Jessica Jahiel's HORSE-SENSE Newsletter Archives

Tack box

From: Kelly

Dear Jessica, I just started showing last year and I love it. Now my big dream is to have a really fancy tack box to carry my saddle and stuff in. The problem is that all the ones I like seem to cost three or four hundred dollars! My husband says he'll make me one if I'll get him a plan, but I don't know where to find one. I know where to get patterns for riding clothes, but this is different. Can you tell me where to get a pattern or plan for a tack box? Nobody around here knows.

Thanks a lot! Kelly

Hi Kelly! Yes, actually I can tell you that. ;-) If you can get your hands on an old issue of EQUUS -- #237, from July 1997 -- you'll find a very useful plan for making a tack box. I've seen one made from this pattern and it's a very nice box.

A few things to think about:

Be sure that your box has handles that are comfortable to hold, because a full tack box can be very heavy. If you use tiny metal handles, it may be difficult for helpful people with large hands to carry your box. ;-)

Put in self-locking supports so that the lid will STAY UP when you put it up, and not fall down and hit you in the head. Without going into detail, let me just say that this is Very Painful.

Either put "feet" on the box, or keep it on a raised surface (old pallets are good, and free). If you put wheels on it, remember that small wheels won't roll easily on all surfaces, especially the sorts of surfaces that tend to prevail at horse shows: water, mud, sand and gravel. You may find it easier to invest in a dolly, which will typically have much larger wheels and make it easy for you to move your tack box around.

Remember that at some point, someone, maybe even you, will use your box to sit on or stand on -- a good polyurethane finish will help protect the stain or paint.

Last of all: put a hasp on it so that you can LOCK it; I recommend the create-your-own-combination luggage locks, because you can set the combination to something easy to remember, you can change the combination whenever you want, and you NEVER have to remember where you put the key. ;-)

Jessica

Materials from Jessica Jahiel's HORSE-SENSE, The Newsletter of Holistic Horsemanship® may be distributed and copied for personal, non-commercial use provided that all authorship and copyright information, including this notice, is retained. Materials may not be republished in any form without express permission of the author.

Jessica Jahiel's HORSE-SENSE is a free, subscriber-supported electronic Q&A email newsletter which deals with all aspects of horses, their management, riding, and training. For more information, please visit www.horse-sense.org

Please visit Jessica Jahiel: Holistic Horsemanship® [www.jessicajahiel.com] for more information on Jessica Jahiel's clinics, video lessons, phone consultations, books, articles, columns, and expert witness and litigation consultant services.