Here's a simple set of instructions to create westen tack for your 1/6 scale horses. Pictured here is a Marx Destiny, but this saddle also fits the 1/6 scale Dragon Blitz horse.

Material Required Materials Needed: Leather saddle Leather glue 6mm-9mm washers Brass brads or small nails Light weight tooling leather Leather Dye Clamps of assorted sizes. If you don't have clamps clothes pins will do.

Shameless plug. Here's a lovely leather western saddle with tooling, a suede saddle seat and silver studs. Firebird sells them, and they fit 1/6 scale horses.

Saddle Large G-ELSADDLELG $15.00 USD Quantity: View Shopping Cart Order by Mail

Leather dye applied to the saddle on the right. This is light brown dye, and will be applied to all the leather, both new and old to blend the parts together.

Parts for the cinch ring. Several types of washers and lock washers. These all range from 6mm to 8mm. Tooling leather strap in natural color, this is about 1/4 inch wide and about 2 inches long.

Fold the dyed strap in half, and trim the edges to better fit around the ring. Apply leather glue, clamp and let dry.

Insert the cinch ring with strap between the skirt of the saddle and the seat. There will be space right before the stirrup fender to tuck the leather strap inside. Trim the end of the leather strap so that after the leather has been inserted between the layers of leather, the ring rest on the edge of the saddle skirt.

Clamp with the biggest clamp you can find. This strap will take all the strain of the girth holding the saddle to the horse, so use good glue and let it set firmly. Repeat for the other side. Use a half hitch to attach the girth strap to the cinch ring.

Stirrups Cut four leather strips, about 4 inches long and 3/8 inch wide. The ones used for this project were just under 4 inches long and a centimeter wide. The proportions looked right for the saddle and the boots of the action figure.

Glue the flesh sides of two of the straps together and fit to the boot of the action figure. It is important to bend the leather around the boot right after the strap has been glued. The inside strap will have a shorter path to follow so that the ends will not meet up exactly. Let dry and then trim the ends.

Punch a hole in both sides of the top of the stirrup leathers. If you have a leather punch, great, if not use a nail and a hammer to go through both layers of leather. Pictured to the right are two brass brads bent at a right angle. Any type of small nail can be used, brad are soft metal, easy to bend, and have a nice rounded head that looks decorative and blends in with the existing decoration on the saddle.

Here's how the bent brad gets used. Add to the saddle by placing the brad through the stirrup , then through the loop at the end of the stirrup leather, then back through the stirrup. The right angle bend will keep the whole assembly together. The point of the nail can be trimmed off if desired. Make sure that the brad head is on the visible side of the stirrup, and the point inside (facing the horse body)

The final stage to apply twist to the stirrup. Dampen the underside of the stirrup leather seat the action figure, and position the stirrups so that the toes of the action figure boots point toward the front of the horse. Let dry overnight. This should set the twist permanently into the leather. A saddle blanket for this saddle should be about 5 x 5 inches. The edge pictured here is a small square of ethnic cotton. But felt, a scrap of wool, or anything else the looks right can be used.

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