Evener to single tree adjustable attachment

[Mark Cowdrey]

I’m always thinking about balancing the load between the 2 horses in the team. I currently run my younger horse about an inch longer than my older, stronger one. One evener has an off center hole at the load pin point, another has an added welded “loop” inside the factory one (Pioneer steel) to shorten up the stronger horse.

At NEAPFD I saw Carl had single trees attached w clevis into a plate with several drilled holes. I suspect that might be a pulling evener for real fine tuning?

Thought I might want to replicate something similar to that. A picture & stock sizes would be great 😀

How do others address balancing the load and how is your equipment set up?

Thanks,
Mark

[J-L]

Mark, mine are set up with three holes drilled through in both ends of the evener. It works well for me. Much of the time I’m using a smaller mule with a larger mule (by 200 lb. or more) and I will cheat the little mule out to the end and the big mule in. They are 1″ adjustments.
The evener is a 42″ piece of 1×3 tubing (looks like 1/8″ wall, not super heavy but plenty stout). Welded on top and bottom at the holes on the ends and where the evener pin goes is 1/8″ plate. The single trees are 1×2 tube. I’ll see if I have a picture somewhere.

[Carl Russell]

Mark, I have several of these eveners. They were made for logging and pulling. I had this pic, but haven’t gotten to the barn to put a tape on it, but it is just a standard evener. They are pretty interchangeable for different pieces of equipment.

I like this design as although it may be over-built for general work, they don’t break.

The holes are 3/8″ and about 1/2″ apart. On this set-up there are two rows of holes so that they can be closer together and not break.

Carl

[Tim Harrigan]

Carl, if you happen to get measurements I would like to see not only width and hole spacing, but the offset of the center hole relative to end holes. With that arrangement, even if the distance from the center line to the end holes is the same for both sides the load shifts to whichever horse forges ahead. Very cleaver transfer of forces.

[mitchmaine]

mark, i might be off the thread here. i know this wasn’t your question, but i have a horse, getting older, able, but a half a step behind the others now. she’s 20 this spring. shes behind whoever you hook her with. so i buck or check the leader back to her heel chain. a soft peice of rope from the leaders halter a little slack to the trace chain of the slower horse, and instead of punishing the worker, cause she’s a worker, just a little slower, the leader comes up against the strain on his halter and backs off a step. in a way, molly holds back the quicker horse and i take a break.
nice evener, carl. that looks like it’ll stand anything. it looks like it was made for or by a puller. it has the strap loops for the two men to help hook in the pulling ring. and i see what you mean by 1/2 inch. is that two rows of 1″ holes offset? how much ($)?
a friend of mine said everything has a price.

[Mark Cowdrey]

Carl thanks for the pics.Those look like shop built rather than commercial clevis’ connecting the single trees to the evener.
Tim, Can you elaborate on the transfer of forces you observe?
Mitch, Although I must admit trying a buck back and finding it annoyingly awkward (maybe I didn’t give it enough of a chance) In this case, as you indicated, I’m not feeling like I’m trying to hold a horse back. Although my younger horse is somewhat less “steady”, he will sometimes forge ahead and sometimes hang back, especially in the first hour, when they are working along good the younger one gets out of wind quicker. That is what I am using to measure how to “divide” the load. I figure that, ideally, their respiration rate should about match. I may be in error here
That said it sounds like your buck back system may be simpler than some I have seen. Do you go straight from the halter to the inside heel chain with a single line? Or?
J-L, sounds like a simple, fairly light weight design. A picture would be great if you get to it.

Thanks all.

Mark

[mitchmaine]

hey mark, if your young horse is working that hard, you are probably right in the first place to give him a little leverage. and that evener of carls looks like a great rig. leave the evener centered on the load and let the horses in or out. print out that photo and go visit your local welder.

merry christmas, mitch

[Donn Hewes]

This winter I sold one of the best mules I have ever had back to the folks I bought her from. She is eighteen and loosing a step on all the other animals I hooked her with. There isn’t any fun asking an honest older animal to step up all the time.

[Tim Harrigan]

@Mark Cowdrey 23099 wrote:

Tim, Can you elaborate on the transfer of forces you observe?

Mark, because the middle hole is pinned behind the end holes where the force is applied, the lever arm for the horse that steps ahead shortenes more relative to the one that lags behind. The shortened lever arm transfers more of the pulling force to the faster animal. This is sort of a self-organizing process. If the faster animal is also the stronger animal his load becomes heavier when he steps ahead.

Probably the best way to see it would be to draw a grid with parallel lines in the direction of travel running through the center hole and and each end hole. Pivot the evener forward 6 or 8 inches and measure the distance perpendicular from the center line to each end hole. I think you will see the forward lever arm shorten faster than the rear lever arm. Very cool application of farmstead engineering.

These offsets make these eveners a little harder to evaluate compared to eveners where the center hole and end hole are all lined up. In that case the load is simply inversely proportional to the lever arm whether the two animals pull together or one forges ahead. Also in that case, shifting the center hole 1 inch has the same effect as shifting one of the end holes 2 inches.

[Anonymous]

Some pullers use an evener with a large ring and hinge point in the center. The extra hinge point lessens the friction required for a horse who gets behind to bring thier end back up.

Tristan

[Carl Russell]

Tim points out a feature that has been a part of the design for logging eveners for eternity. The spread-chain design, or the steel u-bolt staple, put the pivot point behind the single-tree attachment points so that instead of an even arc of rotation, the entire evener sweeps toward the slower, or perhaps weaker, horse, giving that horse a longer fulcrum against the load, thus evening out the exertion.

Then when you add the variable holes for attaching the single-trees, the teamster can make some fairly specific adjustments.

I will try to take measurements this AM, but it is basically a standard 42″ evener. I bought it from a harness shop that supplies pullers in the NE Kingdom of VT. I want to say I may have paid $100 or more.

I also have one that was home built by a logger/puller. I have used it for 25 years with very little need to maintain it.

Carl

[Carl Russell]

Here are the pix I was supposed to post a couple of weeks ago.

43″ evener

Offset holes are about 1/2″ on center

Single-trees 29″ steel tube makes clevises 30″ on center

[Carl Russell]

6″ front to back. Depth from single-tree holes to hitch pin is about 3″

Carl

[Gabe Ayers]

This is a good thread.

I had always thought that the horse that was behind was in the hole and had more of the load just because they were closer to the resistance or load. It seems the horse that is behind has a hard time bringing their side back to even. I guess I was just reading the horses more than the physics or engineering, because it seems that horses that are hooked heavy seem to want to be out front, which made me think it was easier than being behind.
Live and learn.

We have a pretty well worn pulling double tree with the same 1/2 inch adjustments as Carl’s and we have put allot of horses on the “short end of the stick”. Ours is in line, but then the hook is behind all the holes. It was always an adjustment to put more of the load on which horse we knew was stouter for various reasons. I wonder if that is where that saying came from when used to suggest someone is given a disadvantage in a given situation?
The more you work a pair the easier it is to get similar sized horses on even.
The setting in really shows up on long skidds or very heavy loads.

A question I always wanted to ask Tim is if he thought a buffer would add to the capacity of a pulling team? If so, I want one…

Jason

[Mike Rock]

Carl,
A question on construction. In the photo in post #13, what is in the first 1/2″ of the tape? Is that a piece of 1/2″ round to the front of the rod? Also, is the round main member rod or pipe?

In photos 2 and 3 of post #12 we have a lot of parts coming together. It looks like the tab with the five holes , the end of the rod/pipe and the triangular reinforcement and the 1/2″ rod on the rear wraps around the end tab as far as the rear of the tab. How thick is the tab with the five holes? The devil is in the details. This looks great and sure balances the horses.

Thanks,
Mike Rock

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