Pommel Horse Project

I've been wanting to make a pommel horse for a really long time. I just think they're pretty cool from a sculptural-furniture object standpoint, and of course they offer a myriad of perversion possibilities too… Plus this mostly came together from scrap material - I had a piece of foam sitting around, and a leather remnant that was about the right size. I just needed to purchase the 4x4 lumber for the legs, and it was off to the races. 

As you can see from the photos, the structure isn't based on fine mortise-and-tenon joinery. I used the poor-man's method of wood glue and a shit-load of screws. 

I was fine with that, as everything but the legs gets covered with upholstery anyway. And trust me, this baby is strong and rigid. I toyed with the idea of tapering the legs, but if you see the antique versions (1stDibs usually has a great, if expensive, selection) they typically have straight (un-tapered) legs. 

For the next step, I just laid the foam over the horse and wrapped it in plastic. I cut a couple of pieces from the foam to cap the ends. 

Next up: duct tape. Longtime followers of this blog know that it's my preferred method for generating custom pattern shapes for complex objects. 

A couple of layers on, until everything's nice and smooth. Do you notice the lip on the left side of the image below? I thought I'd try something clever there, and make a space for someone to fit their head between the horse and someone straddling the horse. Didn't really work out, so I'd recommend keeping the sides a cleaner, traditional symmetrical shape. 

Draw potential seam lines out with a marker. 

I was toying with the idea of it wrapping around a bit…

Cut the duct-tape pattern off with scissors. We end up with the main piece…

…and two end-pieces. 

I'm sure at some point I traced the duct-tape pattern onto butcher paper to make the pattern. I usually make the pattern symmetrical and perfect the lines. Then it's transferred to the leather. 

I ended up using darts even though I wanted to keep it as smooth as possible. This is dictated by the shape you want to make and the thickness/stretchy-ness of the leather. 

This leather isn't very stretchy…

Once the end pieces are sewn on and flattened, I pull it over the foam and secure along the edge with upholstery tacks. 

It came out pretty nice, and makes me want to do more furniture-type upholstered and padded stuff. 

Put some stain on the legs, just to give it some color. 

In this shot you can see the ridges in the foam from where it was kept in storage. Over time I expect those to come out… 

And finally at least 3 coats of polyurethane to protect the finish. Sanding with fine grit in between. I've been liking the satin finish lately… Do you think I should add some forged iron rings? 

Hope you liked the project! Stay tuned, more to come…

Posture Collar Step-by-Step

In response to a request, here's my process for making the locking posture collar with rolled edge. 

I like this design because it fits a wide range of people really well, it isn't too hard to make, and can be produced in pretty much any color and type of leather you like. 

 I start off with 6-7oz. vegetable-tanned leather. Measures about 3.1mm thick. 

I trace my pattern on the smooth side of the leather. 

 Rough-cut the pieces with my shoemaker's knife.

 At this point I start working the leather over the edge of the workbench to take out the curl. 

I do the final cut out using an X-acto knife. Try to keep the knife vertical. 

 I'll use the diamond sharpener and hone to get the knife razor sharp for these cuts. If you do it right, it'll go through smoothly in one pass. 

 Blank cutout complete: 

Next up, I'll round off the sharp edges with an edge beveler tool. 

 

If your tool is nice and sharp, you'll get smooth, continuous offcuts.

 Edge-bevel complete!

 My next step in edge-finishing is to use 100 grit sandpaper to round those edges. 

 Next, I'll use gum tragacanth and a piece of canvas to burnish the edge. 

 I do have a wood burnishing tool, but to me the canvas is the best way to get the combination of heat and pressure to consolidate the fibers along that cut edge, and get them to lay down. You want the friction to build up, and it turns out nice and smooth. 

 Now I'm ready for the outer leather. I cut this piece a bit oversize, and will trim it after it's glued to the veg-tan blank. 

 Both pieces get brushed with contact cement. 

 Once the glue sets up, these inner and outer layer are stuck together. The excess is trimmed carefully around the edges. 

I use my cylinder-bed (which is set up to sew heavy-weight leather) to topstitch the outer and inner layers together. 

At this point, I'm ready to edge-coat. 

 Now we prepare for the rolled edge. I cut 1.75" strips for the bottom and top rolled edge. About 14" for the top, and 12.625" for the bottom. 

 These all get a bit of glue on their "good" side…

 …as do the collars. 

The edge-strip gets clipped to the collar, good-side to good-side, and stitched a bit more than 1/8" from the edge.  

The bottom strip is clipped and sewn the same way. 

Apply glue for the rolled edge to both the backside of the collar…

 

…and the backside of the edge-strip. 

Once the glue sets up, the rolled edge is folded over towards the back (inside) of the collar.

Then back to the cylinder-bed to top stitch along the front side seam - holding the rolled edge in place. (This is the part that your portable sewing machine will probably not be able to handle.)

The excess rolled-edge in the back can now be trimmed off. 

Sometimes I'll use tape to help me see the position of the holes that need to be punched. These marks are transferred over from the pattern. But you have to be really careful that the tape won't pull up the finish on your leather. Be sure and test first!

I use an oblong punch for the slots:

I use the same method for marking holes for the staple plate, which are riveted into place:

 The front O-ring is secured from the back via screws. 

 And we're done…

 Locking tall posture collar in the color of your choice! Thanks for visiting…