Tag Archives: bite marks

Refreshing a Beautiful Aldo Velani Bent Dublin

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Blog by Steve Laug

This is the second pipe from the lot my brother Jeff picked up an estate sale a few weekends ago. He had received a call from the auction house that was running the sale to let him know that there were going to be some pipes in the sale. They said that many of the pipes were what they called higher end pipes. They talked a bit and he asked if they would mind sending him a list of the pipes that were coming up. They went one step better and sent him the two photos to the left of the pipes as a preview of what was going on sale. Using FaceBook Messenger we went through the pipes and picked the ones that we wanted to purchase. He would go to the sale the next day and see what he could find. It is times like this that I wish I lived close so I could go with him to these sales.

Friday morning he went into the sale and they handed him a bucket and the box of pipes that they had set back behind the counter for him. There were indeed some nice pipes in the batch and certainly pricier than the average lot we usually find at estate or antique sales and malls. There were quite a few Savinelli pipes as well as Stanwell, GBD, Aldo Velani, Nording, Il Ceppo, Barlings, DiMonte and a Chacom Sahara. They made him a proposition for the entire lot of pipes and he went for it. He came home with all of the pipes in the photos to the left.

When he got home he called me on FaceTime and went through the pipes he had picked up. We were both pretty excited by the lot. As we went through them we noted the names, brands and the stamping on the shank of each pipe. I got more excited as we noted each pipe and its condition. We realized that these pipes were in pretty decent shape other than the usual dirtiness and grime from smoking. There was not any significant damage to rims or bowls. Almost all the stems had tooth marks near the button on both sides that would need to be cleaned up. But other than that, it was a very nice lot of pipes. We had done well with the purchase.

I chose to work on the Aldo Velani Italian Dublin next. It is a beautiful Dublin shaped pipe that was in pretty good shape. It was stamped on the left side of the shank with the brand ALDO VELANI. On the underside of the shank next to the stem shank junction it bore the stamp ITALY. The saddle stem was Lucite and had not stamping or logo on it. My brother took the following photos before he worked on the pipes.The finish on the bowl was in pretty decent shape. The rim surface was dirty and had some tars and oil build up. Around the inner edge of the bowl some of varnish coat was peeling off and the briar was showing through. There were some dents and nicks in the surface. On the front right of the bowl there was a spot where the varnish was damaged like the bowl had been rubbed against a rough surface (it is visible in the second photo below). I would need to smooth out those areas and stain and give them a top coat to replace the shine. The finish on the sides and the  bottom of the bowl was in excellent shape. The next two photos show the stamping on the pipe – the brand on the left side and the country of origin on the underside next to the silver band.The stem had tooth chatter on the top side next to the button and on top of it. On the underside there were tooth marks and chatter that would need to be sanded out. Fortunately none of them were too deep.Once again Jeff did his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He scrubbed the interior and exterior and sent me a very clean pipe that I only needed to put the finishing touches on. The next four photos show the pipe when I brought it to my work table. The pipe looked really good. The finish on the bowl sides, bottom and shank were in excellent condition. The scrape on the front of the bowl and the rim scrapes where the varnish coat was missing were clean and ready to repair. The stem was clean as well other than the light oxidation and the tooth chatter. I took a photo of the rim top to show the damage on the inner edge. You can see the area on the right side of the inner edge and the back side. There was also some damage on the front inner edge of the bowl. These would need to be sanded and repaired.The stem was very clean other than the tooth chatter and tooth marks.When I removed the stem the silver band fell off in my hands. The glue that had held it in place had dried and cracked. I used a tooth pick to spread all purpose glue around the end of the shank and pressed the band in place.I sanded the inner edge of the rim to remove the damaged finish. I used 1500-6000 grit micromesh sanding pads to smooth out the damaged areas. I wet sanded the areas to minimize the damage. I touched up the sanded areas with a dark brown stain pen. It matched the stain on the surrounding bowl. I ran a pipe cleaner and alcohol through the mortise and airway in the shank and stem. The pipe cleaner came out very clean and showed that the pipe was spotless.I sanded out the tooth chatter and tooth marks with 220 grit sandpaper until the surface of the stem was smooth. Once I had it sanded smooth I polished it with micromesh sanding pad – wet sanding it with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding it with 3200-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down with a damp cotton pad to remove the sanding dust after each pad so that I could see how it was polishing. To give the repaired areas on the rim top a shine like the rest of the bowl I buffed it with Blue Diamond and then applied some Cherry Danish Oil to the rim top with a cotton swab. I repeated the process until the top of the rim shone. It looked like the rest of the bowl once again. I buffed the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond polish on the buffing wheel. It polished out all of the minute scratches in the surface of the Lucite and the briar. It does a great job with a soft touch when polishing briar and the shine that the Blue Diamond gives Lucite is glassy. I gave the bowl and stem several coats of carnauba wax and buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It really is a beautiful looking pipe. The Dublin shape is perfectly laid out to maximize the grain. This one will soon be for sale on the rebornpipes store. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know either by email to slaug@uniserve.com or a private message on FaceBook. Thanks for looking.

Cleaning up a Beautiful Chacom Sahara Brandy

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Blog by Steve Laug

My brother Jeff got a call from an auction house that does estate sales. He had built relationships with the owner and his son in law over the past months and we had purchased other pipes from them. This time they were calling about a lot of what they called higher end pipes that they had coming up on a weekend estate sale. They talked a bit and he asked if they would mind sending him a list of the pipes that were coming up. They went one step better and sent him the two photos of the pipes as a preview of what was going on sale. We looked them over and chose a few of them for purchase if Jeff had the chance. (It is times like this that I wish I lived close so I could go with him to these sales.

He went on a Friday morning and stood in line for the doors to open. When they did he went in and they handed him a bucket and the box of pipes that they had set back behind the counter for him. There were indeed some nice pipes in the batch and certainly pricier than the average lot we find at antique sales and malls. There were quite a few Savinelli products, Stanwell, GBD, Aldo Velani, Nording, Il Ceppo, Barlings, DiMonte and a Chacom Sahara. They made him a proposition for the entire lot of pipes and he went for it. He came home with all of the pipes in the photos to the left.

He called me on FaceTime and we were both pretty excited by what he had picked up. We went through them and noted the names and brands. We noted all of the stamping on the shank of each pipe. I got more excited as we noted each pipe and its condition. We realized that they were in pretty decent shape other than the usual dirtiness and grime from smoking. There were not any damaged rims or bowls. There were tooth marks on the stem that would need to be cleaned up but really it was a very nice lot of pipes. We had done well with the purchase.

This afternoon I was greeted at my door by the box that he had sent my way. I excitedly opened cut the tape on the box. Like a child at Christmas I tore in to the box to see what was inside. I pulled away the bubble wrap that he had put around each pipe. Now I was really excited by the pipes that he had sent along for me.

I chose to work on the Chacom Sahara first. It is a beautiful brandy shaped pipe that was in decent shape. It was stamped on the left side of the shank with the brand CHACOM over SAHARA. On the underside of the shank next to the stem shank junction it bore the shape number 864. The stem bore the Chacom CC oval logo inset in the vulcanite. There was a band of faux horn/Lucite that was part of the stem. It sat between a thin band of black and the rest of the tapered stem. My brother took the following photos before he worked on the pipes.The finish on the bowl was in excellent shape. There was a thin cake in the bowl and an overflow of lava on the rim top. Sometimes this can be a good sign in that it can protect the finish underneath it. Other times it was a bad sign and hid a lot of rim burn and damage. I wondered what would be underneath this buildup. He took a photo of the pipe from the top and a close up photo to show the condition of the bowl and the rim.He also took some close up photos of the bottom and sides of the bowl. The finish was in excellent condition all around the bowl. Jeff took some good photos of the stamping on the shank. The first shows the left side of the shank. The second shows the shape stamping on the underside of the shank. The third shows the CC logo oval on the right side of the stem.He also took some photos of the chatter on the top and underside of the stem next to the button. Fortunately none of them were too deep.Jeff did his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He scrubbed the interior and exterior and sent me a very clean pipe that I only needed to put the finishing touches on. The next four photos show the pipe when I brought it to my work table. The pipe looked really good. The finish on the bowl sides, bottom and shank were in excellent condition. The stem was clean as well other than the light oxidation and the tooth chatter. The rim top had been cleaned up but it looked dull. I took a close up photo of the rim to show what it looked like after Jeff had cleaned it up. The top was clean and free of all build up. The finish on the rim was a bit dull but it looked like it would polish up nicely.I forgot to take a picture of the tooth chatter before I started working on it. I sanded the surface with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the tooth chatter and marks. I was able to remove all of them without changing the profile of the stem. I left behind the usual scratch marks after sanding with 220 grit sandpaper.I wiped the stem down with a damp cloth to remove the sanding dust and took the following photos before I polished it with micromesh sanding pads.I cleaned out the mortise and the airway in the shank and stem with pipe cleaners and alcohol. My brother had done a great job cleaning both so that nothing came out. It was very clean on the inside.I scraped out the last of the cake on the bowl walls with the Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife until the walls were clean.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil after each pad. The oil both enlivens the rubber and provides bite for the sanding pads. I polished it with the 12000 grit pad and gave it a final coat of oil and set it aside to dry. (I forgot to take a photo of sanding it with 4000-6000 grit pads.) To give the rim top a shine like the rest of the bowl I buffed it with Blue Diamond and then applied some Cherry Danish Oil to the rim top with a cotton swab. I repeated the process until the top of the rim just shone. It looked like the rest of the bowl once again. I buffed the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond polish on the buffing wheel. It polished out all of the minute scratches in the surface of the vulcanite and the briar. It does a great job with a soft touch when polishing briar and the shine that the Blue Diamond gives rubber is almost glassy. I gave the bowl and stem several coats of carnauba wax and buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It really is a beautiful looking pipe. The layout of the grain with the brandy shape is really well done. This one will soon be for sale on the rebornpipes store. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know either by email to slaug@uniserve.com or a private message on FaceBook. Thanks for looking.

Restoring an Unstamped Rhodesian Handmade

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Blog by Steve Laug

When I saw this pipe that my brother picked up I was captivated by the grain. The unknown maker had done an amazing job of laying the shape out with the grain. The sides of the bowl and shank have stunning flame grain radiating from the point at the heel of the bowl. The heel and the cap on the bowl, as well as the top and the pointed bottom edge of the shank have beautiful birdseye grain. He sent me the following pictures to whet my appetite for this pipe. I like the Rhodesian shape and I like the combination of nice grain, a sterling silver band and a black vulcanite stem. This one had them all. The only oddities to me were the shape of the shank – it was an egg shape, pointed at the bottom and the freehand style panel stem. The bowl had a thick cake in it and it was scratched at about 11 o’clock in the photo below. It looked as if it could have been cracked but it was not once he had reamed it free of the cake. The finish was dirty and there was some darkening/burn marks on the back side of the cap. It appeared to me that it was originally a virgin finish but I would know more once I had it in Vancouver and had cleaned up the finish.The next two photos show the grain on the sides of the bowl and the bottom. There is birdseye toward the left side of the bottom of the bowl curving up to meet the grain on the sides.Underneath the oxidation and tarnish on the band it was stamped Sterling Silver in an arch. The stamping was centred on the top side of the shank.The stem was heavily oxidized and had tooth chatter on both sides near the button. On the underside of the button there were deep tooth marks and one of them was on the button. The chair leg style stem would be a challenge to clean up.My brother did his usual comprehensive clean up on the pipe. He was able to remove all of the cake in the bowl and on the rim. He cleaned up the dirty finish on the bowl and cleaned out the mortise and the airway in the shank and the stem. The stem was more oxidized from his cleanup but the oxidation was on the surface so it would be a bit simpler to work on. The next four photos show what the pipe looked like when I brought it to the work table. There was some rim damage on the back side of the bowl. You can see it in the photo below. There was some burn damage as well as some bad nicks in the burned area. The outer edge had been flattened at that point and would need to be reworked. I took close up photos of both sides of the stem to highlight the tooth marks and chatter on them. There were three sandpits on the bottom of the bowl. The first was on the right side and was the largest of the three. The second and third were on the opposite side and were mere pin prick flaws. I filled in the holes with clear super glue. When it dried I sanded it with a piece of 220 grit sandpaper and then with a medium and fine grit sanding sponge to blend it into the surrounding briar.I topped the bowl on a topping board with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the damaged rim and ready the back side for a repair. I was pretty sure that if I topped it most of the damage would be remedied and the burn mark would disappear. Fortunately it was not deep in the briar so the sanding took care of it. Once I had it smooth I sanded it with the medium and fine grit sanding sponge.I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on a cotton pad to remove any remaining oils and dirt on the on surface of the briar. The next set of four photos show the cleaned surface of the briar. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding it with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. The photos below tell the story of the polishing and interestingly the ring grain in the briar begins to show through by the polishing with the three final pads. I rubbed the polished briar down with a light coat of olive oil to highlight the grain and make it stand out. A little olive oil brings new life to the dry briar. This pipe truly  has some stunning grain as is evident in the following photos. I sanded out the tooth marks and chatter on the stem along with the oxidation with 220 grit sandpaper. The photo below shows the stem after the sanding. I rebuilt the dent in the button with black super glue. Once it was dry I sanded it to match the rest of the button.The stem had a very interesting tenon. It was short and it had what looked like threads on it. I decided to leave these in place rather than change the original shape of the tenon. I worked over the stem itself. I polished the vulcanite with micromesh sanding pads. I wet sanded it with 1500-2400 grit pads. I rubbed it down with Obsidian Oil repeatedly during the sanding. The photo below shows the stem after being sanded with the first three pads. There is still evidence of oxidation in the rubber so it will take a lot more sanding and polishing before it is black again. I buffed it after this with red Tripoli on the buffing wheel and was able to remove more of it. I dry sanded it with 3200-12000 grit pads (the second and third photos below) and again rubbed it down repeatedly with Obsidian Oil. Once it was finished I gave it a final coat of oil and let it dry. I buffed the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond a final time and worked to remove any remaining oxidation on the stem. The Blue Diamond is a plastic polish and it really brings a shine to the vulcanite. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I finished buffing by hand to deepen the shine. I polished the silver band with a jeweler’s polishing cloth and removed the remaining tarnish. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. I wish I knew who the unknown maker was. He or she did a great job making this pipe. The shape, the layout with the grain and the craftsmanship make this a pipe that will outlive me that is for certain. It is truly a beautiful pipe. Thanks for walking with me through the process of the restoration.

Restoring a York Super London Made Bent Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

In a recent box of pipes that my brother Jeff sent to me from Idaho there was an interesting little pipe. It came in its own black leather case with a gold felt lining. There was a logo on the inside that read Guaranteed London Made. The case was in excellent condition. The pipe inside was really good looking and from the stem shape and orific button it was clear that it had some age on it. It was stamped on the left side of the shank with the words YORK over SUPER and on the right side of the shank with the words LONDON MADE. For a pipe of this age I was surprised that the finish was still in pretty decent condition. The only real issue of consequence was a spot on the right side where there was a large fill that was falling out. The bowl had a thin cake around the top half of the bowl while the lower part of the bowl appeared to be unsmoked. It had not even darkened from smoking it. There was some minor rim damage on the outer edge toward the bowl front where the pipe had been knocked out against something hard. There were some nicks on the front edge and there were some dents in the rim but they were not too bad. The rest of the finish was dirty and dull but would clean up nicely. The stem had tooth marks and chatter at the button on both the top and bottom sides of the stem and it was oxidized. The vulcanite was older and was a good quality rubber. The button was an older orific style with a single hole in the end. I liked the overall look of the pipe.The next series of photos show the large fill toward the front on the lower right side of the bowl. It was a pink putty fill and it was crumbling revealing the flaw in the briar. The third photo captures the crumbling area of the fill. It would need to be picked out and refilled. The next two photos show the stamping on both sides of the shank. It was sharp and readable and did not show signs of over buffing.My brother took two photos of the stem to show its condition. The photos show the oxidation on the stem and the nature of the tooth marks near the button. The quality of rubber used in this old timer can be seen in the lack of oxidation.I have restored on other older York pipe and from my research I found that it was probably made by KB&B. The London Made stamp on the cover of the case and on the pipe led me to consider several other options but the stamping itself matches exactly the style used by KB&B. From what I could find they also had London Made pipes like this. I would love to find the back story on this brand but at this point this is all I could find. Do any of you have any more information on the brand? Post it here for all of us to learn from. Thank you ahead of time for your help.

My brother did his usual stellar cleanup of the pipe. He scrubbed the surface with Murphy’s Oil soap and removed the buildup of wax and oils on the exterior of the bowl. He reamed the bowl and cleaned out the mortise and airway in the shank and the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. When I ran a pipe cleaner through the pipe it came out clean. The chamber and mortise area showed that this pipe had not been heavily smoked. The stem was clean on the inside and needed no more work on my part. The light tooth marks and chatter would be fairly simple to remove. When it arrived at my work table I took the following photos of the pipe both in and out of the case. The shape is one of my favourites and the diminutive size make it a pipe that probably traveled well in a pocket. I took some close up photos of the bowl, rim and stem to show the condition of the pipe before I started the restoration process. The large pink putty fill was really ugly on the bottom right side of the bowl. It was cracked and chipped, but even if it were not I would still pick it out and start over. The grain on the pipe is quite nice but this eyesore of a fill makes it disappear from view. I picked the fill out completely with a dental pick. I wiped down the surface of the bowl around the area that needed to be repaired with alcohol on a cotton pad. I packed in some briar dust and put some drops of clear super glue on top. I added more briar dust and super glue until the surface bulged slightly above the bowl surface.When the repair dried I sanded the area with 220 grit sandpaper to blend the surface of the fill into the surrounding briar. I sanded it with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge to remove the scratch marks. I refilled the small air bubbles that had showed up in the surface of the bowl with some more super glue and then sanded them again. Once the surface was smooth I wiped down the bowl with alcohol to remove the finish before restaining the pipe. I use alcohol as it does not react to the super glue repair like acetone does. Acetone actually dissolves the super glue and compromises the repaired area. At this point I could have left the rim alone and not worried about the nicks and dings. They do not show up well in the photos but they were very visible in person. I could also feel them when I ran a finger over the rim. To put it mildly, they bugged me. I lightly topped the bowl to remove the damage and minimize the damage to the front edge. I sanded the bowl with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge to remove the scratches. I was happier with the rim top now that I had finished it.I stained the pipe with a dark brown aniline stain and flamed it to set it in the grain of the briar. I have found that when a pipe has been previously stained with a oxblood colour that it will come out in the final colour of the dark brown stain and give the pipe a rich patina that is really close to the original colour.I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on cotton pads to make it more transparent and help the grain show. You will notice in the second photo that the filled area is still showing. I needed to do a little more work on that to get it to blend in more. I used a black Sharpie pen and touched up the spots on the fill that looked lighter than the bowl. I hand buffed the pipe to give it some lustre and touched up the area of the fill with some more dark brown stain. I set the bowl aside to dry and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded out the tooth chatter and tooth marks with 220 grit sandpaper. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. I repeatedly rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil and after the final sanding pad gave it a last coat of the oil and let it dry. I put the stem back on the pipe and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I find that Blue Diamond gives lustre to the briar and the vulcanite. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. Don’t skip this step in the process. Many folks do not buff with a clean pad after the waxing and miss out on giving the pipe a rich shine by missing this. I hand buff my pipes afterward with a microfibre cloth as I find that it deepens the shine and evens out the finished look on the briar and rubber. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The elegant shape of the older bent billiards is quite captivating. These smaller, compact ones have a definitive look all their own. Thanks for looking.

Cleaning up a Dr. Grabow Westbrook 44

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Blog by Steve Laug

Not long ago I received and email from Dave, a reader of the blog, asking about a couple of pipes that he had picked up. I have included his email below. He gives his assessment regarding the pipes and what he wanted done. He had also done a bit of research on the Dr. Grabow pipe for me. I really like this kind of information.

Steve… I have recently been gifted 2 estate pipes that I would love to have reincarnated by your hands. I am not sure of the cost and wanted to speak with you first. One because I have never shipped anything to Canada and I am not sure if there would be any issues. Two, I also wanted to get an estimate of cost before going forward. The 2 pipes in question are not in bad shape, just have some age, cake and minimal wear; one is a Whitehall rusticated with saddle stem and the other a Pear shaped Dr. Grabow Westbrook. The Dr. Grabow from what I can find is a special R J Reynolds model which has the orange spade on the side of the stem. I have attached some images with this email so that you have some idea of how they look. If you need additional images please let me know. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Regards, Dave The first that I chose to work on was the Dr. Grabow Westbrook Pear Shaped pipe. The pear shape came in both a slim pear (#74) and a medium pear (#44). The chart below is taken from https://pipedia.org/wiki/File:1960sDrGrabowFlyer5.jpg. It shows the shape of the pipe I was working on. I believe that I am working on a shape 44, Medium Pear.I examined the shank with a lens and I could see that the left side of the shank was stamped Westbrook over Dr. Grabow. The right side of the shank was stamped Imported Briar over PAT. The number that follows the PAT. stamp is illegible. It is very faint. From this I can extrapolate that the pipe is an early version of the Dr. Grabow Westbrook line. It came out in the early 1960s. https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Grabow

I found an article on Pipedia about the RJ Reynolds pipes and when and how they were offered through pipe coupons. I have included the majority of the article as well as the link.

https://pipedia.org/wiki/RJR_Grabow_information

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company had two other pipe tobaccos which were George Washington and Carter Hall that shared a good hunk of the pipe tobacco market left over from Prince Albert and Sir Walter Raleigh. Thus sets the stage for a coupon to be placed in each package or can of these tobacco products. The pipes presented to the American public were the very finest mass produced pipes ever created by man, or in all probability will ever be created by man. Pipes were presented with either a metal filter or a paper filter. The highest quality pipes were presented with only a metal filter. The Westbrook model came either in a rustic or matte finish and had metal filters along with the Berwyck that presented the same choice with paper filters. These pipes could be purchased only by mailing five coupons and three dollars to Sparta, North Carolina. The classic of the series was a natural grain Emperor with only the metal filters and its cost was five dollars and required twenty five coupons. About half way through the duration of the offer the Sculptura was introduced as demand was high for a quality sandblast grain pipe. So, R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company set out to produce the perfect sandblast grain pipe and boasted that no finer sandblast pipe had ever been produced by man nor ever would be produced by man than its Sculptura that could only be purchased by collecting five coupons and sending that along with four dollars to Sparta, North Carolina.

Each order that was filled for every pipe ordered throughout America came in a neat box with a full set of literature including a shape chart that actually gave a pipe smoker an immediate choice to choose from far greater than any pipe store or other outlet that America has ever seen or probably will ever see.

This mail order offer that began sometimes in the early 1950’s would end in 1987 when R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company sold its tobacco products to John Middleton, Inc. At that time it was announced that this mail order offer was the longest running mail order offer in duration of time of any mail order offer of any product on the American market. Thus, an era ended eighteen years ago or so and as each year turns over these pipes become less available and thus more valuable.

The argument about a good smoking pipe so prevalent today among pipe smokers is not applicable to these pipes for the simple reason that they all smoke good and they all smoke just alike with no discernable differentiation that any one pipe is any better or worse than any of the others. These pipes came from the top twenty percent of Briar obtainable and were constructed with the quality control standards of a Zippo lighter. The only difference was in the shape and this was presented in a very large number of choices. The Dr. Grabow pipe is clearly stamped as such, but was never ever retailed. It was admitted by all that these pipes were superior to the retail Dr. Grabow pipe. Those with the metal filter are no longer obtainable from any source. Those with the paper filter, although similar to the present Dr. Grabow, is of a superior quality. Since those with the paper filter were not nearly so popular as the metal filter in those old days it is rather difficult to find one these days. There will not be many days until those with the metal filter are gone forever never to be replaced and it is likely that anyone who possesses such a pipe has a very valuable piece of Briar or to become such in not very many years. One other point, also like a Zippo, these pipes are virtually indestructible…

I took some photos of the pipe when it arrived. Overall impressions of the pipe were good. The briar was a beautifully grained piece; the stamping was faint on the left side of the shank and not readable on the right. The bowl had a light cake with overflow and darkening on the crowned rim. The stem was oxidized and appeared to have been clipped off. The new button was thin and the slot was sloppy. Work would need to be done with that end of the stem. I took a close up photo of the rim top and bowl to show the overall condition. It was in great shape for a pipe this age. It had been pretty well cared for over the years. I also took photos of the stem to show the thinness of the button. I am pretty certain it was reshaped somewhere along the way. The stinger apparatus was different from other Grabows that I have worked on. It was pressure fit into the threaded tenon and was a tube rather that the shovel stinger I was expecting.I scrubbed the top of the rim with a cotton pad and saliva to try to remove the buildup and darkening that was there. It actually worked very well. I sanded it with 1500 grit micromesh to further smooth things out. I reamed the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife and took the cake back to bare briar.I built up the button top and bottom with black super glue. I did not need to build it up too much so I decided to just use the glue and not add charcoal powder. I set the repaired stem aside to let the glue cure.I sanded the bowl with 1500-6000 grit micromesh sanding pads and wiped it down with a damp cotton pad to remove the sanding dust. The photos below show the bowl after sanding it with 1500-2400 grit pads. I scrubbed out the shank and the metal mortise with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs until they came out clean. The interior of the shank was really dirty. Many pipe cleaners and cotton swabs later the shank was clean and the metal mortise was shiny.In the past I have used a Cherry Danish Oil Stain that matches the colour of these older Grabow Westbrook pipes really well. It is the kind of stain that you rub on, let sit and rub off. Since the finish on the Westbrook smooth pipes was smooth, once the stain was dry I would rub it down to a matte gloss look.I hand rubbed the finish once it had been sitting for a short time. The photos below show what the bowl looked like after it had been rubbed down. The grain really stands out now – showing a combination of birdseye and cross grain. I love the look of the briar on this old pipe. Once the repair had dried I reshaped the button with needle files. I worked on the slot with needle files. The third photo shows what the slot looked like at this point. I will need to smooth it out but it is looking better.I sanded down the file marks and the oxidation on the stem with 220 grit sandpaper. I folded a piece of 220 grit sandpaper and worked on the slot to smooth out the file marks. I sanded the flat end of the button. I cleaned out the airway in the stem with a pipe cleaner and alcohol. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. I carefully buffed the stem with red Tripoli between the 2400-3200 grit pads. I finished with the pads. I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil after each set of three pads. I gave it a final rubdown with oil and set it aside to dry. After I saw the oxidation still showing in the above photo I buffed the stem again with red Tripoli. I started the sanding process over and sanded the stem with the earlier micromesh sanding pads. I buffed it with Blue Diamond on the buffing pad.I worked some more on the stem to get out the hard to remove oxidation. It took time but I think it is gone for the most part. I polished the end of the stem with micromesh sanding pads to smooth out some of the scratches. The stem looks much better. I buffed the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond, carefully avoiding the Dr. Grabow spade logo so as not to damage it. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax to protect it. I buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine and by hand with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. I took the following photos of the finished pipe. It is truly a beautiful piece of briar – hard to believe it is a coupon pipe it is such nice wood. The pipe is ready to go back to Dave. Now I have to finish up the second pipe he sent to me. Thanks for looking.

Restoring a Pipeman’s First Pipe

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Sometimes I get requests to restore pipes that touch a sentimental chord for me. When that happens it brings back all kinds of memories and thoughts for me. A while ago I received an email from Phil regarding a pipe he had that he wanted some help with. He explained that it was not an expensive pipe but that was his very first when he started as a pipeman. We emailed back and forth for a bit and then he sent it up to me in Vancouver to assess and see if it was worth restoring. It came in the mail last week and I opened the package to have a good look at it. I went over it slowly and carefully and found some issues that needed to be addressed. To me the pipe was very restorable and I was willing to take it on.

Here is what I saw as I looked at the pipe. I put together a list for Phil and emailed it back to him. I would say it is well worth a cleanup, repairs, refinishing and polishing. I think that it has a pretty long life ahead of it.

  1. He was concerned with the overall condition of the pipe. It was a basic basket pipe and had a lot of fills in the bowl and shank. The bowl had never been smoked to the bottom so the briar is raw. It is a little smoky looking but is basically sound. The pipe can be smoked for a long time.
  1. The little lines in the bottom of the bowl are called checking. They happen to the inside of almost all pipes and are caused by heating and cooling. In this case it appears that the pipe had never been smoked to the bottom. I recommended a complete reaming and then some pipe mud (cigar ash and water) to fill in the little fissures and then a simple bowl coating to protect the bowl while he built a cake.
  1. He had mentioned a crack on the left side of the bowl. The noted crack was definitely there. It was on the left side toward the front. It is a hairline crack that starts at a putty fill toward the top of the bowl and ran down to another putty fill on the bottom of the bowl. This is one time where fills actually worked in my favour. I repair cracks all the time by drilling a small pin hole at each end to stop the crack from spreading. In this case the fills did just that for me. Go figure. I would need to simply pick out the old putty and repair the fills or top them up with super glue and briar dust.
  1. The rim looked like it had several fills on the top and the inner edge. It was hard to be certain as there was a thick coat tarry lava. It would need to be cleaned off and the fills check for stability and repaired if not.
  1. The stem was in good shape but was oxidized and had tooth chatter. It would need to be cleaned and polished to remove the oxidation and make the vulcanite shine.
  1. Looking in the shank the mortise and airway are also sound.

Here is what the pipe looked like when it arrived in Vancouver. I took photos to set the base for what it looked like before I started. Note the fills on the shank sides, bottom and bowl sides and bottom. I took a close up photo of the rim top to show the condition of the bowl and the rim. The front inner edge of the rim appears to be burned and it is out of round. It is hard to know if there was any other damage on the rim top.I took some close up photos of the fills and crack on the left side of the bowl running between the two large fills. It is circled in red in the photos below. The crack is hairline and is fairly tight. The fills show some shrinkage in the putty and will need to be removed and replaced.I took a close up photo of both sides of the stem to show the tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button.I reamed the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife to scrape out the cake to the bare briar. I used the sharp edge to scrape off some of the heavy cake on the rim top.I scrubbed the top of the rim with alcohol and cotton pads. I was able to remove most of it. The inner edge of the bowl showed a lot of damage. The front edge had a fairly deep burn mark that covered the surface of the rim at that point but did not go too deep.I cleaned up the inner edge of the rim and the sides of the bowl with the PipNet reamer. I used it to remove some of the damaged edge.I topped the bowl to deal with the burn mark that is visible in the above photo. After I topped it  I repaired the damaged fills on the rim and bowl sides that way I could top the repaired portions at the same times. I picked out the fills with a dental pick and removed the putty. The two that joined the crack were quite large and deep. I repaired them by tamping briar dust into the pits and then pushing clear super glue into the dust. I repeated the process leave a thick bubble of glue and dust on the surface of the repair. I did the same on the rim top, inner edge and the shank sides and bottom to repair the fills there.I sanded the fills smooth with 220 grit sandpaper to blend them into the surrounding briar. I added a little more super glue to some pits in the repairs and sanded them once the glue had dried. I sanded the oxidation and tooth chatter off the stem with 220 grit sandpaper. I was able to remove all of the chatter and even the tooth marks as they were not too deep in the vulcanite.I sanded the bowl and stem with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge to begin to smooth out the scratches and sanding marks. I sanded the bowl with 1500-4000 grit micromesh sanding pads in preparation for staining the bowl. I planned on giving the pipe a contrast stain so I started with a dark brown aniline based stain. I applied the stain, flamed it and repeated the process until I was satisfied with the coverage.I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on a cotton pad to remove the heavy dark finish and make it more transparent. I wanted the dark brown deep in the grain once I had removed it from the lighter portions of the briar. I sanded the bowl with 1500 grit micromesh pads. I continued to sand the bowl with 1500-2400 grit micromesh pads to get the transparency that I wanted on the bowl. The next photos show what it looked like once I had finished sanding it. I gave the bowl a top coat of Danish Oil with a Cherry Stain. I rub the oil onto the bowl and rub it off and buff it. The next two photos are a little blurred but you can clearly see the cherry colour that is coming to the surface of the bowl. It works really well to blend in the fills.I set the bowl aside to dry and turned to the internals. I cleaned out the mortise and the airway in the shank and stem with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 and dry sanding with 3200-120000 grit pads. I buffed the stem with red Tripoli on the buffing wheel after the 4000 grit pad and then finish sanding it with the 6000-12000 grit pads. I gave the stem multiple rub downs with Obsidian Oil after each few pads to see if the oxidation at the shank end was getting better. By the time I was finished with the final pads the stem looked much better. I would give entire pipe a buff before I finished the restoration. I mixed a batch of pipe mud – cigar ash and water – to form a paste and applied it to the bowl bottom and sides with a folded pipe cleaner. I pressed the mud into the small checking that was around the bowl bottom with a dental spatula. The pipe mud will protect the bowl while a cake is formed.I buffed the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel to raise the shine and highlight the grain on the bowl. The fills are still visible but they blend into the surface of the briar better than they did before. I gave the pipe multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. I will be packing it up and mailing it back to Phil once I give it a bowl coating. I am hoping he enjoys this piece of his personal pipe history. It should provide many more years of enjoyment for him.

A Medico VFQ Rhodesian with a Cumberland Stem

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Blog by Steve Laug

My brother Jeff and I visited an antique mall that was in an old grainery along a railroad track not too long ago. We went through the display cases and booths on two floors and found a few pipes. This was one of them – an old Medico VFQ Rhodesian. I have been told that VFQ means Very Fine Quality and underneath the grime it appeared that this one may have lived up to the stamping. The stem is a Cumberland like material with swirls and striations in a mahogany coloured stem. In classic Medico style the pipe was made for their paper filter and had a hollow, adjustable tenon. The tenon has a split on both sides that can be expanded should the stem become loose in the shank.The pipe was in rough shape. The bowl was thickly caked and had remnants of tobacco in it. The rim top was covered with overflow from the bowl and there were some large chips on the top and inner edge of the bowl on the right side. The finish was shot with the top varnish coat peeling all over the bowl. The ring around the bowl was dirty but was undamaged.The pipe was stamped Medico over V.F.Q. over Imported Briar on the left side of the shank. It also was stamped with the shape number 76 on the right side. The stem bore the V.F.Q. stamp on the left side as well.The stem was oxidized, dirty and had tooth chatter on both sides at the button. There was an old paper filter still in the tenon and the inside of the shank and stem were filthy.When we got back to my brother’s place we reamed the pipe and scrubbed it down with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the damage finish. We scrubbed the mortise, airway into the bowl and the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. I took photos of the cleaned pipe when I finally brought it to my work table in Vancouver. (Notice the angle of the rim top on the bowl. It was not flat and the damage had left the front higher than the back.) The next two photos show the condition of the tenon and bowl when taken apart and the damaged rim once all the cake had been removed. The rim had damage all the way around but the biggest damage was on the rear right side where there was a large chip missing.The stem shows some wear in the next photos and the striations of colour are almost not visible due to oxidation.I decided to even out the height of the rim cap by carefully topping the bowl. Since the back side was higher than the front I was pretty sure I could remove most if not all of the chipped area on the rear right. I topped it on a board with 220 grit sandpaper and carefully leveled the bowl by applying more pressure to the rear of the bowl than the front and lifting the front edge off the paper as I remove the damaged and excess on the read of the bowl. It took some work to level the bowl properly and end up with an even top both from a vertical and horizontal view.I used a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to bevel out the inner edge of the rim to remove the remaining rim damage and clean up the appearance of the rim.I sanded the rim with a medium and fine grit sanding sponge and with 1500-4000 grit micromesh sanding pads to remove the scratches. I wiped the bowl down with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the remaining finish and stain on the bowl in preparation for matching the newly topped rim with the colour of the rest of the bowl. I did a more thorough cleanup of the mortise and airway into the bowl to remove all of the sanding dust and remaining debris that was there. I scrubbed it out with cotton swabs, pipe cleaners and alcohol. I also ran pipe cleaners through the airway in the stem and cleaned the mortise with cotton swabs.The bowl had many nicks and scratches. I sanded it with micromesh pads to remove the majority of them but decided to leave some of the deeper ones as beauty marks of the old pipe. In the photos the bowl looks pretty richly coloured but in reality it was faded and apart from the flash the grain did not stand out. I stained the bowl with a dark brown aniline stain, flamed it and repeated the process until I was happy with the coverage on the bowl. The look of the bowl in the next two photos is really odd. I think that it is a phenomenon of the flash because it did not look like this in person.I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on cotton pads to remove some of the opacity of the stain and make it more transparent. In the photos below you can see that it is lighter but still to heavy to show the grain to my liking. I buffed the bowl with red Tripoli, sanded it with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge, then polished it with 1500-2400 grit micromesh pads to remove some more of the dark stain and leave behind some nice contrasts in the grain of the bowl. The next photos show it after I had buffed it with Blue Diamond to polish it. I set the bowl aside for now and turned my attention to the stem. I have found that these Medico stems are not fully vulcanite and are a bit of a bear to polish. I have often been left to do the polishing by hand as the buffer can generate too much heat if I am not careful. The heat damages the material of the stem and forces you to start over. I sanded out the tooth chatter and marks on both sides of the stem and reshaped the button edges with 220 grit sandpaper.  The flow of the top of the shank to the top of the stem was interrupted in that the height of the stem at that point was higher than that of the shank so I sanded the top half of the stem to make that transition smoother.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding it with 1500-2400 until I removed the scratches left behind by the sandpaper. I dry sanded with 3200-12000 grit pads. I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil between each sanding pad to give the pads more bite and allow them to really polish the stem. Between the 4000 and 6000 grit pads I buffed the stem very carefully (you have to have a light touch against the wheel). I gave it a final rub down of oil after the 12000 grit pad. I put the stem back on the bowl and buffed bowl and stem with Blue Diamond a final time. It really polishes the briar and with a careful/light touch can polish these older Medico stems. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine.The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. To me the stain goes really well with the polished Cumberland like stem. They play off each other very well. The contrast on the bowl raises the highlights in the stem and vice versa. This pipe will soon be on the rebornpipes store if you wold like to add it to your rack. It is very lightweight and comfortable in the hand. I think, judging from the condition of the pipe when I got it, that it will be a great smoking pipe, with or without the Medico filter.

Rebirth: a Liverpool Stummel with Beautiful Grain and Miserable Drilling

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Blog by Steve Laug

I found this long shank Liverpool pipe sans stem at an antique mall in Idaho when I was visiting my brother. I did not look at it too closely but noticed it was lightly smoked and had some really nice looking grain. I bought it as I figured it would not be too big a deal to make a stem for it. Besides the price was only $4. Looking at the next four photos you can see why the grain got my attention. It is a mix of birdseye, flame and cross grain. The stain that was used really highlights the grain. In the first photo you can see the chip out of the top of the bowl on the left side as well as the chip out of the shank top between the bowl junction and the stamping on the shank side. When I got back to my brother’s place he looked it over and just shook his head. He pointed out the issues with the bowl. The airway entered the bowl at the far right side. The bowl was hardly smoked and this may well have been a reason. Externally the bowl was not round it was entirely lopsided. It was wrong both inside and out in more ways than I had noticed in my quick decision to purchase it. This one was going to be a challenge in more ways than one to restem and make usable once more. I was looking forward to seeing what I could do. The next two photos show the misdrilling and the misshapen out of round external bowl.There were some deep gouges on the left side of the pipe – one had the top of the bowl and one on the shank just ahead of the stamping. There were also some pits and gouges on the underside of the shank and on the end on both top and bottom. I have circled the large one in the first photo below. It is a bright spot circled in red. Then I looked closer at the overall bowl and shank. What a mess. It had been drilled at quite an angle. It appeared that the drill had gone through the right side of the shank just before the bowl. It had been repaired with a fill that was pitted. It is circled in red in the second photo below. The third photo shows the shank from the mortise end. It is obvious that the shank was not round and the mortise was off to the right. This was going to be an interesting pipe to restem. As I looked at the left side of the shank with a magnifying lens I could see that first line of stamping (faint on the top and better at the bottom side of the words read CONTINENTAL. The second line of stamping was clearer and read REAL BRIAR. In examining the rest of the shank, I could see that it was all that was stamped on the pipe. I did some searching for the brand name and found one on Pipedia. The Continental Briar Pipe Co. Inc. manufactured briar pipes in Brooklyn, New York. The address on York and Adams Streets was taken from a letter sent to a Henry T. Rice dated July 28, 1941.

I went through my stem can and found two prospects for stems. Because the shank was misdrilled and out of round and the mortise was also off to the side I needed to have a stem slightly larger in diameter than the shank.  One of the stems was a saddle stem and the other a taper stem. The saddle stem was not quite large enough so I opted for the taper. I used a pen knife to open the mortise and make it more round. I worked to remove briar from the left side of the mortise and make the shank end round. In the third photo below you can see the finished mortise.When I finished the work on the mortise I sanded it with a rolled piece of sandpaper to smooth things out.I pushed the taper stem into the mortise and the fit against the shank was a good fit. The right side where the shank was out of round needed to have some vulcanite removed to make the flow of the stem and shank correct but it would work. The taper stem makes the pipe a Liverpool. If I had used the saddle stem it would have been a lumberman. I like the promising look of the new pipe. There were many on the top and the bottom of the shank and along the right side of the top of the bowl. There was also a place on the right side of the shank at the bowl shank junction that had been filled to repair a drill through. It had been patched with putty but was pitted and rough. I wiped the shank and bowl edge down with alcohol. I filled all of the pits and the repaired area with briar dust and then put drops of super glue on top of the dust fills. The photos below show the patched and repaired areas.When the repairs dried I sanded the repairs smooth to match the briar around them. The photos below show the freshly sanded areas on the pipe. The repairs are dark spots in the middle of the sanded areas. They will be blended in once I stain the bowl and shank. I used a needle file to reshape the button edges on both sides of the stem. They were worn down and the sharp edge was indistinct. I redefined the edges and smoothed out the surface in front of the button.I wiped the bowl and shank down with alcohol to remove the remaining finish on the bowl and to clean off the dust in preparation for restaining the pipe. I sanded the surface of the stem with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the oxidation and smooth out the file marks and tooth marks that remained. I lightly topped the bowl on the topping board to remove the damaged areas on the rim and created a smooth well defined edge on both the inner and outer parts of the bowl. I used a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to clean the inner edge and remove the darkening there.I wiped it down another time to clean off the rim and the edges of dust. I used a dark brown stain touch up pen to stain the sanded areas on the rim, bowl side, shank top and bottom and shank end. I was not too worried about coverage at this point rather providing a base coat before I stained the bowl in its entirety. My thinking was that the base coat would blend in with the existing stain and then the top coat would tie it all together. I stained the pipe with a dark brown aniline stain and flamed it with a lighter. I repeated the process of staining and flaming until the coverage was even around the bowl. I set the pipe aside to dry for a few hours and worked on the stem.I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on cotton pads to remove the dark crusty finish. I wanted the stain to be more transparent to let the grain show through. I sanded it with micromesh sanding pads to polish the bowl and shank. The grain really shown through now and the flame grain, birdseye and cross grain were beautiful. The fills have blended in on most of the bowl while the repair on the right side of the shank at the bowl is dark but smooth. I scraped out the remnants of cake that remained inside of the bowl with the Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife and sanded the walls with 180 grit sandpaper to smooth them out.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil between each set of three pads. I took it and buffed it with Tripoli after the 2400 grit pad and followed that with Blue Diamond. Then I went on to continue polishing it with the higher grits of micromesh pads. I buffed the pipe and stem with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel and carefully buffed around the stamping. I did not want to damage it any further than before. I gave the pipe and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine on the briar and the vulcanite. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It is a long pipe that is just under 7 inches long and the bowl is 1 ¾ inches tall. The bowl exterior is 1 1/8 inches in diameter and the bowl chamber is ¾ inch in diameter. What started out as a major mess came out looking like a fine pipe. Even though the airway enters the bowl on the far right the draw is still very good. I think it should smoke fairly well and provide a decent looking long pipe for someone who wants to add it to his collection. Thanks for walking through the challenge with me.

Restoring a piece of WDC Pipe History – A Meerschaum Bulldog

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Blog by Steve Laug

When I was visiting my brother in Idaho, we called an eBay seller he had bought from before. We were looking for the Koolsmoke base and in the process of asking and buying that from her she also talked to us about other pipes that she had for sale. I love older WDC pipes so when she said she had a WDC Bulldog that was in a case that she would sell to me I was hooked. Then she said it was Meerschaum and that the case was in excellent condition. She said it was red leather-covered and stamped Genuine Meerschaum over Real Amber on the front of the case and Made in Austria on the back side of the case.  We asked her to send us some photos in an email and when she did I bought it. It was a beauty. I loved the shape, the condition the amber stem, actually just about everything about the pipe. Here are pics of the case when it arrived. I opened the case and took a photo of the WDC Triangle logo on the inside cover. The case was in excellent condition both inside and outside.I took a photo of the pipe before I removed it from the case. It looked really good sitting in the opened case. The shape is one of my favourites and the amber stem appeared to be in good shape at this point.I took the pipe out of the case and took a few photos of it to show the general condition of the pipe when I received it. I was amazed that it was in as good condition as it was.  I am guessing that was made in the late 1890’s through the early 1900’s. The bowl had begun to show some colour. There were some nicks and scratches on the sides and also on the stem itself. The rim top was tarred with overflow from the cake in the bowl. The stem was in good shape and showed tooth marks and chatter on the end of the stem on both sides near the button. It had a single hole orific style button. The stem aligned perfectly to the shank. That surprised me as most of the pipes of this era I have worked on had threaded bone tenons and either the internal threads on the shank or those on the bone tenon itself were worn and the stems were over turned. When I took it off the shank there was a small paper washer that had been carefully fitted to the shape of the stem and shank. That is why it aligned. I removed the washer and put the stem back on to find that it was indeed overturned.I scraped out the cake in the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I wanted to remove all of the cake so I carefully took it back to the meerschaum.I worked on the tarry build up on the rim with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads. I wiped rim top with a damp cotton pad repeatedly during the process of sanding it. I was able to remove all of the cake on the rim. There was some darkening around the outer edge of the rim and on the left side there was a small nick in the edge.With the rim cleaned I polished the entire bowl with micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded it with 1500-12000 grit pads to polish the meerschaum and remove some of the finer scratches in the surface of the meerschaum. I left the larger ones and merely smooth out around them. To me these scratches give character and are an integral part of the story of the pipe. The photos below tell the story of the process. With the externals cleaned and polished I turned to the internals. I scrubbed out the shank and mortise with cotton swabs and alcohol. I cleaned the airway in the shank and the stem with pipe cleaners and alcohol. I scrubbed until the internals were clean.I moved on to work on the tooth marks and chatter on the stem. I sanded the stem with 220 grit sandpaper to minimize the scratches and nicks on the sides and angles of the stem.  I sanded out the tooth marks and chatter with little trouble as none of them were deep. That is one beauty of amber as a stem material. It is hard to dent!With the marks removed I decided to address the overturned stem before I polished the stem with micromesh. I have learned a good trick to correct the overturn on these bone tenons and threaded shanks. I have never read about it anywhere but it works really well. I used a clear nail polish, which dries hard and is neutral, to coat the threads on the tenon and the inside of the shank. I carefully apply the polish to the threads and set it aside to dry. It generally takes two or more coats to build up the threads enough to correct the overturn. I painted it the first time, let it dry and turned it on to the shank. It was better but needed a second coat. I gave it a second coat, let it dry and turned it on to the shank. It was a perfect fit. The alignment was spot on.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. I wiped the amber down with a damp cotton pad between each different pad to remove the dust and check on the polishing. It did not take too long before the stem began to glow again. I love the look of a polished amber stem. This particular stem had some really nice patterns in the amber. The underside near the tenon was almost a birdseye pattern. I put the stem back in place in the shank. Things lined up perfectly. I gave it another quick polish with the 12000 grit micromesh pad. I hand waxed it with Conservator’s Wax because it is a microcrystalline polish and it really works well on meerschaum and amber. I rubbed the wax into the finish and buffed the pipe by hand with a microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The meerschaum bowl has a rich glow to it and the amber stem looks really good. The combination is really nice with the amber and the meerschaum reflecting off of each other. I really like the looks of this old timer. It will more than likely remain in the collection with some of my other old timers. Thanks for looking.

Making Work for myself – Restoring a GDB Rainbow 347

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Blog by Steve Laug

I have worked on and collected many GBD pipes over the past 20 years. I have some great resources that I use to identify the nomenclature, shape and date of the various lines that GBD issued. However, all of my sources and resources regarding GBD are from the time prior to the merger (Cadogan) or shortly thereafter. The Rainbow Line is not mentioned in any of them. I also looked on the pipephil Logos and Stampings site and Pipedia and again there is no mention of the line. In my online research, I found several people who think that it is probable that the pipe was made during the 70’s through 90’s. Several things point to this – the chunky Lucite stem, the name of the line itself and the brightly coloured stems used. One fellow on Pipes Magazine’s online forum had a great quote that caught my attention. He said, “If you’re old enough you might remember that Rainbow was a popular theme in the late 70’s to early 90’s due to Sesame Street, “The Rainbow Connection,” The Rainbow Reading Room, etc.” http://pipesmagazine.com/forums/topic/help-with-info-on-a-gbd-pipe I think this is as close as I am going to get to a time period when the pipe was made.

The pipe I picked up on a recent trip to Idaho is a nicely shape apple that was in pretty decent shape. I figured it would be an easy clean up. But things happened along the way and I made more work for myself. It is stamped GBD in an oval over Rainbow on the left side of the shank. On the right side stamped London, England in a straight line over 347 (shape number). On the underside of the shank near the stem/shank junction it is stamped D. The faint painted GBD in an Oval on the left side of the stem also suggests a later GBD. The nomenclature is consistent with usual smooth GBD markings (GBD over Grade (left side) and London England over style number on the right side.) The photos below came from the person I purchased the pipe from and show the general condition.He provided some close up photos of the bowl and rim. He said that the pipe had been reamed and clean. However, it was not reamed and clean to my liking. The bowl had a thick cake that I will need to remove, some rim darkening and some dents in the rim. My guess was that like the bowl, the shank and mortise would need some attention. The stamping on the shank was very clear. The first photo below shows that. Next to the shank/stem junction in the first photo, there is also the remnant of the GBD oval logo that had been originally painted on the stem. The stem had a lot of tooth chatter and some shallow tooth marks in the Lucite.While I was staying with my brother, I cleaned and reamed the pipe. I used the PipeNet reamer and took it back to the walls. I would need to clean it up more once I got home but it was better than when I started. Last evening I took the pipe out of the box to finish the clean up and restoration. I took some photos of it before I started to have a benchmark. I took a close up of the bowl and rim. It was better than when I started but still needed to be cleaned up some more. The rim had some darkening that I could reduce some more as well.I used the Savinelli Fitsall Reamer to scrape the remaining thin cake from the walls of the bowl. I personally like to remove all of the cake when cleaning up a bowl. I will sand a bowl interior a bit later to smooth things out. Little did I know at this point that the decision to sand the bowl would send me on a repair detour.I scrubbed out the mortise, airway in the bowl and in the stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. I used the dental spatula to scrape the walls of the shank and remove the hard tars that had built up there. The airway in the stem was also dirty and had some darkening at the button and in the first few inches of the stem. I cleaned it with bristle pipe cleaners and picked the debris out of the button and from around the stem down tenon with a dental pick.The stem not only had tooth chatter but also some stickiness from a price tag on the top surface. The edge of the button also had some chatter. I sanded the tooth marks out with 220 grit sandpaper and reshaped the button at the same time. The stem was smooth when I finished. It was dull and needed a good polishing.I polished it with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanded with 3200-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down with a damp cotton pad to remove the dust after each pad. I was finished with the stem at this point so I set it aside to work on the bowl. I had decided to use a dark brown aniline stain thinned by 50% with alcohol to darken the grain on the pipe and hide a couple of small fills. I applied the stain, flamed it and repeated the process until the  bowl was covered evenly. I wiped the bowl down with cotton pads and alcohol to make it more transparent. I hand buffed it and took the following photos. It was still too dark to my liking. I sanded the bowl with micromesh sanding pads to make it more transparent and to see if I could make the grain pop. I sanded it with 1500-2400 and took these photos. It was getting there. I continued to sand it with 3200-12000 grit pads to polish it and give it a shine. The next photos tell the story. The bowl was looking better and better. It is at this point that I made a decision that would inevitably cost me. That results of that decision turned out to be a mistake that made a lot more work for me! I put the stem on and decided to work on sanding out the inside of the bowl to remove the polishing compound and remnants of cake. Stupidly, I put the stem on the pipe to enjoy the look of the combination while I worked. Wrong thing to do! Understand, I was sitting at my work table, the top of which is a meter above the floor. I was carefully sanding the bowl interior so as not to damage the nice stain on the rim. Somehow, the pipe wiggled free from my hands and fell to the floor. If you could have watched it and my face at the same time you would have seen the look of horror on my face as it dropped to the floor. That horror changed to a moment of dread as I watched it bounce and heard a snap and watched as the bowl and stem went in opposite directions. I quietly picked up the bowl and stem. The tenon had snapped off in the mortise. It was a clean break. I don’t know about you but I find Lucite is much less forgiving than vulcanite. I have had pipes with vulcanite stem hit the floor with not breakage but not so with Lucite. It seems that the tenon inevitably snaps. Well this one certainly did.I sat and looked at it for a long time just sick at the thought that a pipe I was basically finished with was in pieces on my table. I know how to replace a tenon; that is not a problem. I just did not want to have to do that on this pipe. However, my own stupidity and carelessness had successfully sent me back to work on this pipe. Ahh well… just as well call it a night. Perhaps a good night’s sleep would give me better perspective on this new problem!

I woke up early this morning and dragged my feet about going back to work on the pipe. I think I was hoping at some level that it had not actually happened. I sipped my coffee as long as possible postponing the inevitable. I talked with my eldest daughter who is in Kathmandu for work. I took the dog for a walk around the yard… but finally I made to the basement and the work table. It was not a dream the tenonless stem and the bowl was sitting waiting for me.

I used the Dremel to remove the remnants of the old tenon that were on the face of the stem. I flattened it against the topping board. I went through my assortment of threaded Delrin tenons until I found one that was slightly larger than the broken one. I needed to reduce the diameter slightly to make it work but it would do!I set up my cordless drill and put in a bit slightly larger than the airway and turned the stem onto it by hand. The first photo below shows the bits I used as I repeated the process until the hole was large enough for me to use a tap to thread it to match the tenon. The second photo below shows the last drill bit I used the piece of tape on the bit is to show me how deep I needed to go with the bit to accommodate the new tenon threads.I roughened the tenon surface so I could grip it enough to turn it into the newly drilled stem end. It was a good fit. I painted the end with some epoxy and turned it back in place and set it aside to cure and harden.Once the tenon was set firmly in place I used the Dremel and sanding drum to reduce the diameter to a close fit. I finished the fitting with 180 and 220 grit sandpaper. I polished the new tenon with micromesh sanding pads. Now came the telling moment. Would the stem match up with the shank? Would the fit be tight against the shank end? Even though I have done this many times I always have the same questions. I placed the new tenon in the mortise and carefully pushed the stem against the shank end. It was a very close fit and all I would need to do was sand the left side and top a little bit to make the fit even better. I was relieved and happy. I sanded the stem with 220 grit sandpaper and cleaned up the fit. I was almost back to where I was last night before the pipe dropped and the tenon broke. I have to polish the stem once again but the stem fits well. I took photos of the pipe at this point to check it out. The newly fit stem and the stain on the pipe worked well together. Now to polish it all and get it finished. I polished the bowl and stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads to raise the shine.I buffed the pipe and stem with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave it multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen that shine. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. I am pretty happy with the way it turned out – even with the detour. The stain accomplished what I hope it would in making the grain pop. The grain stands out like it never did in the pipe when I received it. Now it is visible. It is a nice looking pipe that feels good in the hand. Thanks for looking.