I’m looking for experience with V point billets, and whether they can be made to work for my horse, or were just a Bad Idea. Also perhaps whether long or short billets on a dressage saddle are a better idea, and if short V point billets might work better than long ones?
I had my older Passier dressage saddle restuffed by my excellent saddle fitter who also recommended that I shift from long point billets to long V billets. She is willing to change back and refund the charge if we can’t make them work. I like the concept of V billets and the saddle feels good. We will have an appointment soon to look at the saddle, and meantime I won’t use it.
With the point billets, I never had any problems with this saddle shifting forward on steep down hills or at the canter. I rode the same trails last summer, and also cantered a lot in the saddle previously, with point billets.
But now with the V billets the saddle is tending to pivot under the billet straps and end up sliding forward on the horse going down steep hills. The flaps rotate forward over her shoulders and the pommel slides up her withers almost onto her neck (to an alarming degree) though the pommel and whole saddle resets somewhat when we go up a hill. Still, I have a photo of us from the top of rest point of a hill climb on the weekend where the dressage saddle looks like an AP saddle, the flap is forward in front of the dressage pad when it should be straight up and down. And the pommel is high, all tipped back.
And after I did some canter sets on the flat another day, I found that the saddle had pivoted forward, more on one side on the other in the canter. The pommel didn’t shift so I didn’t notice this while I was riding, but when I was untacking I saw that the flaps were just jammed forward and off the edge of the dressage pad. Riding, I thought the pad was slipping back, but when I untacked I saw that in fact the saddle flaps had rotated forward.
Maresy has nice big withers, a big barrel, and a forward girth groove, and is symmetrical. She is particular about her saddles but not difficult to fit, she has a back like a fat TB and does well in Passier or County. She’s a big Paint, apparently a Paint/Appendix cross, but she is fairly uphill and not breed typical. If you were hanging around Andie folk and wanted to BS and tell them she is some kind of Azteca, they’d nod and believe you 
Saddle fit issues on her seem to express themselves as saddle shifting. When she outgrew her old County jump saddle, the saddle started to pop off her back and shift left to right. When the flocking became asymmetrical in the Passier dressage saddle, the saddle started to shift to one side. This doesn’t seem to cause pain or worry the horse particularly, but obviously I notice and get them fixed!
I had moderate intermittent problems with the saddle sliding forward years ago when I was using whatever old gear on her, before I got my own saddle. The saddle would sometimes end up riding up her neck if she bucked a bit.
With the point billets on this particular saddle, the girth always ran forward at an angle to her girth groove, and I had a shaped girth to keep it from running into her elbows. With the V billets, the girth runs forward to the girth groove, except when the saddle rides right up the withers and then the girth aligns with the girth groove. I feel like the saddle wants to move forward to put the girth aligned with the girth groove, but with maresy’s big withers, that means the saddle will ride way up her withers.
