I see there are plenty of posts about the Easy Change system but I don’t think any of them address my question. I have a Wintec as a sort of temporary saddle for different situations. I long ago confirmed with Wintec it has the easy change system. All the how to videos show a screw attached the D ring…but mine does not have that. I emailed Wintec again more recently but never heard back. Does anyone have a link to a video for this scenario, or is mine really not changeable like they said? I see the medium in black inside. And stupidly I thought, oh maybe I just have to twist my D rings like a screw–and I broke one. Help? 
I used to have a Bates with the changeable, so I’m going on the assumption they’re in the same spot, and the screws are on the underneath, in the gullet, so at the the underside from the d-rings…
Thanks, the videos I saw showed unscrewing at the D rings and underneath. Maybe I can just do the screws underneath like you said. I got it cheap so if it gets further destroyed in my attempts I guess it’s okay, but then I have to find something not destroyed…
I have 2 Wintecs and there are two screws on each side: one on the D ring that holds the whole panel together and one under the skirt that holds the gullet in place.
My D rings do not look like yours.
I think you got a non-changeable saddle.
Did you buy this saddle new or used?
That photo looks nothing like my Wintec which I did change gullets out on. OP, any more details on the exact model/saddle photos?
That was my point, I don’t have screws on the D rings but Wintec said because it had the CAIR system, it should be a changeable gullet. I sent them pictures, but not of the D rings. I’ll mess with it more and see what I can do. Sadly I may have to source some temporary saddles for awhile if it doesn’t work. --And yes, I bought it used for a good deal and it worked out pretty well for a particular horses I needed it for at the time.
I will look at mine when I get home, but IIRC the front of my saddle held together with Velcro, I don’t unscrew anything to access the gullet plate. I pull apart the Velcro at the front and the plate is right there.
There is a Velcro flap over the area of the gullet on changeable gullet models. The panels also will separate from the tree by Velcro. But there are definitely a total of 4 screws that hold the entire thing in place: 2 on the Ds and 2 under the skirt that go directly into the gullet.
Both my saddles are Cair. But I’m pretty sure there was an overlap where they were making cair saddles without changeable gullets. If the saddle itself is stamped M, that’s another sign it’s not changeable.
Yes, I vividly remember having to get a REALLY good screwdriver to get the screws unscrewed for the first time and they were so tight I couldn’t get them to budge. I had a wide AP, and had to use the widest gullet on it and it took 3 of us to wrestle the saddle to get the screws back in.
@FjordBCRF Your picture is exactly how my two Wintecs come apart.
I’ve never had major difficulty swapping my gullet plates. It’s not something I would want to do regularly, but the whole process takes maybe 15 min with only minor annoyances.
A friend borrowed my one saddle over the summer and was beside herself that I had to change the plate for her horse. She was sure I was going to somehow ruin my saddle based off all the horror stories she heard second hand over the years. I assured her it was no big deal, but she was convinced the tree would snap, we wouldn’t be able to get the saddle back together, etc. etc. It was only when she saw me do it that she finally believed me it was NBD!
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