If you should one day decide you’d like to carry every aluminum horseshoe on the market, you’d better plan on buying a big shoeing rig.

Once a curiosity seen occasionally at the racetrack, aluminum shoes are now available in more than 6,000 styles and varieties, according to Dan Bradley, the farrier and toolmaker from Lucedale, Miss.

During a presentation at the American Farrier’s Association (AFA) convention in Albuquerque, N.M., in late February, Bradley told his audience that farriers can choose from a multitude of aluminum shoes.

“You’d have to have a 53-foot semi as your shoeing rig to carry all of them,” he said, noting that Victory Racing Plate Co., and Thoro’Bred Inc., — two of the biggest names in aluminum shoes — each offer more than 600 varieties.

David Erb, president of Victory, said in the case of his company, the figure is actually more than 750, when taking into consideration the various sizes and styles.

”We’re working with a world market,” Erb says. “It takes some very creative scheduling and agile manufacturing.”

Victory’s Elite competition shoe, according to Erb, was the industry’s first viable aluminum shoe that could be mass-produced. It was introduced in September of 1988. Since then constant improvements in various aluminum alloys and manufacturing techniques have helped aluminum shoes take a bigger and bigger share of the market.   

ALUMINUM PRIMER…