Tuesday, May 1, 2018

Teach Me Tuesday: Hackamore Hangers

So if you've read any of my trail riding posts, you've probably seen pics of Ruby in her teal paracord-covered little s hack.
I've got it hanging on an old nylon halter/bridle combo that I got with a lot of tack from the auction, but I haaaaaate it. Not just the look, but also the fit. My inner #tackho cringes every time I pull it off the bridle hanger. I use it infrequently enough that it's not become a major problem yet, but it's looming on the horizon. Ruby is very pleasant to hack out so I rarely even need to put contact on the reins, but I really do need a better setup.
Because this is my favorite view, but let's class up the tack a bit haha.
So teach me Tuesday -- where do you find a bridle to put a hackamore on? Nothing I own has short enough cheekstraps for this thing. I'm not opposed to scrapping this nosepiece and starting from scratch with something new either, so bring on the ideas! (Also shout-out to Aimee for letting me borrow her awesome TMT concept!)

20 comments:

  1. Not sure if I'm hitting the ask, butt if you have an English style bridle laying around, maybe swap out the cheek pieces? I've seen them sold separately - Dover or a tack sale group - so you could get cob or pony sized, or I've also seen short ones made for use with elevator gag bits. The latter might be hard to find in black, but I bet they exist somewhere!

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    1. Hmmm, I own several cob-sized bridles, perhaps I can frankenbridle something. But mostly I was stymied about where to find short cheekpieces, looking for them separately is smart 🙂 thank you!

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  2. no advice but Ruby sure is cute. :)

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  3. i've always just used a normal english bridle (not a monocrown), and just put the cheek pieces allllll the way up on the top hole. your hackamore isn't really hanging that much higher than a typical loose ring bit would hang, so i can't imagine it would be too crazy to fit with like, a cob (or even pony) size bridle.

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    1. Ahh, the horrors of switching to almost exclusively monocrowns, haha. I'll have to try my hand at frankenbridling something together! 😂

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  4. You can get a cheap and pretty colored bridle (teal is an option) from two horse tack for your hackamore. They sell the halter/bridle combos or just get a regular bridle. That's what I use for my hackamores. Depending on what model you get, you may need to message them and ask for the bit hangers to be made smaller for a hackamore. Alternatively, a small English bridle will work if you put a regular size browband on.

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    1. I had considered ordering something from them, I do like the buckle nose halter I have. Hmmm. Food for thought!

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  5. Two Horse Tack or Distance Depot should be able to sell you just the bit hangers if you have something to hang them from. Otherwise, I second Olivia - my hacks are on my biothane tack with bit hangers.

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    1. Probably would be easier to just get a matching bridle. With reins. Obviously 😉😎 brilliant suggestion!

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  6. You could just get some shorter cheeks for one of your current bridles (not a monocrown though). There are some other options out there, but mostly kind of expensive. Search ebay for "Hackamore Bridle" and you should find them. I'd search worldwide though. I think the ones I have seen are in England.

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    1. Ahh the worldwide search was something I hadn't considered! Normally I get all kinds of western headstalls, which isn't necessarily what I'm going for haha (although the little s hack is a bit more "western-y" I guess?). Maybe I just should scrap it and get one of those unicorn hacks from Australia 😉

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    2. There's a ton of those on ebay now too! WITH the leather pieces attached.

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    3. Shut the front door!!! I'm going shopping haha

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  7. I just built myself a side pull! I got a western headstall from ebay (biothane though, not leather), and the side pull noseband and reins from Riding Warehouse. The Berlion Beta Biothane bridle I got feels and looks great, I'm really happy with it.

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    1. I'm totally fine with biothane, just literally anything besides this shitty nylon set up we're rocking right now 😂 I'll have to do some poking around!

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    2. Oh, well then! The version I got comes in, wait for it... TEAL! I saw the teal version first and immediately thought of you, haha

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  8. Two Horse Tack, Taylored Tack, and Distance Depot all get recommendations from me!! Or get a pony sized English bridle and use it specifically for the s-hack. That's what I did with Booger. I had to swap out the brow band since her forehead is not pony sized, but the hack sat right where it needed to :)

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    1. I have tons of spare browbands, so pony cheekpieces is probably the way to go! Except I found this incredibly tempting unicorn hackamore..... 😂

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