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Dressage letters

5K views 18 replies 13 participants last post by  Valentina 
#1 ·
Has anyone else notices they're stupidly expensive?
I want to come up with a cheap way of lettering my arena. It's very makeshift made of pickets and white poly rope.
It's full size 60x20m so need the larger letter sets. The arena is in the middle of a paddock so needs to be horses age even outside!
How can I put letters up without spending a fortune?
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#2 ·
I used to have rather large sheets of watercolor paper (maybe 2'x1' if I remember right) that I don't think were very expensive...could you possibly get something like that, write your letters down, and get them laminated?
 
#7 ·
They are without a doubt the most over priced item ever. It won't take much to make them on your own. Even of you take a piece of foam board, cut it down to size, and buy the over sized sticker letters at your local hard ware store, it works just fine.
 
#12 ·
Have you SEEN the price of a single traffic cone though?! They're like 17 bucks each. As opposed to something like 80 cents for a plastic bucket. Or free with a heap of water if you get those big plastic water bottles, the 10L ones with bottled water in them, and use those. I've seen people use plastic jerry cans too [if anyone isn't familiar with the term, it's basically an Aussie-ism for gas can]

I need some way to mark an arena [for corners at least] and some letters, granted we can school a few figures here and there and movements at home but it's darn difficult to practice, for example, a trot leg yield from the 3/4 line to B [or E depending on which rein you're on] then canter a 20m circle! That not only is a movement in a test, it encourages correctness in the leg yield, so it's a pretty important set of movements to train. Pickets and rope sounds like a viable option to mark out the arena.

At my pony club they have proper letters for shows but they also have cheap letters for meetings. Some are made of large plastic water bottles, you know, the 10L kind you get at the supermarket? And others aren't as safe, and are made out of metal bent into a V shape so it stands up. I've seen the V shape metal ones at a few clubs now and while, given the choice, I personally don't like to ride in an arena marked out with them, they do work. And the insurance company doesn't throw a fit over them, so the risk level can't be THAT high. However if the horses are going to be in the paddock with the markers then metal is not your best choice.

Blocks of wood work, as do wide planks [one simple butt join and a lick of paint and there you have it, one dressage marker].

To make sure you know which letters go where there are heaps of diagrams, just google search :)
 
#15 ·
looks like another visit to the tip shop for some wood :) one of the friends who live on the property with my horses is a carpenter so he's gotta be good for something!

unless i can find 12 cones left by the side of the road!

If I used buckets I'd probably have to put some concrete in. It's very windy out there and I'm far to lazy to put the letters out when I need them

BEP: i just built my arena out of star pickets (with caps of course) and some cheap but sturdy 8mm white poly rope from buntings.
Paid about 5.50 a picket $220
$7 for 50m of rope $45
and approx $1 a cap $40

all up cost about $310
 
#16 ·
BEP: i just built my arena out of star pickets (with caps of course) and some cheap but sturdy 8mm white poly rope from buntings.
Paid about 5.50 a picket $220
$7 for 50m of rope $45
and approx $1 a cap $40

all up cost about $310
MUCH more viable option than trucking in sand and building a proper arena with a proper fence! haha, and we're renting, so it's always good to be able to take stuff with you when you leave.

Going to do something about it sooner rather than later though I may well have to put the arena in the back paddock because I'm not convinced we have room in our other paddocks.
 
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