The Myler brothers developed the Myler bitting system to allow for more effective communication between the horse and rider, thus improving the horse's ability to learn and raising their level of performance. The single most important part of a horse is its mindset and what many inexperienced riders don't take into account is the fact that the bit they use directly impacts upon the way in which the horse thinks and behaves.
Many traditional bits aren't designed in a way that minimizes stress effectively and the rider will often experience resistance from their horse or their commands may be evaded altogether. This is because many of these bits have been designed around the belief that horses evade and resist bar pressure more than anything else and their design, which often collapses completely and pushes down into the tongue (in addition to pinching the outer lips and bar), creates a great deal of tension.
The Myler brothers firmly believe (their theory has been backed up by extensive research and the opinions of several medical practitioners) that in actual fact it's excessive tongue pressure, rather than bar pressure, that causes a horse to become evasive. Horses, just like humans, need to be able to move their tongues in order to swallow. If you restrict the horse's ability to swallow, not only will this unsettle the horse mentally (impacting upon its ability to focus), but you will also impair the horse physically. The tongue is the strongest muscle in a horse's entire body and it's connected to the hyoid bone, as well as the shoulders of the horse. If the tongue is completely restricted, it can't fully utilize key muscle groups in these areas and is unable to lift its back. Not only that, but when excess tongue pressure is applied, the tongue often gets pushed back up into the throat and restricts the flow of air, which naturally affects performance.
In addition to the negative mental and physical effects that arise due to the design of traditional bitting systems, the signals that are produced by these bits aren't particularly clear either. For example, with the single jointed bit that we've already mentioned, when the rider wants to pick the horse's shoulder up, when he lifts either right or left, the bit will pull in that direction but at the same time it will also drive down into the tongue. This produces somewhat of a mixed signal and can confuse the horse.
The Myler bitting system incorporates a number of innovative features to ensure that any factors (such as the ones mentioned above) that could cause interference in communication between horse and rider are removed. Some of these features include: