known and respected English make uses cut off webbing simply tacked up into the tree to hold the front girth straps on, a crude, cheap dangerous short cut. The front girth strap webbing should go OVER the tree and be one piece, so with pressure it bears down on the tree. The method they have used with the cut off webbing as previously described means if the horse applied a sudden bought of pressure, say like collecting themselves up and going over a jump, the front girth webbing could in theory pull straight out of the tree, the front straps would then break free of the saddle.Doesn't bear thinking about as you sail over that 5 foot jump does it?
The second saddle in my chamber of horrors, not ONLY has this short girth web method but it has homemade trees made out of, wait for it, plywood!
A soft crude tree with no strength at all, they usually break across the gullt plate, that's why I had so many in for repairs.
The wooden tree should be laminated beechwood set in a hot press and covered in muslin, beechwood is a hardwood and much stronger, the plywood was made out of pine, a soft wood!
Both these "named" brands were hiding dangerous secrets.
 
The problem is Oz that people generally don't realise what is inside their saddle at all. It looks all lovely on the outside, maybe has a smart maker's stamp or plate on it, saying Walsall or something similar, and is actually something horrendous made out of odd bits of scrap wood, metal and webbing. One of mine has the cut off webbing (a Walsall make) and another is just patched together bits of wood which are nailed together and the nail ends bent any which way.

I do run saddle fitting and saddlery courses for riders, and they are all horrified when I produce these trees because it's simply never occurred to them to question what exactly is inside their saddle :(
 
Rowreach said:
The problem is Oz that people generally don't realise what is inside their saddle at all. It looks all lovely on the outside, maybe has a smart maker's stamp or plate on it, saying Walsall or something similar, and is actually something horrendous made out of odd bits of scrap wood, metal and webbing. One of mine has the cut off webbing (a Walsall make) and another is just patched together bits of wood which are nailed together and the nail ends bent any which way.

I do run saddle fitting and saddlery courses for riders, and they are all horrified when I produce these trees because it's simply never occurred to them to question what exactly is inside their saddle :(
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Yes, I agree, that is the problem, they look ok on the outside even having hand sewn skirts rather than machined which denotes time taken to make it by hand so you'd expect quality but when you look inside it's often not what it seems!
I used to fit one of these brands round yards regularly until I had to strip one down, now I don't touch them with a barge pole!
Oz :)
 
I recently saw a very well known and very expensive (1.5k plus) English saddle tree, I was shocked on the quality of the tree and what it was made off. It looked like it was at least 30 years old!!
 
Am I right in thinking that at least checking that your stirrup bar is stamped with a british standard mark is a good place to start? Given that most peeps are going to be wanting to take their saddles apart to check :)
 
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