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I promised to post this a while ago. Here is the pearl rosetting .
in these photos you can see I am using straight pieces of abalam pearl. This is a great material for this job. The tools I use are a 20 penny nail with a sharp needle point that I will use to manipulate the pearl is I have to , The head , I use to roll the pearl into the slot and glue bed. A bone saddle blank to control the breaking of the strip.
I start with laying in a bead of glue. I use tite bond or elmer's white for this I then use the bone and find a good angle so I can control the break with the saddle blank. Once I get started I can do this in a short period of time. The more I can get the strip to break and follow the channel the better it looks. I do about a third of the rosette at a time. I gently hold the pearl strip against itself so the joints of the breaks are tight. When I finish off an area I will wipe off the excess glue with a wet paper towel across the rosette. Don't go with it as you can pull the pearl out of position.

as you can see this isn't that difficult . Here in these photos you can see how I manipulate the pearl . Once I am happy with position I can start the rolling in. This seats the pearl against itself and into the bed of glue. After it sets up I will sand level .

here I finish up the process. After the glue sets up , the pearl is a bit below the top surface. I like to rough the top to about .150 and do my rosetting , I can then have some fudge room . Once the rosette is set I start the level sanding through the sander with 60 grit paper. Once I am leveled off I thickness the top off the back side. I don't worry much about the finish sanding at this point as we have the bracing and such. I can finish sand later.
With this being real paua I will have some filling to do. I drop fill the voided area of the pearl with CA. Don't flood just drop fill. The finish filling is complete in the finish cycle when you get a few coats of finish on. Then you can do the final body and fender work .

Thanks for posting that John. I have never installed shell strips of any kind but I plan to so this is very helpful, I don't really understand the whole "breaking" thing, are you breaking up and down, left and right, a combination of both, why does it not fall apart as you break it?

David L

it is the way pearl has been done for a long time. Remember that the glue is in there so it does have something to bed into

I asked this question on another thread and probably should have asked it here.

Any advantage (easier/prettier) to using the curved ablam strips (made for rosettes with around 4.9" diameter) instead of using the straight strips? What width Ablam are you using in these pictures?

PS Just checked and one advantage of straight strips is they are cheaper.

John,

I have a few questions about this process I hope you won't mind answering.

1) Were the B/W purfling rings in the middle part of the rosette glued in first and allowed to dry before starting the install of the ablam? If so, did you use a plastic spacer the width of the Ablam while the glue for the B/W purfling dried? If so, where did you get the plastic spacer?

2) When you break the Ablam using the bone saddle, I assume you hold it at a slight angle pointed radially back to the center of the rosette. Does the Ablam breat nice and straight or do you need to pull the Ablam out of the rosette and file it flat? And the other side of the break......the one on the piece of Ablam still in your hand.......does it have to be flattened or will it match up well to the break on the piece of Ablam already in the rosette?

3) Finally, if I purchase the Rosette Inlay set from the Martin 1833 Shop named the "D-45 style W/O pearl Rosette Inlay" (part no 13R45), will it have similar purfling lines as you used in these photos? Does it include a "plastic" spacer that is later pulled out for the pearl? If so, do you know the width of that spacer? (curious what width Ablam it matches up with)

Thanks John!

I stopped using the pre shaped pearl as I could see the darn joint lines and I do find working pearl a nice way to escape . The point to this exercise is to show just how easy it can be done

Ok, thanks. I had multiple questions......and I now have the answer to one of them. Anyone care to answer the other questions?