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How to Print a Guitar Template

Note: if you fi nd t his process tedious, put t he template fi les on a USB t humb drive and t ake t hem to a Fedex Offi ce shop
(formerly known as Kinko’s), Offi ceMax, or local printer t hat can handle large-scale print s. A0 sized paper is more t han enough
(33.1 ″ x 46.8″ ). The cost for black and white print s of t his size shouldn’t be more t han a few dollars. St aples off ers large format
print ing services in bot h Canada and t he US for about $22 USD shipped.

Templates are a great way to build, not only for emulating your favorite models, but also for basing your
own designs. It’s much easier to work with the proper proportions and scale. The luthier community at
large has been creating and sharing templates based on numerous popular models for a long time, but if
you don’t know how to get it from PDF to MDF, there’s not much purpose. And that’s a shame since it’s so
easy.

Tools for making your own guitar templates:

A4 Paper Standard Jigsaw Inkscape Others

Printer

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How to Print a Guitar Template
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– 10mm MDF board
– Scissors
– Sandpaper (400 – 800 grit)
– Bandsaw (in place of jigsaw)
(https://inkscape.org/en/download/)
Amazon Link Download Link
(http://amzn.to/2igKoKX) (https://inkscape.org/en/download/)

Using Inkscape to Print from a PDF

If you were to go to a professional printing place and gave them a thumb drive with your guitar template
PDF, they’d be able to print it for you on one sheet of paper for a fair price.

If that’s not an option for you, then the next best thing is to print out a bunch smaller images on standard
A4 paper and put them together again afterward. You can do this with any old desktop printer.

But we need to ensure that your image will be printed full-scale and easily put back together again – that’s
where Inkscape (https://inkscape.org/en/download/) comes in. It’s a free program that’s compatible with
Windows / Linux / OSX.

OSX users may need to download xQuartz (https://www.xquartz.org/) first. Make sure to restart your computer after installation before
opening Inkscape.

Here’s the steps to go from PDF to Paper:

1 Import your PDF to Inkscape

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/1.png)

2 Draw a 45 degree line across the image with the Bevel/Straight Line tool
(you can hold down CTRL to snap the line to 45 degrees before clicking
the second point). After that, duplicate the line (CTRL – D).

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/3.png)
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3
How to Print a Guitar Template Flip the duplicated line horizontally (H).

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/4.png)

4 Group the two lines (CTRL – G).

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/5.png)

5 Create a tiled clone (Edit > Clone > Create Tiled Clones).

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/6.png)

6 Enter the following settings in the Shift panel:

Shift X: 5% per row, 0% per column
Shift Y: -1 00% per row, -1 00% per column
Rows, columns: 1 00 x 1
(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
Press Create
content/uploads/8.png)

7 Select all the lines and group them, then adjust your lines to cover the
template in full.

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/9.png)

8 Print. The default settings should print the image in full scale across
multiple sheets of paper. Use the guidelines to tape the images together
accurately afterward.

(https://www.electricherald.com/wp-
content/uploads/10.png)

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 (https://www.electricherald.com/) How to Print a Guitar Template

After that, it’s just a matter of putting the pieces together. You can cut away any excess paper and use
regular tape to fix everything together. It may be helpful to use a light underneath the pages to line your
grid up perfectly.

If you’re having issues with margins on the paper, make sure you double check that your paper size
matches the settings on Inkscape.

Once you’ve got everything together, it’s pretty self-explanatory – cut around the edges, glue it to your
MDF board, and cut it out with a band saw (recommended) or jigsaw. You can clean up the edges with a
belt sander to get things perfect.

Go to the guitar templates (https://www.electricherald.com/guitar-templates) section to get started!

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Joel Bennett (https://www.electricherald.com/author/admin/)
Joel is the owner and main contributor for Electric Herald. Originally from England, currently residing in Southern Mexico.

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