Mark has been following the blog for awhile now and posting his work on Pipe Smokers Unleashed pipe forum. I have been reading about his work for awhile now and invited him to write about his refurbs for the blog. I am hoping this is the first of many posts that he will do for us on his restorations.

This is my first full writeup on a pipe. I got this Pre-Republic Shamrock shape 106 billiard on eBay. It has the circle COM dating it between 1947-49. The pics from eBay were enough to scare away the casual smoker. The bowl was heavily caked and had severe lava flow on the rim. The calcified stem didn’t fit all the way into the shank, in fact it was stuck. But the nomenclature was crisp and when I saw the “Made in Ireland” circle format, I knew I had to have it!

When I got the pipe in, it was just as shown. The cake was so thick I couldn’t get my pinkie into the bowl very far. The stem had a tooth mark divot on the p-lip opening and was frozen into the shank upside down.

First thing I did was use a cotton pad to wipe the outside of the bowl to get rid of 65+ years of grime. The bowl stain was still in excellent condition. Put the pipe in the freezer for 30 minutes then was able to free the stem. I soaked the bowl with the alcohol/cotton ball routine overnight. The next day I reamed the bowl, worked an alcohol soaked shank brush into the shank until the buildup was gone. When dry, the stem fit perfectly!
Here is the stem after “painting” it with a bic lighter to remove oxidation and raise up tooth depressions. Note the large divot in the airhole.

I put a Vaseline coated toothpick in the opening and used the StewMac black superglue to close up the opening to a more normal size, filling in the divot over several days.

Using 320 grit wet/dry sandpaper on up to 1200 grit, I reshaped the stem where the glue was built up. Then moving to the Beall 3 wheel buffing system I hit the pipe with Tripoli, white diamond and carnauba wax. Each wheel is dedicated to each compound and is attached to a ½ hp motor on an old barstool in my garage (mancave). I put an old quilt under the buffer because occasionally the pipe or stem I am working on will jump out and hit the concrete. This gives it a soft cushion should it happen. Here is the finished pipe, one of my new favorites!