This is a collection of some useful tools that are easy to make.
Circle Tool
I developed this circle tool in about 2013. It is a great way to draw circles on the pan. It is very much easier and more accurate to use than the traditional method of using a ruler and felt-tip pen.
The white tube is PVC pipe. There's a hole drilled in the bottom end to take a felt tip pen.
The gray part close to the pen is a metal rod insert that I added to give some weight to part near the pen and keep it on the note surface. Initially the tool didn't have this, but it has proved useful.
The large wooden block has a hole drilled in it that the PVC pipe slides through. The PVC pipe is not super-snug in this hole - the tolerance is about 1/32" or 1mm
The L-shaped metal piece is made from a 1/4-20 bolt that was bent into the L shape and then the head was cut off (not required, I just got tired of the feel of it). The threaded part of the bold is inside a 1/4-20 threaded insert that is set into the wooden block. This way the L piece can be used to tighten down the PVC pipe and hold it in place.
I did upgrade this tool a little after I took these photos. I changed the flat piece of wood and replaced it with a steel plate, since the wood wore out and ended up with a rut in it from the number of times it went around pans! I also replaced the hinge mechanism with a section of piano-hinge. I also replaced the wheels that run around the outside of the pan with short nails that slide against the rim of the pan.
This tool could use further refinement because its hard/impossible to draw the 2" (50mm) line with it. But it works pretty darn well "as is" and is way faster and more accurate than using a ruler!
IMPORTANT NOTE
You still have to use a ruler to mark the position of the line you intend to draw, and then adjust the tool to position the pen on the line. The geometry of the hinge and sliding points on the tool mean it is not easily possible to create a system where you could calibrate the tool to draw a given line.
Radial Line Tool
One of the challenges of pan making is drawing "straight" lines on a curved surface. The simple fact is that straight lines and curves just don't readily mix.
Using a ruler to accurately draw a line from the center of the pan to the rim of the pan is really only possible when the pan is flat. As soon as the pan has any depth to it, suddenly the ruler can take a number of different paths from the center to the rim. In extreme cases I've seen pans where the lines between the rim notes are very visibly skewed to one side.
Since repeatability is one of the goals in making good pans, it's important that we remove the guess-work regarding these lines, and that's why I came up with the Radial Line Tool.
The tool is basically two boards mounted at 90 degrees to each other. The first board sits on the rim of the pan, the other (curved) vertical board can rotate in a plane 90 degrees to the first board.
Once the tool is on the pan, line up the vertical board on center of the pan and the location on the rim to which you wish to draw the line (offset by half the width of the pen you're using). Place the pen against the vertical face and slide it from the center to the rim of the pan.
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