Official Luthiers Forum!

Al,
Ever since I first saw your braid with the paua backround, I've felt it was the acme of rosettes, and seeing it again just reinforces that feeling. And after seeing your posts somewhere as to how you made it, and all the jigs required for it, I've been even more in awe.

Mike,
Sorry to take this long to reply to your question, I forgot to check back till now...
The gears were posted here a few years ago and my memory's not so hot, so here's the explanation from back then.

That one was for a friend that is a writer who plays to escape the stresses of writing(what stress is beyond me <g>). So I made the rosette out of escapement gears I got from a watch repair guy. He actually got the visual pun.
Bad picture, but the guitar is long gone so can't get better ones.

I just routered a trough as usual, put down a "floor" of veneer, arranged the gears and tacked them down with thin CA, and then just filled the "pool" with thin CA just a few drops at a time so it wouldn't take forever to set, or set off the exothermic boiling that turns CA opaque white. That also does away with trapped air bubbles like thicker CA or epoxy always has given me. It, I believe, is less likely to yellow with age than epoxy, but I can't prove that, so take it with a block of salt.

My first try.



Alex


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

_________________
"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Alex, too bad you couldn't move the pattern down a bit so that pitch pocket would have fallen into the soundhole.

By the way, nice rosette.

Alex - I like your rosette a lot. Clean and simple and well done with a very pretty piece of wood. Is that spalted maple? I'm working up a rosette design now and want to use something with that overall color. That grain pattern fits the width of the rosette really well too.

_________________
Once in a while you get shown the light in the strangest of places if you look at it right - Robert Hunter

Thanks, Barry and Jay. It would have been a bit of a reach to avoid the pitch pocket while avoiding a chip in the top. I don't mind natural flaws in wood, myself, and it might draw the eye away from whatever flaws that I build into the guitar!
The rosette ring is spalted maple, Jay. I glued a piece of 1/64" ply to the back, double stick taped it to a carrier board, and ripped it in half on my table saw. Before I cut the ring, I flooded the blank with thin CA.

Alex

_________________
"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Here's my latest.

_________________
Max Bishop
Brighton, Michigan

Here's a few of mine

_________________
Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

Hey Jim. What do you use for the heavy black line?

Danny, It's just multiple black purfling lines.

_________________
Jim Watts
http://jameswattsguitars.com

I really like them, Jim. The black adds a nice visual weight.

I did this one last weekend:
- .135" paua curved strips from Rescue Pearl (cut to .130-.125" when I routed the purfling channels)
- 20/20/20 black/koa/black purf from DennisK

Lots of beauties but Alex's first! Nice bud.
One on my latest guitar for me. Couldn't find the right piece of spalted wood that I wanted but Michael Greenfield does these very cool book matched spalted rosettes. http://www.greenfieldguitars.com/guitars/ I'm trying to spalt some Maple myself right now. I hope the spalting goes in the direction I need.


This is on a very small hole on a parlour I just sprayed. Used an Depule pre cut for a much bigger hole. I cut the pieces in two but as you can see could have taken more time on the joints. The wood is Bloodwood.

Oops. Sorry for the HUGE images. Now you get to see the real, always in a hurry, me.

Danny, what did you use for the red rings in the second rosette? Is it a black-red-black with a black-white purf on either side? Looks really nice!

Alex

_________________
"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

I've always been a sucker for this type of effect but have never thought it through and figured out an easy way to accomplish it... I'd love to see how it's done

Edit: seems the forum doesn't quote pictures very well:

Another attempt and hopefully a little smaller.

That is bloodwood Alex. So is the purfling but the rosette darkened up with bending.



Better look at the crappy MOP joints.

They aren't crappy, Dan, they are ...... rustic!

Alex

_________________
"Indecision is the key to flexibility" .... Bumper sticker

Great looking stuff folks!!!

Here's one I just finished this morning. It's spaulted birch.

_________________
My Facebook Guitar Page

"There's really no wrong way, as long as the results are what's desired." Charles Fox

"We have to constantly remind ourselves what we're doing....No Luthier is putting a man on the moon!" Harry Fleishman

"Generosity is always different in the eye of the person who didn't receive anything, but who wanted some." Waddy Thomson