My apologies if topic posted elsewhere.
Having seen skull plates fracture between antlers on a friends collection years ago because of the narrow wedge of bone left from sawing antlers off,when i somewhere read of leaving more plate i began cutting from behind nose through center of eye sockets to back of skull.(i start from back,picture line).
Final shaping of profile done on /with concrete last time .
30 plus years and plates are tight with great integrity.
Happy hunting all!

more is better

I always cut straight trough about middle of the eye socket so a some brain falls out. Then find a nice ant hill and shove them down into it and let nature clean them up. Maggots will do a lot of the work then the ants will eat the maggots and finish cleaning them up. Thats what I always do.

Here's my finished product. I've yet to have a set of antlers come apart doing it this way.

You have a lot of bone left that really isn't needed. As long as you keep most of the skull cap when cutting them off, you'll be fine. I've never had a skull plate separate.

I do all European mounts now on any decent sized deer. The little ones just get sawed off with the skull plate.