add a brichen?

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  • July 26, 2012 at 7:29 pm #43960
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    I am on a tight budget and so I got a logging harness from a friend that has chain tugs. Can I retrofit a brichen on this so that I can get my new horse out on the cart? I have seen old pictures with mules wearing this kind of harness with a brichen clipped to the chains, actually the newest rural heritage has a picture in the vintage picture section. Any ideas would be great. I was also thinking of padding the saddle and tightening it up and hitch to where the saddle and chain tugs connect kind of like a norwegian style. I know I wouldnt want him to try and slow anything heavy down but for light driving would it work?

    Jared

    August 11, 2012 at 3:22 pm #74564
    near horse
    Participant

    I know both Midwest Leather (UT) and Samson Harness (MN) sell logging harness w/ removable brichen and have the brichen available by itself. Give ’em a call and see what they say. Both have been very helpful in the past.

    August 11, 2012 at 3:41 pm #74562
    grey
    Participant

    If you can add a breeching to your harness, that would be ideal. Not sure what you have and what you don’t have, but I would guess that you are missing the entire spider (attaches to the hames, runs back to the top of the rump), britchen and crupper. As a second-best, you could put what’s called a “false breeching” on the cart. That’s where you attach the britchen directly to the cart shafts. The false breeching is slung between the shafts of the cart and made fast so that it cannot slide up or down the shafts. The traces are tightened to the point that the false breeching comes up snug against the horse’s rump.

    The main drawbacks of the false breeching are:
    – the necessity of securing the false breeching to the shafts in such a way that it cannot slide (a 2nd set of footman’s loops under the shafts will do the trick)
    – if the horse squats down, it is theoretically possible for him to get *under* the false breeching, which can then be quite a mess
    – the false breeching only works on cart shafts that are high enough to put the breeching in the correct location on the horse’s rump. If the shafts have too much downward slope, they will put a false breeching on the horse’s gaskins rather than the rump.

    August 11, 2012 at 4:08 pm #74563
    grey
    Participant

    I just did some checking-around and I guess the general consensus is that false breeching should not contact the animal until braking is required, the cart rolls up on the animal and the false breeching comes into play.

    Thinking about it, I can see why this would be preferred, since the horse’s rump is going to be moving more than the shafts, which could definitely result in abrasion.

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