Blog by Steve Laug

A few weeks ago I was contacted from a fellow in Montana who was selling his pipes as they had not been used for quite a few years. I asked him for a picture and he sent me the one to the left. It included the following brands (from the top to the bottom of the photo): Savinelli Autograph 5 Freehand, Mastro de Paja Ciocco 0C Bulldog, Mastro de Paja Media 1C Bent Billiard, Ser Jacopo Delecta Octagonal Bent Billiard, Caminetto Business KS 118 Canadian, Radici Rind Rhodesian, Dunhill Bruyere ODA 836 Panel Billiard, Barontini Straight Grain B3 Freehand and a Ben Wade Martinique Hand Made in Denmark Freehand.

Almost all of them were higher end pipes and all were hand made pipes. They were a mix of finishes – smooth, sandblast and also rusticated. They were a mix of shapes as well and the majority of them were Italian Made other than the Dunhill and the Ben Wade Martinique. They were beautiful pipes and after exchanging quite a few photos of the pipes from various angles to get a sense of what was there we struck a deal. We sent him the payment and the pipes arrived in Idaho a few days after I left for Vancouver.

Jeff cleaned the all and yesterday I received them in Vancouver. I am impressed with the way they cleaned up and the beauty of the brands. They truly are some beautiful pipes. I just need to put the final touches on each of them and address minor issues on the bowl rims and the stems and they should be good to go. I am really looking forward to working on each of them in the days ahead.

This evening after work I decided to continue working on the lot. I chose to work on the Caminetto Rusticated Business KS 118 Canadian. It has a rusticated classic shape Caminetto Business style finish in a Canadian with an Italian twist. The rustication is one that I am familiar with from the other Caminetto pipes that I have worked on. The pipe has rustication on the rim top that matches the rest of the pipe. The shank end has a smooth band around it to allow the stem to seat correctly. The pipe is stamped on a smooth panel on the underside of the shank. It reads Caminetto [over] BUSINESS followed by a shield with a KS in the middle. Following that it has the shape number 118. Toward the end of the shank it is stamped Made in Italy [over] Cucciago (Cantu). The classic Moustache Caminetto logo is on top of the stem. The stamping is clear and readable. The finish was very dirty with grime ground into the rustication. The bowl had a thick cake and the rim top was dirty with lava filling in the rustication and some darkening around the inner edge of the bowl. The stem is silver and black variegated acrylic and was dirty with light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button and on the button itself. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up work on it. Jeff took photos of the bowl and rim top to show what they looked like before the clean up. You can see the darkening and thick lava on the inner edge and in the rustication on the rim top. He also took some photos of the stem to show the condition of both sides. You can see the tooth marks and chatter on the top and underside next to the button. The photos of the sides and heel of the bowl show the Business rustication style around the bowl and shank. The stain adds depth finish on the pipe. Even under the grime it is a real beauty. The stamping on the underside of the shank is shown in the photo below. It is clear and readable as noted above. The third photo shows the Caminetto Moustache Logo. I have worked on several Caminetto in the past so I turned to one of the restorations on the rebornpipes blog and reread the background information on the brand. I am including that info here with this restoration (https://rebornpipes.com/2020/04/19/pretty-tired-and-dirty-messy-restoration-of-a-caminetto-business-tomahawk-182/).

When the pipe arrived I turned to Pipephil (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-c1.html) to see if he included not only information on this Caminetto Business 182. He gave some interesting information about the brand. It was created in 1986 by Guiseppe Ascorti, Luigi Radice and Gianni Davoli as the distributor. It states that in 1979 the first Caminetto period ended with Luigi Radice leaving the company. Guiseppe Ascorti continued making the pipe with his son Roberto. In 1986 the New Caminetto period began by Roberto Ascorti.I turned to Pipedia for more information on the Caminetto and how to date the pipe I had in hand (https://pipedia.org/wiki/The_History_of_Caminetto_(shapes,_stamping,_articles,_etc.). I quote a pertinent paragraph:

Stampings and dating: First off, dating earlier Caminetto’s is nearly impossible. Nevertheless, there were three phases, some in which were much earlier, of development that occurred in the stamping process of Caminetto. Before that though, every pipe had the stamp of Caminetto in one of two ways: Caminetto in script or Caminetto within quotation marks in block letters (I do not know how it was decided which pipe got which stamp, as I have had EARLY Caminetto’s with both)…

The stampings are shown in the photo to the left. The stamping on this pipe is like #3.

…Now, the question is which stamps are earlier and more likely to have been made by Ascorti and/or Radice. The answer is #1. The differences in #2 and #3 seem to be minute, as Cucciago is simply a suburb of Cantu. Pipes stamped like #1 are the most valuable Caminetto’s as they are the earliest production of the brand, as well as what some would claim the most perfect of Ascorti and Radice’s work. The last tidbit is, of course, debatable…

… There is also another factor in stamping, that is, which series the pipe falls in. The majority of Caminetto’s one sees are those of the “Business” series, which are stamped such with their collective shape (see photo of shapes below). Another stamp that sometimes follows the “Business” one is “KS,” which from what I know means “King-size” (this could be wrong, as there are pipes stamped with KS1, KS2, and KS3).

Now it was time to look at it up close and personal. Jeff had done an amazing job in removing all of the cake and the lava on the rim top. He had reamed the bowl with a PipNet Pipe Reamer and cleaned up the remnants with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He took the cake back to bare briar so we could check the walls for damage. He scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime on the bowl and rim and was able to remove the lava and dirt. He cleaned out the interior of the bowl and shank with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol until they came out clean. He cleaned the stem with Soft Scrub to remove the grime on the exterior and cleaned out the airway with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. I took photos of the pipe before I started my part of the restoration. I took close up photos of both the rim top and the stem. Jeff had been able to get the grime and lava off of the rim top and it looked pretty incredible. Even the darkening and marks on the rim top on the right side look much better. The stem looked very clean. The tooth marks and chatter were minimal and predominantly on the underside near the button. They should be easy to remove. The stamping on the shank underside was readable as noted above. I also took a photo with the stem removed to give an idea of the perspective and design of the pipe.I started my work on the pipe by addressing the slight darkening on the top and the edge of the bowl with a brass bristle wire brush. I worked over the darkening in the rustication with the brush to remove the remaining debris and clean up the top. Over all the rim top and edges looked much better.The bowl and shank were very clean. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the finish of the bowl and shank with my fingers and a horsehair shoe brush. I want the product to go deep into the finish because it works to clean, enliven and protect the briar. Once I was confident that it was deeply worked into the finish I wiped it off and buffed it with a soft cloth to polish it. The pipe really began to have a rich shine. I took some photos of the bowl at this point to mark the progress in the restoration. The finish on the pipe is beautiful in the photos below. I set the bowl aside and turned to work on the stem. I sanded out the tooth marks and chatter on the surface of the stem with 220 grit sandpaper. I started polishing it with 600 grit wet dry sandpaper.I touched up the moustache stem logo on the top of the stem with white acrylic fingernail polish. It looks much better but it is shallow on the outside edges of the stamp.I polished the acrylic stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding it with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad because I find that the oil provides a great surface for polishing with the micromesh pads.I finished polishing it with Before & After Pipe Polish – both the Fine and Extra Fine polishes. I gave it a final coat of oil and set it aside to dry. This Caminetto Business KS 118 Canadian is a real beauty and has a lot of life left. I put the bowl and stem back together again and buffed the bowl and the stem with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I used a soft touch on the rusticated bowl so as not to fill it in with the polishing product. I gave the bowl several coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem several coats of carnauba wax. I carefully buffed the entire pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I finished buffing with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished pipe looks very good. The rustication is very tactile and feels great in the hand. It is comfortable and light weight. The finished Caminetto Business Canadian is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 ¾ inches, Height: 2 ¼ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 71 grams/2.50 ounces. This great looking rusticated Caminetto turned out very well. It should be a great pipe. It will be going on the rebornpipes store in the Italian Pipemakers Section shortly if you are interested in adding it to your collection.

As always, I encourage your questions and comments as you read the blog. Thanks to each of you who are reading this blog. Remember we are not pipe owners; we are pipe men and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of those who follow us.