Official Luthiers Forum!

I'm looking for a rosette cutter that can be set up to cut all three channels at once on a drill press. I have the usual router in an adjustable radius base but am looking to speed up the operation to fit standard 3-ring rosettes that are widely available.
LMI's looks good, albeit a bit fiddly to get set up correctly. But, once it is dialed in for a 4" soundhole and standard rosette set no further adjustments would be necessary.
Luthiertool has one on their site but they have taken down the PDF manual page as well as pricing info.
Or, is this type of cutter just too problematic in terms of tear out, chipping, etc?
Thanks for your comments.

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Stay with the happy people.
--Reynolds Large

From what I understand, they are the least likely to chip out, as long as you drill press table is level...

After fighting a plunge dremel setup for a dozen or so guitars I took a big gulp and bought the LMI cutter for my last guitar (I was cutting some Brazilian rosewood for the rosette and I didn't want any screwups). The cutter itself works fine but was a complete hassle to set up and would barely reach the diamerers that I wanted to cut (which were fairly standard for wood rosettes). I think it would be an ideal cutter for a small production shop where you could take the time to set it up for one size ring and then do a bunch of them, but I have my doubts for doing a different ring each time.

There were also some machining tolerences that I felt were unexceptable - the cutters and spacer blocks were a tight (too tight) fit in the machined slots, and lately, LMI did not supply the correct length bolts to lock the cutters in the slots

I wrote an e-mail to LMII expressing my dissatisfaction with the tool - they told me that it was being redesigned. It would be worth while to see if this was actually done. I might be able to find the e-mail

I have 7 of them great tool love it on a scale of 1 to 10 100

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John Hall
blues creek guitars
Authorized CF Martin Repair
Co President of ASIA
You Don't know what you don't know until you know it