10 | July | 2015 | rebornpipes

On 07/08/2015 at 11 o’clock am Pacific Time the number of views of the rebornpipes blog site reached 500,000. Three years ago in May of 2012, when I started this blog I had dreams of where it would go but I did not have a clue how it would develop. I had no idea of the reach it would have across the globe and the number of people who would read it and come to contribute to it. Over the past three years many faithful readers have chosen and continued to follow the blog via email and twitter and now Facebook.

Many of the readers and followers of the blog have gone on to become significant contributors to the blog with consistent write ups on their restoration and refurbishing work. Thank you for helping make rebornpipes what it is today. Without your contributions it would be less valuable than it is. I appreciate and learn from each of you as I read and interact with their work on the pages and photos of their explanations. I also learn from you readers who take time to comment on each post and ask both questions and share information and suggestions. Thank you all.

For me one of the personal benefits of the blog, that I never expected or could have predicted, is the gathering of historic information – brochures, catalogues and leaflets that have been added as resources for the community. I continue to learn a lot about the history and marks of various brands that each of you restore and refurbish. That unpredicted benefit has given me much to read.

These milestones always provide a pause for me to reflect as I have done above, on where we have gone through the years. But they also provide an opportunity for me to look ahead and speculate on where the future may take us. I look forward to:

…learning more tools, techniques and tricks from each of you in the years ahead.
…many of you who are currently reading and practicing what you are learning to become contributors to the blog with your writing and your photos of the pipes you are restoring. There is always room for more of you to add your work to the blog.
…the addition of more historical documents, background information, catalogues, brochures, book reviews and pipe reviews to the blog. The addition of these pieces of information can never be to frequent to liking.
…learning more about pipe brands, makers, manufacturers that are currently unknown to me.
…fine tuning refurbishing skills through our interaction and refining the processes of refurbishing.
…improving photography skills to better document my own work.

What are you looking forward to seeing and learning? Add your comments below.

Blog by Dave Gossett

A pipe shape this elegant deserves a better name than squashed tomato. I received this pipe looking more like a bruised tomato. It was beat up and chewed up. An LHS this shape doesn’t pop up very often so I was happy to accept the pipe in any condition.

I started off with the routine internal cleaning of the pipe with alcohol, pipe cleaners, and shank brush.

Next I began to work out the dents by heating a butter knife with a propane torch and pressing it firmly to the dented areas with a damp rag between the two. This generates steam and lifts the dents out of the briar. This may have to be done several times to the same area depending how bad the dents are.

After steaming, I sanded the scratches from the rest of the briar, smoothed out the bowl chamber, prepping it for the carbon coating, gave it a light alcohol scrub with 0000 steel wool to remove the leftover patchy original finish, and finally, masked off the shank and polished the aluminum.

Next up is the stem rebuild. A tight fitting plug/form for the air way and bit is made from cardboard wrapped in clear tape.

Here is a picture of all the materials used for the stem rebuild.

Cyanoacrylate glue (medium viscosity), activated charcoal. I use disposable things for mixing and application process. 25% charcoal/75% glue mixed thoroughly is the recipe. I mix it in bottle caps, and use a q-tip stem with a small scoop/spoon cut into the end to apply to the repair site.

The repair site needs to be scored and cleaned before the mix is applied. Once the material has cured, the tape covered cardboard plug is easily removed. Using a needle file I reshaped the button and then wet sanded the stem.

Back to briar.
Now that it has been steamed, sanded, and had the old stain removed, I applied a custom color mix of Fiebings, consisting of dark brown, a hint of orange, and a bit of oxblood, thinned a bit with alcohol.

I always like seeing the color transformation from the dry stained tint to the very different shade it becomes after the carnauba wax is applied.

The final step in the restoration after waxing is the carbon bowl coating. It’s a very simple detail to make an old estate pipe look fresh again. Maple syrup and activated charcoal. After the bowl chamber is clean and smooth, lightly coat the bowl chamber with maple syrup, then fill the bowl to the top with the charcoal. Leave it for one hour or more then dump the bowl and blow through the shank to remove the excess. Next is the hard part. Don’t touch it for 5 days. It takes 3-5 days for it to harden and cure. I usually give it a week just to be sure. Once it has set up, it’s as tough as a Savinelli carbon coating and looks just as good. The pipe will have the familiar slightly bitter taste of a brand new pipe, but it doesn’t last nearly as long. After you smoke a bowl or two it goes away.