Partition Cutting

[CaptSquid]

It's getting closer. I'm almost ready to start paneling the inside of Brunhilde. I can see a lot of things inside my coconut (I'm mechanically gifted), but, for the life of me, how do I cut wood where it matches the curved surfaces, i.e., wheel arches, roof transition? I don't want the curved cuts to appear amateurish.

[Jolly Roger]

Good afternoon sir, I thought there was a thread in here for that but I guess it has been several discussions in the past. Sorry.
I like to use cardboard to make a template. I use a good straight piece that matches the width of what the full board squared off and then I use thinner cardboard to kind of bend and crease into the curve(trimming necessary as you go with some curves) don't have to be perfect yet? Tape it to the square piece that matches what it should be and fine trim the edges. Then I go around the entire perimeter of the curved cut out usually with a stick ruler and start marking add an 1/8 from mark/line to line add 1/4 there and make a perfect template out of the heavy cardboard that I am happy with and then use it to mark my finish board and cut one time.
They also make a scribing tool called the perfect butt (google it I don't have one) I have a harbor freight thing called a contour guage that helped in the tight and changing curve into a curve into the window laying in 3/8-1/2" for 2' and the wall laying back out a touch to level.
I could only afford what I needed so no muck ups and the cardboard was free from raiding the big box stores backside's.
Damn I wish I could post picks? I used bead board/wainscoting and a piece of sheet copper in the kitchen area and some white shower board stuff throughout and ended up dang near beautiful (not bragging) in the roof curves the bus wire mold curves and ending up close enough to square enough to just put trim on it.
Hope this helps?

[family wagon]

Jolly Roger is correct, it's a topic that comes up from time to time. Not that this helps you any -- I've just failed to search my way to any of the existing threads I recall, and that's coming from a place of knowing it's there and having an inkling of what to search for!

Here's a photo showing my setup for tracing the curve of the roof. Basically I held a cardboard panel in a fixed position near the curve with a rough hack at the shape. Then trace along the contour using a fixed-length offset between the curve and the pen/pencil/marker. The curve is thus transferred onto the panel. Cut it out, hold the panel up to the curve, and repeat if needed until you're satisfied with the fit. After one or two iterations the template will fit the curve closely enough that the marker can be slid directly on the surface with no additional spacer/offset. It's OK that the template doesn't cover the entire space that the finished piece should cover -- make a top half and a bottom half separately (for example), then join them together and use the composite template to cut the real material.

Here the cardboard was held up by being screwed to the diagonal 1x2. The straight edge and pencil are shown clamped at the top corner in approximately the position I held them as I slid them together to trace along the roof. I didn't have a helper to hold the camera or the props, so I used a clamp to hold the props..

[Piersg]

A tool like the Perfect Butt scriber can make the job easier:

http://www.amazon.com/M-POWER-PB-Per...s=perfect+butt

[Robin97396]

That's a pretty fancy pencil holder, but yes it would certainly trace the curves smoothly.

I've been told I'll never have a Perfect Butt.