# What size stirrup irons and leathers should i get?



## Sjr009 (Feb 17, 2016)

hi,

I'm looking to get some stirrup irons and leathers and I've looked everywhere for someone to tell me a size guide and i can't find one! 

im a size 8 shoe (uk) and 5.85". please can someone heeeelllllpppp?!:sad::gallop:


----------



## Saskia (Aug 26, 2009)

You want to be able to fit a finger either side of your boot in the stirrup leather - so measure across the ball of the foot of the boots you ride in and add an inch and a half or so.

Stirrup leathers come in three sizes usually, child, small adult (54 inches) and tall adult (58? inches). It's going to depend on your height as well as what style of riding you do. You can also get ones inbetween sizes and different brands might use inches vs centimetres.

To protect my saddle I got padded leather ones which are pretty good.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


----------



## Tack Collector (Nov 10, 2009)

I disagree with that size recommendation for the stirrups. I wear a size 6 boot and I use 4.25" or 4.5" irons. I feel that an iron that is 1/2" (1 finger) wider than the boot width is adequate. If I go up to 4.75" with typical riding boots, the irons start sliding and moving around too much due to the sloppy fit. If I'm wearing work boots or some other big bulky footwear, I can use the 4.75" irons.

Dressage leathers: 60" - 62" or even 64" for average to tall. I'm 5'1" and 50"-52" is plenty for me.

Jumper: Short people like me can use 48" (I can actually use those for saddleseat and for hunt flatwork.) Average is probably 52" - 54" or so.

If your saddle is very soft layered leather (thin leather glued to thicker layer) or it's just very soft or thin single thickness, then you'd want some calfskin wrapped leathers. I find them bulky and I hate them, actually. I like leathers that stay flat If your saddle doesn't demand calfskin wrapped leathers, get a good British-made stirrup leather that has a beveled instead of a squarish edge on it. The bevel prevents the leathers from scuffing up the saddle badly, and it also helps keep stirrup leathers from pinching your leg.

If the stirrup bars are really snug against your saddle, you might consider a monostrap stirrup leather and some kind of safety stirrup irons. 24" is short, and 33" or so is long for a monostrap. I'd have to look that up, though.


----------



## horselovinguy (Oct 1, 2013)

My stirrup irons measure inside 5".
I have fillis style irons that a white pad is in the base of the iron.
http://www.doversaddlery.com/stirrup-irons/c/3701/

The stirrup needs to allow your foot to move some so you can position that stirrup correctly on the shoe sole.
Remember depending upon what shoe/boot you ride with you may need more or less room...
You must have some wiggle room so your foot can easily fall free in case of a fall or when dismounting you not get hung up.
When I ride with my tall boots or paddock boots my stirrup is slightly to wide, but if I ride with my Ariat shoes with a bulkier sole I have the added room I need for safety...

Stirrup leathers come in different lengths. They also come in different widths and materials made from.
_Stirrup Leathers < English Horse Tack | Dover Saddlery_
Most common is leather unless you ride with a synthetic saddle then you may need synthetic leathers...
Some leathers come lined with nylon so the leather then is much thinner and you rely on the nylon material sealed to the leather for strength.
The buckle used on leathers can also vary....
All of this is really important with your saddle and how your stirrup bars are attached on you saddle. 
If you have a deeper recessed bar then you can have a thicker stirrup leather than a saddle that doesn't have recessed bars....
Why? Because you _will_ feel the bulk, the buckle under your thigh as you ride...
Wider leathers for the same reason are also felt more than a narrower leather...

Tack Collector had some very good information and tips for you when searching....

It all comes down to your preference, what you like and truthfully,_ what *you* want and what you want to spend in $.

You may need to copy & paste those addresses if they don't link correctly...sorry.
:runninghorse2:...
jmo...

_


----------



## Tack Collector (Nov 10, 2009)

bulky buckles: I ride saddle seat but I have an AP and a CC. This might just be me and the way I am built, but I have found consistently that if I feel the stirrup leather buckle under my leg, it means that the saddle is too short in the seat. Ultimate Dressage forum is gone now, but saddlers and riders there once had a lengthy discussion about distance between dip of the seat and the stirrup leather. Many people said, and the saddle fitters backed this up, that if you are riding a balanced seat position, the distance between where the stirrup leather hangs and the dip of the seat will be consistent for you across the board, whether you are riding dressage or hunt saddles. At that time, I had a couple of ccs and two APs that fit me, and I always have a plethora of saddle seat cutback saddles that are for sale as well as the ones I am keeping. So, I could go measure all of the saddles that I thought were the best fitting ones for me, and by gosh, they were all pretty close to the same distance between dip of the seat and stirrup leather, regardless of whether they were cutbacks, ccs, APs, or dressage.

Going back to my original point, on all of those saddles, the stirrup leather buckle was real close to the front of my thigh, maybe my thigh touched it, but it was definitely not under my thigh. It was just barely out in front in front. That's just my $0.25. lol

Wide leathers: I have leathers ranging from 3/4" wide all the way up to a whopping 1 1/4" wide. (Fennell's still offers wide 1.25" leathers.) Back in the day, like '50s / '60s / '70s, many saddles including the hunter saddles had 1.25" wide leathers for the added strength. Men always used them. And the part of the stirrup bar where the leather hangs was longer back then, because almost everyone used wide leathers. The width shouldn't bother you, if those leathers physically fit on your saddle. Excessive THICKNESS is bad. And square non-beveled edges are bad. Those 1.25" Fennell leathers bothered me when I first got them, but they had square edges. I bought an edge beveler tool from Tandy Leather and I beveled all the edges (4 edges per leather) of those leathers, and those leathers have felt completely flat ever since.

Really wide leathers like the 1.25" ones tend to not move around much. If you go the other extreme, and have 3/4" or 7/8" standard single thickness leathers, you'll find it easier to swing your legs around a lot. Thinner and less bulky leathers are more nimble.

Calfskin wrapped leathers annoy me because they stick on any saddle flaps, and they stick like Velcro to a sticky leather saddle, and the nylon core makes them hugely thick. I hate them. Like I said, I won't use them unless the saddle demands it. And I have buffalo leather saddleseat cutback saddles and I'm not a fan of calfskin or layered leather because it just flat-out lacks durability and it's too easily blemished. "Impractical" is what I call layered leather. Buffalo and good old stamped cowhide will literally last decades and can withstand abuse and heavy use.

That concludes my sermon for today. >;-D

If you like standard old-style leathers and can use them on your saddle, check out Fennell's for some new ones at reasonable prices. Tack Solutions by Leslie offers used leathers and irons for a song, too. Both have web sites.


----------

