Down here in Florida I have only a small ‘shop’ area and I try to do operations that create sawdust outside, where my workbench is a couple of sawhorses. It is kind of like camping, doing things with limited resources. I do however bring down a selection of small tools with me from the main shop in Pennsylvania. Doing pearl inlay takes very little bench space, and uses only small tools, so I try to bring down a number of glued together tops, and do the pearl rosettes while I am here, so that they are ready-to-go when I get back up north and start real builds. The ‘shop’ and outside shop:
Using these I have been experimenting with a new rosette style. Thanks to Beau Hannam, luthier extraordinaire, with the inspiration and challenge to create some jigs that would make these easier. I cut some basic jigs up in Pennsylvania before I left, and have been developing a process to use these, in a particular order, to create the desired result. Here are the first two, with black cardboard overlays to show how the soundhole and fingerboard will be.
