Category Archives: Pipe Refurbishing Essays

Essays and pictorial essays on the art of refurbishing

The Fourth of Six Pipes from Salmon Arm for Restoration –A Vauen Dr. Perl 103 Sandblast Pot

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by Steve Laug

A few weeks ago, I received an email from a friend, Sonny in Salmon Arm, BC. We have worked together on pipes over the past few years either ones that I have sold to him or those he has picked up on auctions or sales that I have restored. He wrote that he had some pipes that needed restoration.

I also have some of those old estates I still need to send to you for restoration. Hopefully I will be able to pack them up and get them off to you this week. Thank you again, Steve! – Sonny

He followed that up with another email regarding what he wanted done on the various pipes. I have included it below.

 I would like the Vauen bent ball shape to have no band on it. It looks like it may have had a band there at one time and I’m not sure why. And if any of them needs to be stained again, I would like them to be black, especially the Peterson 309 and that ball Vauen. Let me know what you think.

I took a photo of the box of six pipes once I unwrapped them. There were 6 interesting pipes – a Vauen Luxus Bent Ball, a Vauen Dr. Perl Billiard, a Sand Blast Vauen Dr. Perl Pot, a Parade News Briar Shop Oom Paul, a Bari Pearl Bamboo shank Ball and Peterson’s System Premier 309 Bent Billiard. All were in need of various degrees of restoration.The fourth pipe I chose to work on was the Vauen Dr. Perl Pot. It is stamped on the underside and reads Vauen [over] Dr. Perl. To the right of that it is stamped with the shape number 103 followed by a pair of crossed bent pipes. The finish was quite clean with light dust in the sandblast grooves. This bowl was an odd one. It was quite clean but when I took it out of the box there were a couple chunks that fell out in my hand. I examined the bowl with a lens and found that the bowl had been given a thick bowl coating that was cracked and chipping. As I examined it I hit a few spots with my fingernail and the coating chipped off. There was no cake in the bowl as it appeared to have been cleaned before the bowl coating had been applied. The coating was very thick and very brittle and I figured it would all come out quite simply. The stem was lightly oxidized but otherwise clean. There was a paper filter in the filter mortise. That filter was in decent condition with some yellowing on the paper. There did not appear to be anything other than tooth chatter ahead of the button. I took these photos before I started my work on the pipe. I took a photo of the rim top and bowl to show the condition of both of them. There is something on the walls of the bowl but the cake is gone. It appears to be a bowl coating of some sort but it is in rough condition. Otherwise the bowl is clean and in good condition. The photos of the stem show the heavy oxidation and tooth marks/chatter on both sides ahead of the button.I took photos of the stamping on the underside of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable as noted above. It is much clearer in person but is hard to capture on the curve of the shank. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo to show the proportions of the pipe. I removed the filter from the shank. It is a bit of a unique filter made by Vauen that I have not seen before. I am including the background on the Vauen brand that I have used before. I always read over it before I start my work on a pipe. It is an important part of the restoration to me as it adds colour to the pipe I am working on. I turned to Pipephil’s site (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-v1.html). I did a screen capture of the information on the site. There was a great sidebar that gave some history of the brand. I include both of them below.In 1848, Karl Ellenberger and his partner Carl August Ziener establish a pipe factory in Nuremberg. In 1901 they merge with Gebhard Ott an other factory in town and they create a firm named Vereinigten Pfeifenfabriken Nürnberg (abbreviated : VPFN*). Shortly after Ernst Eckert, a member of the Ott family became manager of the society. During the 20th century Adolf, Ernst (jr) and Alexander Eckert (CEO in 2012) followed one another at Vauen’s head.* VPFN : “V” is said VAU in German (pronounce faou) and “N” becomes EN. Hence VAUEN.

Dal Stanton (Pipesteward.com) wrote a great piece on the history of the brand on a Vauen pipe that he worked on. I reread that and quote a section from the blog below that gives a great sense of the history of the German brand and some photos from the website (https://rebornpipes.com/2021/04/27/breathing-new-life-into-a-german-vauen-6294-p-lip-saddle-billiard-for-a-special-young-lady/).

… I turn to the question of the history of the VAUEN name? I look to the History section of the VAUEN website and again, I am impressed with the presentation. Whenever I work on a pipe, and especially when a pipe name is new to me, I enjoy looking at its history to appreciate the pipe more fully now on my worktable. From VAUEN’s website:Quality and a wealth of ideas have a long tradition at VAUEN. 160 years of VAUEN: that means 160 years of skilled workmanship and modern technology and 160 years of experience in fulfilling the individual wishes of today’s pipe lovers, and those of tomorrow.

In Nuremberg in 1848, Karl Ellenberger and his partner Carl August Ziener turned an idea into reality: Germany’s first pipe manufacturer produced tobacco pipes for connoisseurs around the world using a selection of the best wood. In an amalgamation with the Gebhard Ott pipe factory, which was founded in 1866 in Nuremberg, the Vereinigten Pfeifenfabriken Nuremberg (United Pipe Factories Nuremberg, or VPFN) was born in 1901.  Under the management of Ernst Eckert, a descendent of the founding Ott family, a company was born whose products and services would shape the tobacco and smoking culture in Europe and overseas for the next 160 years and counting.

The question about the name, VAUEN, not being a name of a person and why it is capitalized throughout is explained:

In his search for a name that would be easily remembered by all pipe lovers, Ernst Eckert’s son, Adolf Eckert, coined a new name for the company in 1909: VAUEN – a composition of the first letters V (pronounced vow) of Vereinigte Pfeifenfabriken and N (pronounced en) of Nuremberg. A brand for the future was born.

Armed with that information I turned my attention to the pipe itself. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the brittle and crumbling bowl coating. It was very strange stuff and little fell apart as I touched it. I cleaned up what remained of the coating with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl to remove any remnants with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once finished the inside of the bowl was smooth and the briar was bare of the coating. Once the pipe was reamed, cleaned I worked on the internals – the mortise and airway in the shank and airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. The shank was quite clean other than the dust from my work on the bowl. The stem was also very clean.When I get the bowl to this point in the process I use Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I work it into the briar with my finger tips to make sure that it covers every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. Once the time has passed I wiped it off with a soft cloth then buffed it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. You see the shine that the briar has taken on and the way sandblast has depth. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I worked over the stem with Soft Scrub cleanser and cotton pads to further remove the oxidation in the surface of the vulcanite.I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to break up the remaining oxidation. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with an Obsidian Oil impregnated cloth. It began to look good.Since I did not have any filters for the Vauen like the one that was in place I used it again. It was discoloured from time but had not been used so it was clean.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. As usual at this point in the restoration process I am excited to be on the homestretch. I look forward to the final look when I put a pipe back together, polished and waxed. I polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to polish out the scratches in the briar and the vulcanite. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The sandblast finish really pops with the wax and polish. The shiny black vulcanite stem is a beautiful contrast to the dark browns of the bowl and shank. This Vauen Dr. Perl 103 Pot was another fun pipe to work on. The pipe is comfortable pipe to hold in the hand. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.20 ounces/33 grams. Just two more of Sonny’s pipes to work on before I send them all back to him. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I working on it. 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 pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of those who follow us.

A The Sterling Pipe 530 Canted Dublin Restoration

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This is a beauty John. Nice job on both is unusual brand and the shape.

Photographed and written by John M. Young I am a sucker for a Dublin shaped pipe and I love the look of a forward canted bowl.  These two features …

A The Sterling Pipe 530 Canted Dublin Restoration

The Third of Six Pipes from Salmon Arm for Restoration –A Peterson’s System Premier 309

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Blog by Steve Laug

A few weeks ago, I received an email from a friend, Sonny in Salmon Arm, BC. We have worked together on pipes over the past few years either ones that I have sold to him or those he has picked up on auctions or sales that I have restored. He wrote that he had some pipes that needed restoration.

I also have some of those old estates I still need to send to you for restoration. Hopefully I will be able to pack them up and get them off to you this week. Thank you again, Steve! – Sonny

He followed that up with another email regarding what he wanted done on the various pipes. I have included it below.

I would like the Vauen bent ball shape to have no band on it. It looks like it may have had a band there at one time and I’m not sure why. And if any of them needs to be stained again, I would like them to be black, especially the Peterson 309 and that ball Vauen. Let me know what you think.

I took a photo of the box of six pipes once I unwrapped them. There were 6 interesting pipes – a Vauen Luxus Bent Ball, a Vauen Dr. Perl Billiard, a Sand Blast Vauen Dr. Perl Pot, a Parade News Briar Shop Oom Paul, a Bari Pearl Bamboo shank Ball and Peterson’s System Premier 309 Bent Billiard. All were in need of various degrees of restoration.The third pipe I chose to work on was the Peterson’s System Premier. It is stamped on the underside and reads Peterson’s [arched over] System [over] Premier. To the right of that it is stamped with the shape number 309 [over] Made in the [over] Republic [over] of Ireland. The pipe was dirty and there were white spots of paint in the sandblast finish. There was a silver ferrule on the shank end. It is stamped Peterson’s [over] Dublin followed by Sterling [over] Silver. That is followed three silver hallmarks: Hibernia seated arm on a harp for the country of manufacture; the crowned Harp designating sterling quality and the date letter marks which in this case was the letter I. The bowl has a thick cake in it and some lava in the sandblast on the rim top. The stem is a system stem with a metal chimney. It was very dirty with heavy oxidation and light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. I took these photos before I started my work on the pipe. I took a photo of the rim top and bowl to show the condition of both of them. There is a moderate cake in the bowl and some lava on the thin rim top. There is also debris in the bowl. The photos of the stem show the heavy oxidation and tooth marks/chatter on both sides ahead of the button.I took photos of the stamping on the underside of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable as noted above. It is much clearer in person but is hard to capture on the curve of the shank. I also tried to capture the stamping on the silver ferrule. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo to show the proportions of the pipe. The first of those photos shows it with the chimney in place and the second shows it unscrewed. Before I started working on the pipe I wanted to dig into the detail on the stamping on the pipe. I knew what some of the stamping meant regarding the rough age of the pipe.

 Because the pipe was stamped Made in the Republic of Ireland I knew that I was dealing with a Republic Era pipe made between 1950-1989. It was a Sandblast Peterson’s System Premier 309 Billiard with an interesting blast finish. The stain on the bowl was a mess with fading and paint in the blast. Originally it looked like the bowl had been stained with a combination of brown stains. Now it was time to tighten down the date on the pipe from the hallmarks on the Sterling Silver ferrule.

I turned to the hallmarking chart on one of the blogs on rebornpipes to lock down the date for the pipe (https://rebornpipes.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/peterson-cataloguecomp_page_27.jpg). The chart defines the meaning of each hallmark. The first one of the seated woman with a harp is known as the Hibernia stamp and identifies the pipe as made in Ireland. The second stamp is a crowned harp which is a fineness mark denoting the high quality of silver that was used. The third stamp is an italic lower case “i”. I have included a larger screen capture of the chart in the lower left of the photo below. I have drawn a RED CIRCLE around the date letter below. It is a lower case “i” as seen in the circled letter below. It identifies the date of this Peterson’s pipe to 1976. I knew that I was dealing with a Republic Era pipe made between 1950 and the present. The hallmarks date the pipe to 1976. Now it was time to work on the pipe.

Armed with that information I turned my attention to the pipe itself. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake. I cleaned up what remained with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl to remove any remnants of cake with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once finished the inside of the bowl was smooth. I scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. I also worked over the interior of the shank and bowl with brushes and soap at the same time. I rinsed the pipe off with warm running water and dried if off with a soft towel. The pipe is certainly cleaner. In speaking with Sonny I knew that he wanted the bowl stained black as he preferred that colour. So, this morning early I obliged him and stained the pipe with a black aniline stain. I applied it with the wool dauber and then flamed it to set the stain. I repeated the process until the coverage was even around the bowl.Once the stain dried I buffed it with a coarse cloth to remove any excess stain and to blend it into the surrounding surface smoothly. It looks good with the black stain. I sent photos to Sonny and he approves! Before I cleaned the inside of the shank and the stem I took the stem out of the Briarville’s Pipe Stem deoxidizer where it had been sitting over night and rubbed it briskly with a coarse cotton cloth to remove the oxidation on the surface and dry off the remaining deoxidizer on the stem. I am pleased with how well the product worked even after I have used this batch for over a year. Once the pipe was reamed, cleaned and stained and the stem was deoxidized I worked on the internals – the mortise, sump and airway in the shank and airway in the stem. I cleaned out the airway to the bowl, the mortise, sump and the airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. I also worked over the aluminum chimney that screwed into the tenon on the stem.When I get the bowl to this point in the process I use Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I work it into the briar and the bamboo with my finger tips to make sure that it covers every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. Once the time has passed I wiped it off with a soft cloth then buffed it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. You see the shine that the briar has taken on and the way rustication has depth. The black stain works on the pipe and it is a beauty. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I wiped the stem down with Soft Scrub cleanser and cotton pads to further remove the remnants of oxidation in the surface of the vulcanite.I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to break up the remaining oxidation. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with an Obsidian Oil impregnated cloth. It began to look good.Once finished that I screwed the aluminum chimney back into the tenon on the stem. The fit and look is very good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. I polished the silver ferrule with a jeweller’s cloth and the silver took on a deep shine. It is a pretty pipe with the shinning silver and the black stain on the bowl. I am excited to finish restoration and reworking of this Republic Era Peterson’s System Premier 309. I put the pipe back together and buffed it lightly with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I hand buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with beautiful mixed grain all around it. The polished sandblast on bowl along with the silver ferrule look great with the black vulcanite stem. This sandblast Peterson’s System Premier 309 Bent Billiard is great looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 6 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 49 grams/ 1.73 ounces. It is a beautiful pipe that I will be sending back to Sonny once finish the remaining three pipes of the six he sent to me for restoration. I look forward to hearing what he thinks of it. 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 pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of those who follow us.

A Barclay Rex 357 Prince Restoration

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Great work on this Barclays Rex…. Love the prince collection and the above Pete meer.

Photographed and written by John M. Young I have to admit that I had no idea that Barclay Rex was a high end members only pipe shop.  Actually I had …

A Barclay Rex 357 Prince Restoration

The Second of Six Pipes from Salmon Arm for Restoration –A Bari Pearl Bamboo Shank Apple

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by Steve Laug

A few weeks ago, I received an email from a friend in Salmon Arm, BC. We have worked together on pipes over the past few years either ones that I have sold to him or those he has picked up on auctions or sales that I have restored. He wrote that he had some pipes that needed restoration.

I also have some of those old estates I still need to send to you for restoration. Hopefully I will be able to pack them up and get them off to you this week. Thank you again, Steve! – Sonny

He followed that up with another email regarding what he wanted done on the various pipes. I have included it below.

I would like the Vauen bent ball shape to have no band on it. It looks like it may have had a band there at one time and I’m not sure why. And if any of them needs to be stained again, I would like them to be black, especially the Peterson 309 and that ball Vauen. Let me know what you think.

I took a photo of the box of six pipes once I unwrapped them. There were 6 interesting pipes – a Vauen Luxus Bent Ball, a Vauen Dr. Perl Billiard, a Sand Blast Vauen Dr. Perl Pot, a Parade News Briar Shop Oom Paul, a Bari Pearl Bamboo shank Ball and Peterson’s System Premier 309 Bent Billiard. All were in need of various degrees of restoration.The second pipe I chose to work on was the Bari Pearl 7080 Bamboo Apple. It is stamped on the left side and reads Bari [over] Pearl. On the right side is stamped Made in [over] Denmark [over] the shape number 7080. The taper stem is stamped Bari on the left side of the taper. The pipe was dirty but the bamboo shank has some nice patina. The vulcanite ahead of and following the Bamboo shank is oxidized and almost brown. The finish was shiny but very dirty with lots of grime ground into the surface of the briar. The bowl had a moderate cake and debris in it and there was some lava on the rim top. The stem was very dirty with oxidation, calcification on the surface and light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. I took these photos before I started my work on the pipe. I took a photo of the rim top and bowl to show the condition of both of them. There is a moderate cake in the bowl and some lava on the thin rim top. There is also debris in the bowl. The photos of the stem show the oxidation, calcification and tooth marks/chatter on both sides ahead of the button.I took photos of the stamping on the left side and the right side of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable as noted above. It is much clearer in person but is hard to capture on the curve of the shank. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo to show the proportions of the pipe. I turned to Pipephil to see if I could find information on the Pearl model but there was nothing there on the model (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-b1.html). I quote from the sidebar below and also have included a screen capture of the information.

Brand founded by Viggo Nielsen in 1950 and sold to Van Eicken Tobaccos in 1978. At this time Age Bogelund managed Bari’s production. The company has been bought in 1993 by Helmer Thomsen. Bari’s second: Don, Proctus.I then turned to Pipedia for some history of the brand and also to see if there as information on the Pearl model (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Bari). I have included the history below. There was also a photo that was done by Smoking Pipes.com and had a copy right so I did not include it. It did help me determine the kind of stem to use on the pipe.

Bari Piber was founded by Viggo Nielsen in Kolding around the turn of 1950/51. Viggo’s sons Kai Nielsen and Jørgen Nielsen both grew into their father’s business from a very young age and worked there till 1975.

Bari had very successfully adapted the new Danish Design that had been started mainly by Stanwell for it’s own models. When Viggo Nielsen sold Bari in 1978 to Joh. Wilh. von Eicken GmbH in Hamburg Bari counted 33 employees.

From 1978 to 1993 Åge Bogelund and Helmer Thomsen headed Bari’s pipe production. Thomson bought the company in 1993 re-naming it to Bari Piber Helmer Thomsen. The workshop moved to more convenient buildings in Vejen. Bogelund, who created very respectable freehands of his own during the time at Bari got lost somehow after 1993.

Bari’s basic conception fundamentally stayed the same for decades: series pipes pre-worked by machines and carefully finished by hand. Thus no spectacular highgrades but solid, reliable every day’s companions.

The most famous series are the smooth “Classic Diamond” and the blasted “Wiking”.

I did a quick Google search for the Bari Pearl pipe and found that Smokingpipes.com had quite a few different shapes of the model. It was interesting that all of them had a single knuckle like the one that I was working on and that the bamboo had been shaped and tapered on the front toward the bowl and toward the shank end. All of them had a vulcanite space on both ends of the bamboo. They were pretty pipes.

I then turned to Pipedia for some history of the brand and also to see if there as information on the Pearl model (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Bari). I have included the history below. There was also a photo that was done by Smoking Pipes.com and had a copy right so I did not include it.

Bari Piber was founded by Viggo Nielsen in Kolding around the turn of 1950/51. Viggo’s sons Kai Nielsen and Jørgen Nielsen both grew into their father’s business from a very young age and worked there till 1975.

Bari had very successfully adapted the new Danish Design that had been started mainly by Stanwell for it’s own models. When Viggo Nielsen sold Bari in 1978 to Joh. Wilh. von Eicken GmbH in Hamburg Bari counted 33 employees.

From 1978 to 1993 Åge Bogelund and Helmer Thomsen headed Bari’s pipe production. Thomson bought the company in 1993 re-naming it to Bari Piber Helmer Thomsen. The workshop moved to more convenient buildings in Vejen. Bogelund, who created very respectable freehands of his own during the time at Bari got lost somehow after 1993.

Bari’s basic conception fundamentally stayed the same for decades: series pipes pre-worked by machines and carefully finished by hand. Thus, no spectacular highgrades but solid, reliable every day’s companions.

The most famous series are the smooth “Classic Diamond” and the blasted “Wiking”.

Armed with that information I turned my attention to the pipe itself. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake. I cleaned up what remained with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl to remove any remnants of cake with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once finished the inside of the bowl was smooth. I cleaned up the inner edge and top o f the bowl with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to remove the lava coat and the darkening. It looked much better.Once the pipe was reamed and clean I took the opportunity to work on the internals – the mortise and airway in the shank and stem. I cleaned out the airway to the bowl, the mortise and the airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. I worked on the vulcanite spacers on both ends of the bamboo shank. I scrubbed them with Soft Scrub and cotton pads. While it is still lightly oxidized it is looking better. I sanded the bowl and the vulcanite shank spacers with 2 x 2 inch sanding pads using grits 320-3500 to remove oxidation on the shank spacers and the remaining finish on the bowl. It worked well and the pipe and shank look much better at this point in the process. I sanded the bowl with the micromesh sanding pads 1500-12000 grit to smooth out the finish and to allow the grain to stand out clearly. I dry sanded the briar rather than wet sand it. I prefer to use the pads dry and find they work very well on the briar. I sand with each pad (9 in total) and group them by threes for ease of reference. I wipe the bowl down with a damp cloth after each pad to remove the sanding debris and check the briar. I love seeing the developing shine on the briar as I move through the pads. I include many photos of the bowl so you can see the change. Pay attention to the changes in the briar in these photos as you work through them.  When I get the bowl to this point in the process I use Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I work it into the briar and the bamboo with my finger tips to make sure that it covers every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. Once the time has passed I wiped it off with a soft cloth then buff it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. You see the shine that the briar has taken on and the way the grain just pops. It is a gorgeous pipe. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I pained the stem with the flame of a lighter to lift the tooth marks and was able to lift them all. I sanded out those that remained along with the oxidation and calcification with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I touched up the faint Bari stamp with some white acrylic fingernail polish to see if I good get it a bit more legible. Once it dried I scraped the excess off and sanded it with a worn 400 grit sanding pad. It was better, but still a little faint.I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to break up the remaining oxidation. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with a soft cloth. It began to look good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. I am excited to finish restoration of this Bari Pearl 7080 Bamboo Shank Apple. I put the pipe back together and buffed it with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I hand buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with beautiful mixed grain all around it. The polished grain on the pipe looks great with the black vulcanite stem. This smooth Bari Pearl Bamboo Shank Apple is great looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 45 grams/ 1.59 ounces. It is a beautiful pipe that I will be sending to a friend of mine who included this pipe among the six he sent to me for restoration. I look forward to hearing what he thinks of it. 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 pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of those who follow us.

The First of Six Pipes from Salmon Arm for Restoration –A Vauen Bent Ball Filter Pipe

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Blog by Steve Laug

A few weeks ago, I received an email from a friend in Salmon Arm, BC. We have worked together on pipes over the past few years either ones that I have sold to him or those he has picked up on auctions or sales that I have restored. He wrote that he had some pipes that needed restoration.

I also have some of those old estates I still need to send to you for restoration. Hopefully I will be able to pack them up and get them off to you this week. Thank you again, Steve! – Sonny

He followed that up with another email regarding what he wanted done on the various pipes. I have included it below.

 I would like the Vauen bent ball shape to have no band on it. It looks like it may have had a band there at one time and I’m not sure why. And if any of them needs to be stained again, I would like them to be black, especially the Peterson 309 and that ball Vauen. Let me know what you think.

I took a photo of the box of six pipes once I unwrapped them. There were 6 interesting pipes – a Vauen Luxus Bent Ball, a Vauen Dr. Perl Billiard, a Sand Blast Vauen Dr. Perl Pot, a Parade News Briar Shop Oom Paul, a Bari Pearl Bamboo shank Ball and Peterson’s System Premier 309 Bent Billiard. All were in need of various degrees of restoration.The first pipe I chose to work on was the Vauen Bent Ball. It is stamped on the left side and reads Vauen [over] Luxus. On the underside is the shape number 3083. The pipe was dirty and the shank appeared to have had band on it at one time. There were no cracks or damages on the shank end or sides so it was cosmetic. Where the band had been there was some dried glue and debris on the shank. The finish was very dirty with lots of grime ground into the surface of the briar. The bowl had a thick cake in it and there was some lava on the rim top. The stem was a 9mm filter stem and it was very dirty in the tenon and the airway in the stem was plugged. The airway in the shank was heavily tarred and there were light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. I took these photos before I started my work on the pipe. I took a photo of the rim top and bowl to show the condition of both of them. You can also see the debris where the shank band had been. The photos of the stem show the oxidation and tooth marks/chatter on both sides ahead of the button.I took photos of the stamping on the left side and underside of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable as noted above.As usual I do some background reading to remind myself of the background on the Vauen brand before I started my work on the pipe. It is an important part of the restoration to me as it adds colour to the pipe I am working on. I turned to Pipephil’s site (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-v1.html). I did a screen capture of the information on the site. There was a great sidebar that gave some history of the brand. I include both of them below.In 1848, Karl Ellenberger and his partner Carl August Ziener establish a pipe factory in Nuremberg. In 1901 they merge with Gebhard Ott an other factory in town and they create a firm named Vereinigten Pfeifenfabriken Nürnberg (abbreviated : VPFN*). Shortly after Ernst Eckert, a member of the Ott family became manager of the society. During the 20th century Adolf, Ernst (jr) and Alexander Eckert (CEO in 2012) followed one another at Vauen’s head.* VPFN : “V” is said VAU in German (pronounce faou) and “N” becomes EN. Hence VAUEN.

Dal Stanton (Pipesteward.com) wrote a great piece on the history of the brand on a Vauen pipe that he worked on. I reread that and quote a section from the blog below that gives a great sense of the history of the German brand and some photos from the website (https://rebornpipes.com/2021/04/27/breathing-new-life-into-a-german-vauen-6294-p-lip-saddle-billiard-for-a-special-young-lady/).

… I turn to the question of the history of the VAUEN name? I look to the History section of the VAUEN website and again, I am impressed with the presentation. Whenever I work on a pipe, and especially when a pipe name is new to me, I enjoy looking at its history to appreciate the pipe more fully now on my worktable. From VAUEN’s website:Quality and a wealth of ideas have a long tradition at VAUEN. 160 years of VAUEN: that means 160 years of skilled workmanship and modern technology and 160 years of experience in fulfilling the individual wishes of today’s pipe lovers, and those of tomorrow.

In Nuremberg in 1848, Karl Ellenberger and his partner Carl August Ziener turned an idea into reality: Germany’s first pipe manufacturer produced tobacco pipes for connoisseurs around the world using a selection of the best wood. In an amalgamation with the Gebhard Ott pipe factory, which was founded in 1866 in Nuremberg, the Vereinigten Pfeifenfabriken Nuremberg (United Pipe Factories Nuremberg, or VPFN) was born in 1901.  Under the management of Ernst Eckert, a descendent of the founding Ott family, a company was born whose products and services would shape the tobacco and smoking culture in Europe and overseas for the next 160 years and counting.

The question about the name, VAUEN, not being a name of a person and why it is capitalized throughout is explained:

In his search for a name that would be easily remembered by all pipe lovers, Ernst Eckert’s son, Adolf Eckert, coined a new name for the company in 1909: VAUEN – a composition of the first letters V (pronounced vow) of Vereinigte Pfeifenfabriken and N (pronounced en) of Nuremberg. A brand for the future was born.

Armed with that information I turned my attention to the pipe itself. To clean up the hardened glue and debris on the shank end I washed it off with acetone on a cotton pad. I was able to remove the debris and glue as well the shiny varnish coat on the bowl. It looked much better than when I started. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake. I cleaned up what remained with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl to remove any remnants of cake with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once finished the inside of the bowl was smooth. Once the pipe was reamed and clean I took the opportunity to work on the internals – the mortise and airway in the shank and stem. I cleaned out the airway to the bowl, the mortise and the airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol.I sanded the bowl with 2 inch sanding pads using grits 320-3500 to remove the lava on the rim top and the remaining finish on the bowl. All of it was done to prepare the bowl for a restaining. Sonny had asked that once the pipe was cleaned up if I would stain it black for him. He also did not want the and in place on it. I stained it with a black aniline stain – Feibing’s Black Shoe Dye. I applied it with a dauber and flamed it with a Bic lighter to set the stain in the briar. I set it aside to dry.I set the bowl aside to let the stain cure. I turned my attention to the stem. I worked it over with cotton pads and Soft Scrub cleanser. I was able to remove the oxidation and the stem began to look very good at this point.I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to break up the remaining oxidation. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with a soft cloth. It began to look good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. Once I finished the stem, I fit it with a clean 9mm filter. I have a small box of Vauen Dr. Perl Junior filters that I have here and they fit the stem perfectly.From there I moved to polishing the briar with micromesh sanding pads. Before I sanded the bowl, I wiped it down with isopropyl alcohol on a cotton pad to make the stain a bit more transparent. Then it was ready for sanding. I sanded the newly stained bowl to allow the grain to stand out clearly. I dry sanded the briar rather than wet sand it. Again, it is a matter of personal preference. I prefer to use the pads dry and find they work very well on the briar. I sand with each pad (9 in total) and group them by threes for ease of reference. I wipe the bowl down with a damp cloth after each pad to remove the sanding debris and check the briar. I love seeing the developing shine on the briar as I move through the pads. I include the many photos of various angles of the bowl so you can see the change. Pay attention to the changes in the briar in these photos as you work through them. When I get the bowl to this point in the process I use Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I work it into the briar with my finger tips to make sure that it covers every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. Once the time has passed I wiped it off with a soft cloth then buff it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. You see the shine that the briar has taken on and the way the grain just pops. It is a gorgeous pipe. I finished with the Blue Diamond and moved on to buffing with carnauba wax. Once I have a good shine in the briar and stem I always give the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I have found that I can get a deeper shine if I following up the wax buff with a clean buffing pad. It works to raise the shine and then I follow that up with a hand buff with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is always fun for me to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished stem. It really is a beautiful pipe. The smooth finish around the bowl sides and shank show the grain shining through the polished black stains on this Vauen Luxus 3083 Filter Ball and the polished stem is a great addition. The finished pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 5 ¾ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.20 ounces/34 grams. It is a beautiful pipe that I will be sending to a friend of mine who is collecting older Vauen pipes. I look forward to hearing what he thinks of it. 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 pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of those who follow us.

Cleaning up a Pineapple Style Rusticated Peterson’s of Dublin System Standard 312

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by Steve Laug

I finally finished the heavy group of pipes that I was working on for the wife of an old pipe man in Ontario. There were some amazing pipes there and with the restoration they came out looking very good. I will be mailing them out to him early in the week ahead. Now it was time to work on other pipes awaiting restoration. The first of those on the table is a Peterson’s of Dublin System Standard 312 with a pineapple style rustication and an acrylic fishtail stem. I received an email before my trip to Idaho to visit my father. In it a friend Matthew wrote about a pipe he had picked up that needed my attention. I have included the email below.

Steve, The Peterson is heading your way.  I probably would not have even purchased the Pete, except it is an example of the “pineapple” rustication that Peterson used to employ.  They’re getting hard to find and I do not know if it from rarity (not many made) or that Peterson did not sell many because the rustication did not appeal to pipe smokers. Please examine the Pete and give me your diagnosis. Thank you. Matthew

This afternoon I opened the box Matthew shipped the pipe in and found a nice looking green Peterson’s box inside. I opened the box and found a Peterson’s 312 inside and the original green pipe sock it came in. It was a great looking pipe. The smell in the box was a heavy English/Latakia smell that filled the room when I opened the box. The finish on the pipe was quite clean with just some dust in the rustication grooves. The polished nickel ferrule was in excellent condition with no dents or tarnish. The bowl had a thick cake on the walls of the bowl and the shank had a lot of tar and oil sludge filling the sump, the mortise and the airway in the shank and the stem. The stem was acrylic and was a fishtail style stem. I believe it is a Peterson’s made fishtail stem that came with the pipe but I am not sure. The fir in the shank is perfect which seems to point this direction. There is no P stamp on the saddle portion of the stem but that is not abnormal as many of their stems did not have the stamp. Overall it is a beautiful pipe with a unique finish. I am looking forward to working on it. I took photos of the pipe before I started. I took a close-up photo of the bowl and rim top to show its condition. The inside of the bowl was heavily caked with debris in the bottom of the bowl. The rim top looked very good with just some grime in the rustication. There was a polished nickel ferrule on the shank end that was in decent condition with no nicks. The acrylic stem was dirty and had some light tooth marks and chatter on the top and underside ahead of the button.I took photos of the stamping on the smooth panel on the underside of the shank. It is faint but readable as noted above. I also took a photo of the stamping on the left side of the nickel ferrule and it is also very clear. I also removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the pipe. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake. I cleaned up what remained with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl to remove any remnants of cake with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once finished the inside of the bowl was smooth. Once the pipe was reamed and clean I took the opportunity to work on the internals – the sump, mortise and airway in the shank and stem. I cleaned out the airway to the bowl, the mortise and the airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. The stink in the pipe was still strong so I decided to exorcise the stink. I stuffed the bowl with cotton bolls and twisted a cotton boll and stuffed it in the sump and mortise. I used an ear syringe to fill the bowl with 99% isopropyl alcohol and set the bowl aside to let the oils wick out of the briar. I let the pipe sit overnight. In the morning the second and third photos show what I found. The shank plug cotton had wicked out tars, oils and some stain! It smells far better than when I started the process. I will let it dry out and check it again to see if I need to repeat the process. I cleaned up the rim top a bit with some Before & After Briar Cleaner. I worked it into the rim top surface with a tooth brush and then buffed it off with a cotton pad. It looked much better at this point in the process. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the surface of the briar with my fingertips and a shoe brush to clean, enliven and protect it. I let the balm sit for ten minutes then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. Mark Hoover’s Balm is a product that I have come to appreciate and one I use on every pipe I have been working on. I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to break up the remaining oxidation. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with a soft cloth. It began to look good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. Matthew’s beautifully shaped K&P Peterson’s of Dublin System Standard 312 was a fun one to work on. It has unique Pineapple Rustication beauty that the Peterson’s System Pipes have ceased to use. I put the bowl and stem back together. I polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to blend in the stain and to polish out the scratches in the briar and the vulcanite. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The rusticated finish is well done and the polished smooth finish on the shank end and rim top look really good with the black vulcanite stem. This Peterson’s of Dublin System Standard 312 was a fun pipe to clean up. It is a comfortable pipe to hold in the hand. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 51 grams/1.80 ounces. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. This interesting Peterson will be going back to Matthew to fire up and enjoy! Thanks for reading this blog and walking through the restoration with me.

Restoring the last pipe for an old pipeman – a Dunhill Shell Briar 111FT Patent Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

Earlier in June I received an email regarding restoring some pipes for her husband. Here is here email.

I have one Calich and one Dunhill pipe which my husband destroyed using a torch lighter on. I am wondering if it is possible to get them restored somehow. If you want to have a look I can send pics.

I wrote and asked for photos of the pipes. She wrote that there were actually 5 pipes not two and included photos of all five. I asked her if she was wanting to sell them or just repair them. Here is her response.

No… I don’t want to sell (yet) he’s 86 and has taken up smoking his pipes again. He was using a torch lighter until I discovered and replaced with proper pipe lighters. For now I’m wondering if it’s possible or even wise to restore them. – Kathleen.

I replied to Kathleen and invited her to send the pipes to me in Vancouver. They arrived just before I left for my visit with my Dad in Idaho. Here is what I found when they arrived. There were three Caliches, a Dunhill, and an Ed Burak Connoisseur. The Calich Pipes included a rusticated straight Opera, a bent Rhodesian with an octagonal rim cap and an acrylic stem. The Dunhill was a sandblast Billiard with a repair band on the shank. The Ed Burak Connoisseur was a bent Bulldog. All had rim top damage from being lit with a torch lighter. Some were in worse condition than others. The worst were the Calich Opera and the Dunhill Billiard which had torch damage on the left side of the rim and down the bowl side. The others had varying degrees of burn damage. I set them aside until I returned home from my visit. She sent me photos of the next pipe, a Dunhill Shell Briar Patent 111F/T Billiard that had a worn Patent No. stamp and a repair band on the shank.I took the pipes out of the box and laid the group out on my worktable. I took some photos of the group to show their condition. The photo of the left side of the shank shows the damage I mentioned in the earlier paragraphs. The right-side photo looks very good. The photos from the rim top show a lot of damage and the overall condition of the pipes very clear. All I had left of the five pipes was the last – a Dunhill Shell Briar Billiard that is by far the one with the worst damage of the lot. It was hard to know whether the previous Calich Opera or this Dunhill was worse but both were a mess and had suffered much from the torch lighter. This one is classic Dunhill Billiard that is stamped 111 F/T on the heel of the bowl [followed by] Dunhill [over] Shell Briar. That is followed by Made in England [over] Pat. No. The patent number itself was partially covered by the Sterling Silver repair band. The band was stamped on the top and read Sterling Silver arched on the topside. The pipe had a very thick cake in the bowl and there was a lava overflow on the top. There was some major burn damage under the lava the front right as well as a deep burned area on the left back side and edge. The burn was like a large bite out of the top and left side of the bowl as can be seen in the photos. The shank had a thick coat of tars and oils and the stem had a thick tar build up as well so its fit in the shank was very sticky and dirty. The stem itself is vulcanite with a single white spot on the topside. It was oxidized and had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides of the stem just ahead of the button. There were overflowing tars on the smooth shank end around the fit of the tenon in the mortise. The Sterling Silver band was heavily oxidized. The finish was dusty and tired but had a nice sandblast under the grime and appeared to be in good condition. A lot would be revealed once I had cleaned it. I took photos of the pipe before I started my cleanup work. I took a close-up photo of the bowl and rim top to show its condition. The inside of the bowl was heavily caked with a wet oily tobacco and debris in the bottom of the bowl. The rim top had damage on the front right in the photo below as well as on the back left. The back left side is the worst as it is quite thin and is like a deep bite mark down the side of the bowl. It left a mess for me to clean up. The shank bore a silver repair band that is stamped Sterling Silver. The stem was dirty and had some light tooth marks and chatter on the top and underside ahead of the button. There was a thick coat of calcification and oxidation on the stem. The white spot on the stem top was in good condition.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It was faint but still readable as noted above. The Patent Number is partially covered by the silver band. I also took the stem off and took a photo of the parts of the pipe. Even with the major damage it was still quite a nice looking pipe.Without the patent number or the date stamp it was hard to identify the age of the pipe. I know that the patent number ceased to be stamped after 1954. The issue was at this point with the illegibility of the stamping I could not even tell what the patent referred to. It could be the Shell Briar Finish or an inner tube. I was not even sure what the country of Patent was – England? Canada? or the US? What I knew was that the pipe in hand was a Shell Briar Billiard that was made before the Patent Stamp ceased to be used after 1954. Now it was time to work on the pipe. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the majority of the cake. I cleaned up what remained with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl to remove any remnants of cake with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once finished the inside of the bowl was smooth. Once it was clean I turned my attention to the rim top. I cleaned up the inner edge of the bowl with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I flattened out the rough edge on the damaged area with the sandpaper to give a flat surface for my repair.  I topped the bowl with 220 grit sandpaper on a topping board to give the rim top a smooth surface. This preparation provided a clean and smooth surface to attach a new piece of briar in the burned area. There was a small crack in the surface of the rim in the burned area on the right front edge. Once topped I filled it in with some briar dust and CA glue and topped it again. I decided to work on the repair to the deep burned area on the left side of the bowl. I cut a piece of briar out of a cracked bowl I keep around for just this purpose. I eyeballed the shape of the divot and used a hacksaw blade and a carving knife to remove the chunk that I would use. I shaped the piece of briar more closely to the shape with a Dremel and a sanding drum.I mixed up a batch of JB Weld and applied the mixture with a dental spatula to the divot on the bowl side and on the underside of the cut piece of briar. I pressed the piece of briar into divot on the bowl side. I held it until it started to set and then set it aside to cure. I purposely used a little taller piece of briar than necessary as it gave me material to work with. I have found it simpler to work with the larger piece and then remove the excess. Once the JB Weld set enough for the repair not to move I set it aside to cure. Once the piece was solid in the repair to be stable I took the opportunity to work on the internals. I scraped the inside of the mortise with a dental spatula to remove the hardened tars and oils that lined the walls of the shank. Once I had that done I cleaned out the airway to the bowl, the mortise and the airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. When I finished the pipe smelled very clean. With repair solid in place I took the opportunity to fill in the crevices at each end of the repair and around the joint of the two piece of briar. I also filled in a bit of the burned area on the right front of the bowl.  I used clear CA glue and briar dust to build up those areas.Once the repair had cured for several hours and the briar dust repairs had hardened I used a Dremel and sanding drum to remove the excess briar and flatten out the rim top as much as possible with the tool. I then topped the bowl again on a topping board with 220 grit sandpaper to get a smooth rim top. With the top flattened, I used some more briar dust and CA glue to fill in some of the spots on the topsides of the repair. I used needle files to reduce the inner edge and reshape it to match the inner edge on the right side of the bowl. It took a bit of time and working through several needle files but it looked much better when I finished. I still had some work to do on the rim top and the inner edge but it was very close.I mixed up another batch of the JB Weld and spread it on to the inside wall of the bowl to protect the area where the bowl and inserted piece joined. I also applied it to the front right side where the flame had also left its mark. This would keep the heat from following the repair joint out to the exterior and create potential burnout in the bowl. I set it aside to allow the JB Weld time to cure and harden before I sanded it smooth. The next step in the process was to try and replicate the sandblast finish on the rim top and the inserted piece of briar. The first photos show what the rim and side looked like before I started my rustication. I used my Dremel and a series of burrs to do the work. I wanted it to look like the deep sandblast on the bowl already. It was both rugged and worn smooth in spots. Once I finished rusticating the new finish I stained it with a combination or Walnut, Black and Mahogany stain pens. I am pretty happy with the look! The stain would blend in very well once I buffed and waxed it.Once the internal coating of JB Weld cured overnight I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth it out. I then mixed a batch of bowl coating with some sour cream and charcoal powder and coated the walls of the entire bowl. I used two teaspoons of sour cream and four of the Charco caps to mix a black/grey mixture that I use for the bowl coating. I applied it to the walls of the bowl with a folded pipe cleaner and covered the interior of the bowl with it so that it was smooth. I set it aside to cure. Once it hardens and dries it is odorless and leaves behind no lingering taste. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the surface of the briar with my fingertips to clean, enliven and protect it. I let the balm sit for ten minutes then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. Mark Hoover’s Balm is a product that I have come to appreciate and one I use on every pipe I have been working on. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I “painted” the stem surface of the stem with the flame of a Bic lighter to lift the tooth marks and chatter on the surface. I was able to remove it all. I sanded the stem surface with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the remaining chatter marks. I wiped the stem down with an Obsidian Oil cloth and it looked much better at this point.I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to break up the remaining oxidation. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with a soft cloth. It began to look good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This is the last of five pipes from Kathleen that I am working on. It is a beautifully shaped Patent Era Shell Briar 111F/T Billiard. It has the kind of beauty I have come to expect from older Dunhill Shell Briar pipes. I put the bowl and stem back together. I polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to blend in the stain and to polish out the scratches in the briar and the vulcanite. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The rusticated finish is well done and the polished smooth finish on the shank end and rim top look really good with the black vulcanite stem. This Dunhill Shell Briar Billiard was another challenging pipe to bring back to life. It is a comfortable pipe to hold in the hand. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 31 grams/1.09 ounces. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. This interesting lot of pipe will be going back to Kathleen for her husband to enjoy once again – but with a proper lighter.

Finishing a Restoration on a Recently Purchased House of Robertson Chunky Apple

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By Steve Laug

The next pipe on the work table is a bit of a break for me after working on the last four heavily damaged pipes. That lot of pipes was a lot of work and I still have one hard one to work on. Sometimes I need to take a deep breath and work on something else for a bit. If you have followed rebornpipes for a while you will recognize that we love old House of Robertson pipes. They were made in Boise, Idaho by Thayne Robertson and something about them always intrigues me. Perhaps it is because I spent a lot of my early youth in Idaho and the thought of a pipe made in Idaho catches my attention. I am not sure why but I know that when we see them for sale we always look and often we pick them up.

The Robertson that one I have chosen to work on is a beautiful chunky rusticated Apple with a saddle stem. We purchase it on 05/20/24 from a seller in Austin, Texas, USA. The name House of Robertson is roughly hand-etched on the left side of the shank with an engraving tool. This pipe is a huge, thick shank Apple with a saddle stem. The bowl has an interesting bark like rustication on the sides of the bowl and shank. There is a smooth panel for the brand mark on the left side and a band around the shank end. The seller had done a lot of clean up work on the pipe before he sold it. This often makes me leery of purchasing it as it generally inflates the price and rarely meets our standard. The bowl had been reamed but there was still too much cake in it for my liking as I want to know what is underneath. It is important for me to see the bowl walls and check for heat and burn damage. The rim top and edges of the rim were in good condition. The pipe was quite clean and it appears to be in excellent condition. It is definitely an interesting pipe that caught my interest. The fit of the stem to the shank left a gap. The saddle stem had been modified by the seller. The original button had been cut off and a new one imposed on the stem end. It was rough but workable and would take some time to clean and smooth out. I took photos of the pipe while I visited Jeff. Before I started my work on it I have included them below for you to see. I took photos show the condition of the bowl and the stem. The photos of the bowl and rim show the moderated cake remaining in the bowl but the rim top was in excellent condition. The rustication on the top of the bowl and the inner and outer edge of the rim looks really good. The finish was well cleaned. The saddle stem had been recut and a new button formed. It was rough at best and needed a bit of work to make it work for me. The button edge was sharp which was good but there was a trough ahead of it to give it definition. The taper of the stem dropped off at the trough. I would need to redefine the taper of the stem to get rid of the trough and make the flow more seamless between the new button and the slope of the stem. I would also need to shape the button to be more of an ellipse curving to a point on each end of the outer edges and clean up the slot and make it extend across the button surface and taper into the airway like a “Y”. You can also see that the stem does not sit tight against the shank end.The next photo shows the etched name on the left side of shank on the shank. It reads House of Robertson.I am including the information that I found when I received my first of the House of Robertson Pipes. I found a link on Pipedia that gave me the only information I could find on the brand. I include that in total as it is interesting to read (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Robertson).

“House of Robertson” was in business for many years, but alas, closed their doors in 1999. They were located in Boise, Idaho. They are noted for making rather large and interesting pipes. Thayne Robertson was a Master Mason, AF & AM, and started the shop about 1947 and his son Jon started working there in 1970 when he finished college, along with Thayne’s daughter. Thayne and his son started making the big pipes at that time, and made them together until 1987 when Thayne passed away. Jon kept the store and his sister moved on to other things. The House of Robertson appears to have closed around 1999.

Since then I have worked on a lot of House of Robertson pipes and have been able to track down more information. I am including a link to a Catalogue that I picked up on eBay. Click on the link and have a look at this interesting book of information on the brand and the pipe maker himself (https://rebornpipes.com/2022/12/11/a-house-of-robertson-catalogue-filled-with-great-examples-of-thayne-robertsons-work/). I am including a page below that helps with understanding the shape and finish on this particular pipe. It is clear that it is what he calls a Knarled Bark pipe. The catalogue describes it as follows:

Handcut like knarled bark on rustic old trees. Very individual, appealing. Dark finish. Medium $30.00. Medium-large $40.00. Large $50.00. Secret-cured…I am also including a biography of Thayne Robertson that I found on Facebook from a fellow in Boise, Idaho. It is an interesting glimpse into the mind and life of the pipe maker. Make sure to take time to read it (https://rebornpipes.com/2021/10/31/house-of-robertson-pipes-boise-pipe-carver-thayne-robertson/).

Now it was time to work on the pipe itself. Because the seller had done a fairly good job in his clean up it would not take much on the bowl and shank. I decided to take the cake back to bare briar so I could check out the condition of the walls. I cleaned up the remaining cake in the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the bowl walls with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. I wiped down the inside with a damp cloth and checked for damage to the walls. There was no heat or burn damage on the walls which is always a relief for me.I did a quick clean up of the shank and the stem. Both were very clean and by and large I just removed dust and some debris in the shank from the reaming. The stem photo shows the stem after my rework of the button and slope so inevitably debris on the pipe cleaners came from that. It was nicely cleaned up by the seller.I decided to use the least intrusive method of getting the stem to seat well in the shank first. I used a knife to give the inner edge of the shank a bevel and sanded it smooth. I wanted to see if that would help. Unfortunately, it did not seem to make a difference. The fit still wans not snug. (By the way you can see the button shape in the first photo below. It shows the trough and the new button quite clearly.)I looked through the various bands and ferrules I have in a bag here and found an interesting thin brass ferrule that file well and did not cover the signature on the shank. The hole in the center was not quite big enough for the tenon to slip in. I used a cordless drill and drill the hole to fit. I found that doing it on the shank held it firmly in place and kept me from drilling off centre. Oh if I had a drill press it certainly would have been much easier but I have to use what is available to me at the moment. I tried the fit of the stem to the shank and it was perfect. I glued the ferrule in place with all-purpose glue. Once the glue set I gave the edges of the drilled hole a slight inward bevel and started polishing it out. I would need to take it through the regimen of the micromesh pads but it was looking pretty good. I took photos of the newly capped shank end to show the look of the pipe at this point. Once I finished the reshaping of the stem and the button I would put them together and take photos. I put the stem on the shank and looked it over and was happy with what I saw at this point. I worked Before & After Restoration Balm deep into the smooth finish to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I rubbed it in with my fingers and a shoe brush. I worked it into the finish then set it aside to dry for 10-15 minutes. I wiped it off with a soft cloth and buffed the bowl with a cotton cloth to polish it. It really began to have a deep shine in the briar. I took some photos of the bowl at this point to mark the progress in the restoration. The rustication on the bowl stands out with interesting lines moving across the sides of the bowl and the shank. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to reshaping the stem and the button. I started the process by filling in the notches on each side of the button and stem surface with black CA glue. I also filled in some of the deeper pits in the button surface at the same time that had been left behind when the button had been shaped. This was merely the first step so it is hard to know what it looks like yet. Once the repairs cured I used a rasp to flatten out the stem surface ahead of the trough that had been carved. I want to change the flow of the pipe to a smoother transition from the stem to the button. The trough was ragged and did not work for me.I used a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to continue to shape the stem and the button. I wanted to smooth out the transition of the trough and the angle of the stem from the saddle to the button. There was still a ways to go but it was definitely looking better. I started polishing the stem flow and shape of the button with sanding pads – dry sanding with 320-3500 grit pads. I wiped down the stem after each pad with an Obsidian Oil cloth and the stem began to really show the shape of the button and the flow from the saddle to the button.With the stem ready for the final polishing I decided to pause and reshape the slot in the button. The first photo shows where I started. It was basically a rectangular cut. I wanted to make it follow the width and curve of the elliptical button shape. I used some small needle files to accomplish what I was looking for. I used a triangular shaped blade to start the process of taking the cut to the edges of the button. I followed that with an oval and a round needle file to get an elliptical shape. I cleaned up the top and bottom edge of the slot with a round needle file. I think it looks much better and the slot is shaped like a Y thus spreading the smoke into the smoker’s mouth. I polished the vulcanite stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding it with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. I polished it further with Before & After Pipe Polish – using both the Fine and Extra Fine Polishes. I gave it a rubdown with Obsidian Oil one last time and set it aside. I put the House of Robertson Chunk Bark Finish Apple and reshaped saddle stem back together and worked the pipe over on the buffing wheel using Blue Diamond to lightly polish the stem. I buffed the bowl and stem to raise the gloss on the briar and the vulcanite. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the entire pipe with a clean buffing pad on the wheel to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished the House of Robertson Chunky Apple is shown in the photos below. The dark brown stains on the Bark finish of the chunky apple bowl works well with the rich black of the vulcanite stem. The dimensions of the pipe are: Length: 6 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside Diameter: 1 ¼ inches, Diameter of the chamber: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 73 grams/2.54 ounces. This is an interesting piece of briar with a rugged old tree bark rustication is unique and looks great. I hope to enjoy this pipe tomorrow afternoon on the front porch with a great bowl of good Virginia. Thanks for walking with me through the restoration process.

A 1939-1941 Ken Pat. Apld. SE Billiard Restoration

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Thanks John great job on another strange pipe from the endless search for a cool dry smoke.

Photographed and written by John M. Young Just when you thought I had moved on from my fascination with pipes from the 1940s I throw another one at …

A 1939-1941 Ken Pat. Apld. SE Billiard Restoration