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I/ve tried 3 times to bend 3 different types of rosette on my first OM doug fir top. The rings were abt .100 wide by .060 thick . One was a piece of walnut stringing, cracked another black /white/ black, white was maple veneer, and then a pear/massaranduba ,hdwd from brazil. I used titebond 1 for the laminated veneer, at 250-300 deg f on luthiers bending iron. The laminated ones would delaminate and break , and the walnut would just break. My 1st outer ring is abt 5.5in in diameter. Maybe someone can tell me what I/m dong wrong. Was going to use 1 laminate inner and outer rings and a spalted sycamore 1/4in ring for the middle piece.

Ernie,
You can't bend stuff that wide. You need to lay it out flat and cut it. Most of us use a circle cutting tool like this one from Stew Mac.

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"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered." G. K. Chesterton.

I have 3 circle cuting jigs, I am talking abt the inner and outer rings the ones that are .100 by .60. The center 1/4in ring will be cut out with the jig. Is your inner and outer ring plastic .?? got some plastic too, but wanted to use wood instead ?? thanks

Try smaller (less wide) veneer strips (.20 -.60) and make sure you are trying to bend long grain. Narrower purfling strips can generally be laid into your rosette without pre-bending. Also, I wouldn't laminate the veneer strips if it weren't absolutely necessary. They should bend to shape more easily individually, though you can install them all at the same time.

Steve's purflings appear to be B/W fiber. I regularly bend .60 B/W/B purflings to standard SS rosette diameters without pre-bending on a hot pipe.

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Aaron Craig

I would agree that you should either not pre-laminate (lay it up in the rosette in separate pieces), or, alternatively, you could laminate it around a round caul, and let the glue cure in the shape it's going to be on the guitar. This would work better with sheets of laminate and then cut them into strips as needed.

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Jim Hansen

I found some b/w/b plastic binding in bsmt. It is the exact match for the inner and outer ring. Will cut out the spalted sycamore center ring with my circle cutting jig. Next time jim ., I will take up your idea and bend the thin purfling strips around a rosette caul and glue them together , then inlay them in the rosette trough.I just tried cumpianos method of laying the stringing in a hot water bath, and then pushing the walnut, and then w.oak stringing into a blank rosette cavity.Did not work stringing broke around the tight curves, Murphy is working on me overtime, past 2 days. hey thanks for all the suggestions

ha.. that's not my method! :p

I just remember seeing some youtube videos of classical builders making up a rosette log and slicing them off.

I always build my rosette in the actual channel. Someday I want to try to make a traditional classical rosette.. it's in the luthiery related section of my bucket list. =)

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Jim Hansen

Thanks jim realized that ss gtr rosette needs a different set of criteria.Have been watching cl rosette making on bogdanovich dvd , and he used the circle cutting jig, uber thin wood veneers and a center wheat sheaf to produce a cl gtr rosette.His method would work for cl . I am using a simpler method for my 1st ss rosette 1 inner and outer ring of BWB plastique and a center wood ring. KISS, keep it simple stupid.

Here are a couple of videos from JMT

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Jim Hansen

Interesting way to make a rosette. Guess everyone has their own unique technique that works for them thanks