Official Luthiers Forum!

I've been searching for an ellipse cutting jig to make an oval rosette and soundhole. I have seen some home made ones, but was wondering if anyone has purchased a tool like this for this purpose. (There's an article about a manual one of these in the most recent American Luthier mag, that was made for mandolin soundholes). It's not hard to find iterations that use a router to make frames and larger ellipses.
When I cut my oval sound ports, I just glue a paper tracing on and rout it out with Dremel followed by sanding the edges. I could do something similar or use a home made template for the soundhole, but still have to make the channels for rosette inlay.
Thanks! Beth

Chris Paulick came up with a design for such a tool. PM him and find out if he marketed it or the plans.

Bob

He might have done a video in the tutorial section or on U-tube.

Bob

Beth, Stew mac makes a violin purfling jig that mandolin makers modify for oval hole mandolins. Would work for guitars too. Here is the Stew mac tool...

http://www.stewmac.com/shop/Tools/Speci ... Guide.html

Here is a photo of the mods. Note the plexi "rest" that sits on the top and is bolted to the aluminum bottom part of the jig. You can make the mods with a hacksaw, a file, tap and bolts.

As a cheap alternative you can draw the oval on some MDF and very carefully rout it out and then use that as a template/jig. I do this for Selmer oval and D-holes and it works quite well.

I knew this would work for the sound hole itself, but was wondering how to rout for the rosette. Something I read mentioned using various sized bushings on the router to give the various sized ovals. How do you rout for your Selmer rosettes?

Yup various sized bushings. I just use one for the Selmer. A half inch flush cut. The jig is actually a two and one. The outside diameter is the rosette and I cut a 1/2in channel then I insert and MDF doughnut that is the sound hole size and just rout that out to depth. This jig came out of M. Collins book on Selmer construction and works quite well.