Great Topic!!
Leia, I saw you mention sliding backbands - I'd love more info. I looked at chimacum tacks web site and didn't see anything about ssb.
I'm after a harness that will be most beneficail for the horse. I've thought a SBB would be great esp. for trail driving on unlevel and/or rough terrain.
Please give opinions on Sliding backbands. Are they commonly used? I've never even seen an ad for 1.
Could a ssb harness and/or freedom collar be used in the show ring (local 4-H type shows)? Trail driving is much more fun than showing but we like to hit a few local shows too.
Seems like the Freedom collar is highly reccomended - can it adjust to fit multiple horses or is it made to fit each individual?
Thank you all for the info. in this thread!
You guys are good for me- you're forcing me to upload pictures I meant to do ages ago!
So on a standard single horse harness saddle in the U.S., typically the tugs are hung from two separate straps which are fixed to each side of the saddle by screws. They can swing forwards and backwards along the horse's sides but cannot move up and down to allow for the way one shaft raises if you drive along the side of a hill. In the U.K. and other more traditional driving countries that kind of saddle is frowned upon for two-wheeled vehicles. Instead they will often use what's called a "gig saddle" which is very wide and heavily padded in order to distribute the weight of a heavy gig cart across the horse's back. Gig saddles also have one other standard feature: a sliding backband. A sliding backband is just what it sounds like- the tugs are hung from one continuous strap that slides through a channel in the saddle, allowing the tugs to roll slightly around the barrel of the horse in order to keep the pressure even on uneven ground. This design allows the overgirth to remain snug at all times but prevents that situation where one tug is pulling down hard on the saddle and the other one is up in the air pulling on the overgirth. With a properly padded and treed saddle that's bad enough as it puts a lot of pressure on one side of the spine...with a typical mini saddle which is basically a flat leather pad you're going to get the saddle rolling around the barrel unless you cinch it so tight the horse can't breathe!
OH! But with a SBB saddle the tugs will simply shift to follow the pull of the shafts, leaving the saddle itself untouched and the horse merrily driving along without interference from the cart.
So quick answers are yes, the SBB is very common in Europe but not here in the U.S. It is gaining popularity as more and more people learn to ask for it. You won't usually see it advertised but many manufacturers will make one if asked including Smuckers, Camptown, and I presume Chimacum since they use the same harness maker as Camptown.
Here are a couple of pictures of a Camptown mini SBB prototype I got to see in person at the National Drive in KY last October.
Closeup of the channel the backband runs through:
The tugs pulled to the left:
The tugs pulled to the right:
This one didn't slide quite as easily as I might like to see and the keepers on the bottom were too high to allow much movement but some WD40 and one quick modification would fix that.
Here's a SBB saddle by Barb Lee that our local Intermediate competitor Merridy Hance uses at Happ's:
As you can see there isn't much visible difference until you're up close so you could certainly use these saddles in any show ring and the judge would probably never even notice. Merridy's has a couple of metal brackets that the backband runs through near the terrets instead of having it go through a channel of leather; either one works fine although Merridy's slides very nicely.
The Freedom Collar is available in standard A or B mini sizes althought the strap length is customizable if you want them shorter or longer. It wouldn't fit in well in the breed ring but is common at CDE's and I'd think would be perfectly acceptable at small local shows of the kind where most people are using EE carts. It might not look as traditional as a patent-enhanced straight breastcollar but if your horse moves better in it that should more than make up for any aesthetic lack.
Hope that helped!
Leia
