Thread: First Rosette

Originally Posted by Different

I have a few questions

1. Is what I have done common ? (amongst paupers)
2. Are bought purfling materials easier to bend that solid?
3. Other than shell what other common materials are used for this job?
4. What methods for cutting the rings do you all use?
5. Do all first rosetts look like a drunk person with Parkinsons did them.
6. Does anyone know where I can find free Acoustic guitar plans on the internet?

Ross

First of all "GOOD ON YA Ross!!!, Aint it the best fun ever!!".

1. Yes, reminds me of my situation.
2. Depends what you buy. Fibre puflings are easy to bend but hader to get to look good when you finish as they tend to crumble a bit when you sand them. Im turning more to wooden purfling as I get a better finish.
3. precisely the kinds of materials you used. Ive heard of brass and silver but it is mostly timber. Some folk use little bits of burl or weird grained timber. I have a plan to use some polymer pen blanks. Gold leaf has possibilities as well.There are plenty of tutes around but basically you cut out little bits and fit them into a trial rosette first. Jack Spira did a tute for this forum, search his posts.
4. Ive done it by hand, tricky as the grain tells you where to cut, or using a circular cutter. Im making a cutter using a broomstick and some dowel. Not all soundholes are round. Im just to nervous to consider using a router/laminate trimmer/Dremil just yet.
5. Mine did and I was sober. Search for Tenor guitar on this forum. Im getting better with practise. Its one reason why i dont use expensive timbers.
6. Try Watson Bailey http://www.watsonbailey.com/plans/ or MIMF. With a bit of planning you can find pictures of instruments and bracing and blow them up to scale. Once again there are plenty of tutes out there. Some other forums are Official Luthiers Forum and the ANZLF. There are plenty of fret calculators as well.

Good on ya for having a go, Id love to see some piccies,

Sebastiaan

mate i buggered up my rosette not too long ago. had to do two passes with a 3mil bit to make a 6mil channel and at one section it was only 5mil wide!
stuck the purflings in before the ab without doing a dry run first to see if everything fit. we ended up having to rout a channel in between the two prefling strips for my ab and had to eat into some of the black white black perfling. Amature hour!
im over it now mate and i figure thats what first guitars (and second and third....) are for.

Here are the Pics I promised and keep the chuckles to yourself !!!!


Ross

good on you.. well done.. its rewarding to get results with limited resources.

as far as bending timber purfling for a rosette.....i found it as simple as soaking in some hot water and wrapping around a bottle or tin thats got a similar diameter and put some masking tape on it for 10 minutes or so.

Originally Posted by gratay

good on you.. well done.. its rewarding to get results with limited resources.

as far as bending timber purfling for a rosette.....i found it as simple as soaking in some hot water and wrapping around a bottle or tin thats got a similar diameter and put some masking tape on it for 10 minutes or so.

I thought of that but this stuff would not have bent much without the heat in fact I had about a 50% failure rate even with the heat but the veneer bent well around the hot pipe.

Ross

can you change the grain direction by 90 deg? Slab sawn instead of quater sawn sort of thing?

Originally Posted by mongrel

can you change the grain direction by 90 deg? Slab sawn instead of quater sawn sort of thing?

In a word No.

Ross