Blog by Steve Laug
This one was sold as a Parker on Ebay and came with a Parker pipe sock and box. There was nothing about it that looked like a Parker in my opinion. Everything about it said Stanwell made. When the pipe arrived my brother took it out of the box and sure enough it was a Royal Guard pipe which is listed on pipephil’s website as a Stanwell second. http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-r6.html It was in decent shape. The plateau was dirty with tars and oils. The rim had some darkening but no damage to the bowl. There was a light cake in the bowl. The finish was dirty and there was dust in the grooves of the sandblast. The stem was in great shape though there was some tooth chatter on the top and bottom sides near the button. The stamping on the saddle stem was in good shape though there were spots where the white was missing in the stamped letters. My brother took photos of the pipe before he cleaned it.
He took photos of the stamping. On the left side of the shank it was stamped Royal Guard. On the underside of the shank it was stamped Made in Denmark.
The next photo he took shows the tooth chatter on the bottom of the stem.
He also took a close up photo of the rim top. It shows the dust and the tars and oils in the grooves of the plateau.
My brother scrubbed the exterior of the bowl and rim with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. He rinsed it off with water and dried it. He scrubbed the rim and removed the tars, oils and dust in the plateau. The soap and rinse also removed the dust and grime in the sandblast finish. He cleaned out the inside of the shank and stem. Once he had finished there was not much that I would have to do once I received it.
When the box came I opened the Parker box, took out the Parker pipe sock and slipped the Royal Guard pipe out of the sock. It really was a beautiful pipe. The sandblast and the smooth portions worked together to make a stunning pipe. The plateau on the rim was also perfect and the darkening worked well with the colouration of the briar in the sandblast finish. I took some photos of the pipe when I took it out of the box.
I took some close up photos of the rim and the stamping on the stem. The plateau looks really good and the inner edge of the bowl is clean. The stamping on the stem is clearly an interlocking RG. The white colour in the stamp is in great shape.
I used the Savinelli Pipe Knife to clean up the remnants of cake in the bowl. It did not take much to remove the last of the cake. I took it back to bare briar and wiped out the inside of the bowl with a cotton pad.
I wet sanded the stem with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads and rubbed it down with Obsidian Oil. I dry sanded it with 3200-4000 and with 6000-12000 grit pads and gave it a rub down with the oil between each set of three pads. I finished by giving it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry.
I gave a quick touch up cleaning with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs. It took very few because the pipe was clean other than the dust from my sanding.
I gave the bowl several coats of Conservator’s Wax and hand buffed it with a shoe brush.
I buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the wheel and lightly buffed it with several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean buffing pad and then hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. This one is available if you are interested in adding it to your rack. Send me an email (slaug@uniserve.com) or a message. Thanks for looking.
The fourth and fifth pictures remove the mystery of the knurled edge on the bottom of the bowl that showed in the first photo. You can see in that photo of the bowl bottom that the silver disk looks like it was made to be rotated. We talked and my brother bid and won the pipe (I can’t wait for the pipe to get here so I can check this out). The fifth photo shows the inside of the bowl. The top of the disk appears to be a cup intruding into the bowl bottom. It was really odd looking.
That information was helpful on many levels. He did not however have any photos or drawings of the pipe or pictures of the advertisements. I wanted to know if the bottom “sump” as he called it was pressure fit or threaded and screwed into the briar. I wanted to know if the bottom of the bowl was damaged or if the “sump” sat as it was supposed to flush with the bottom. It was hard to tell from the photos. I wanted to know was the “wads” were that sat in the sump. From the look of the bowl bottom it appeared that the “wads” may well have been lozenges that fit in the curved cup and then sat flat in the bottom of the bowl. But what did they look like? More research would be needed to answer these questions. But at least the mystery of the knurled edge peaking from the first photo was solved. It was a single unit with a cup on the inside of the bowl. I could not wait to see this in person and “fiddle” with it.
He gave the dimensions of the pipe as follows: overall length: 5 ½ inches, bowl height: 1 ½ inches, diameter of the bowl: 1 5/8 inches, bore diameter: 7/8 inches, bore depth: 1 1/8 inches and the weight: 44 grams or 1.6 ounces
I took it out of the alcohol bath and heated the disk with the flame of a lighter. I used a pair of pliers to hold tightly to the edge of the disk and I was able to twist it out of the bowl. Once it popped free I could undo it by hand. The first photo below shows the inside of the silver disk. The second shows the knurled outside.
To remove the damage to the rim top and edges I topped the bowl on a topping board with 220 grit sandpaper.
There were some nicks around the hole in the bottom of the bowl so I sanded those smooth with sandpaper and then cleaned out the threads in the briar with a cotton swab and alcohol.
I used the brass bristle brush to scrub the threads and the cup on the disk. I cleaned it afterwards with cotton swabs and alcohol.
I used a cotton swab to coat the threads on the disk with Vaseline and turned it into the bottom of the bowl. I wanted to make sure that I could easily turn the disk by hand.
I cleaned out the internals with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. It was pretty clean thanks to my brother. It did not take too many to clean it out.
I sanded the bowl and stem with a medium and a fine grit sanding block. The pipe is beginning to look really good. I had to make a decision how far to sand the bowl and how many of the original dings and dents to remove without changing the “story” and character of this old timer.
I heated the briar and then stained it with dark brown aniline stain cut by 50% with isopropyl alcohol. I flamed it to set the stain and repeated the process.
I wiped down the stain with alcohol dampened cotton pads to make it more transparent and make the grain stand out. At this point the fills stood out and I would need to address them a bit differently.
I used a black Sharpie Permanent Marker to draw some lines across the fills and blend them into the grain on the pipe. I then chose to give the bowl a second contrast staining using a Cherry Danish Oil stain. I find that the combination of the black marker and the cherry stain blends the fills better than a brown stain. The combination of the brown and the cherry stains gives depth to the finish so I like using them together.
Once the cherry Danish Oil stain dried (overnight) I buffed it lightly on the wheel with Blue Diamond and then gave the bowl a coat of carnauba wax. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth. You can see the small dings that I left in the bowl sides rather than change the look. I polished the silver disk with a silver polishing cloth. The next series of photos shows the bowl at this point in the process.
I set the bowl aside and worked on the stem. The old hard rubber that was used on this stem was good quality. There was very little oxidation if any on it. The main issue was the pitting that covered the surface of the stem. I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper to address the pitting and smooth out the surface and then began my normal sequence of micromesh sanding pads. Between each set of three grits (1500-2400, 3200-4000, 6000-12000) I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil. I gave it a final coat of the oil and let it dry before I buffed the pipe.
I buffed the pipe and stem with Blue Diamond and gave it several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to put the finishing touches on the pipe. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. Thanks for looking.
