Las Cruces Bit

Steve223

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Apr 20, 2007
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SW NewMexico
Heres a Las Cruces Cheeked bit with a halfbreed mouth that i finished this week. This was my first attemped at relife engraveing. I made a bunch of mistakes but i learned abunch doing it and im fairly happy with the results, Of corse its pretty crude compared to what most of you all are doing but its a start for me. And its a half decent pic to LOL
Thanks for looking and for any comments you might have.
Steve

 
Last edited:

DKanger

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Sep 30, 2007
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West TN
Heres a Las Cruces Cheeked bit with a halfbreed mouth
Steve,
For those of us who have no "horse sense," you could have said it was a goat harness and I would have believed you.

Good job.

Dave
 

santos

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Nov 12, 2006
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France
Hi Steve,

I notice you've been practising in the reverse side of the brass ?
It looks very nice to me
 

jr hoot gibson

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Feb 25, 2008
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Santos
It has become a practice of engraving the backbone of the scrollwork on the back side of a lot of western gear. It is engraved iron, with silver inlays on the edges, and overlaid sterling silver. This pattern is a very traditional vaquero style.
Hoot
 

Steve223

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Apr 20, 2007
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SW NewMexico
Santos Hoot is right on! Thanks for explainin that Hoot. And thank you forr the nice comments guys.
Steve
 

eastslope

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Conrad, MT
Steve, now thats a sharp looking rig. Your inspiring me to give one a try. Beautiful work, Seth
 

Steve223

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Apr 20, 2007
Messages
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Location
SW NewMexico
Dave next time ill post a goat harness LOL
Thank you Joe
You should build one Seth and be sure and post pics of it i would love to see it.

I guess i should have elaborated on it a little more.
This one is built out of 1018 cold roll. It has a 5 1/4" wide mouth,the canon is 3/8" diameter The staple in the mouth is 2 1/4" long. The cheeks are 9" long and theres 3'' above the canon and 6" below the canon. Theres a total of 48 1/8" wide silver stripes,24 inlaid in each cheek. The origanal plan was to do some file work inbetween each stripe but i changed my mind after i got them inlaid, I just dident want to mess up the lines. I finnished it down to 800 grit then polished it with 0000 steel wool then french greyd it.The rein chains are built out of 18 guage nickel wire
The only thing i dident build on this bit were the slobber chains and they are just bulk nickel watch chain.
Thats prolly more than anyone wanted to know LOL.
Steve
 

ken dixon

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Nov 28, 2006
Messages
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Eastern Wyoming
Steve,
That is a really nice looking bit, thanks for the specific tech info. I too have a bit on my list of "when I get around to it projects".
Ken
 

Steve223

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Apr 20, 2007
Messages
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Location
SW NewMexico
Thank you Ken! And when you get around to building that bit i would sure love to see it.
Alot of guys like building spurs and spurs are more personal but bits have fasanated me since i was a kid and the first time i saw a mission style bit really put my fasanation in to overdrive and i still have it and i love to build bits!!
Thank you everone for looking and takeing the time to post.
Steve
 

Ed Warnock

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Joined
Aug 12, 2008
Messages
4
Steve nice job!
The angel of the staple is right nice, the longer length should be good. I notice alot of them are shorter now days which can contact the back edge of the hard palet in the mouth.
Your engraving is great!
Ed
 

Steve223

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Joined
Apr 20, 2007
Messages
552
Location
SW NewMexico
Thank you Ed and i agree with you you see a lot of them that are pretty short. I kinda figure those old timers knew what they were doin.
Thank you Denny i really appercaite you takeing the time to comment.
Steve
 

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