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The basics for laying out a pattern. A suitable piece of timber, a drawing and a selection of tools. Note that I use a scalpel for scoring lines. If you follow suit, being VERY, VERY careful not to slip while using the knife, otherwise you are going to spend some time at your local emergency department getting part of you stiched-up.

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First job is to get the main centre lines marked on after one edge of the timber is squared-off. Only work from that one edge when laying out.

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This is what we are going to produce. It's for a inspection cover plate for a scale model traction engine. It will be cast in iron. Sorry the lettering doesn't show up too well in this image.

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Once the main lines are on, the radii are drawn with a pair of deviders.

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Now over to the bandsaw to trim off the excess timber.

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The disc sander table is set to a couple of degrees of taper bigger from the top edge, and the job is carefully sanded back to the scored lines, plus the corner radii.

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Transferring to the mill, I'm machining the the centre section to produce a flange around the top edge, If you don't have a milling machine, use some suitable thickness of plywood to produce the same effect.

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Just cleaning up the inside corner radii with a suitable gouge.

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So there's the basic pattern sanded with all the corners radiused.

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Time for the first coat of varnish. This one is cellulose based, brushed on thinly it dries very quickly.....

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....which is good because it means I can crack on with attaching the lead letters after a light rub down of the varnish. I checked that I could get suitable sized lettering before I started the pattern. Take care when placing the letters as bad spacing and wavy lines look terrible. After the lettering was secure another coat of varnish was added.