Tag Archives: Bowl – refinishing

Restoring a Beautifully Grained Amphora X-tra 725 Bent Billiard

Blog by Steve Laug

For the next pipe, I chose a unique looking pipe that we picked up back in March of 2018 from a friend in St. Leonard, Maryland, USA. It has been here for a while and I am just now getting to it. This one is an Amphora Bent Billiard. It has a really nice mix of flame and straight grain around the bowl and shank. It was stamped on the sides of the shank. On the left side it reads Amphora [over] X-tra [followed by] the shape number 725. On the right side it reads Genuine Briar [over] AMPHORA, Holland. The pipe was dirty with grime ground into the finish. The grain really shined through the grime. There was a thick cake in the bowl and a light lava overflow and darkening on the thin rim top. The inner edge of the rim looked very good. The vulcanite saddle stem was heavily oxidized and had tooth marks and chatter ahead of the button on both sides. There is an A in a circle inset on the left side of the saddle stem that is faded and worn looking. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up. He took photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show the condition of the pipe. The bowl is heavily caked and you can see the light lava and darkening on the rim top around the bowl. The stem is very oxidized and there are some light tooth mark on the top and underside of the button.Jeff took photos of the sides of the bowl to show the grain on the sides. It is really quite a pretty looking piece of briar.He took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It is clear and readable with some faint stamping on the edges.I knew from past work that there was a connection between Amphora and the Royal Dutch Pipe Factory. The Amphora – Holland stamped pointed to that for me. I turned to Pipephil’s site to remind myself of the connection (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-a5.html). I have included a screen capture of the section on the site that give some photos of the stamping. The pipe I am working on is stamped like the first photo below.There was also some information in the side bar that I have included below:

A brand of Elbert Gubbels & Sons – Royal Dutch Pipe Factory who has gone bankrupt on March 2012. See also: Big-Ben, Humbry, IRC, Roermond, Royal Dutch, Thompson and Porsche Design.

Now that I was reminded about the Royal Dutch Pipe Factory connection it was time to work on the pipe on my end.

Jeff had done a great clean up of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer and took the cake back to bare briar. He cleaned up the remnants with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed internals of the shank and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He cleaned the exterior of the pipe with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime and the lava on the rim top. He scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub to remove the debris that had accumulated on it. The pipe looked clean and ready for the next step in the process. Here are some photos of it when I finally got around to working on it 4 years later. I took some close up photos of the bowl, rim top and the stem surface. It looked amazingly good. The stem looks good with a little oxidation at the button end. There were also some light tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button.I took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It was readable though faint on both sides of the shank and stem side.I removed the stem from the shank to show the components of the pipe. It is a great shape and is a beauty.I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. It really began to take on a shine. I rubbed the bowl down with some Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, renew and protect briar. I let it do its work for 15 minutes then buffed it off with a soft cloth. The pipe is really quite a beauty. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I scrubbed off the surface of the stem with Soft Scrub All Purpose Cleanser to remove the residual oxidation on the shank end of the pipe. It looked much better.I used 220 grit sandpaper to sand out the tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button. I started the polishing with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper to further blend in the sanded areas.I polished the stem on both sides using micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded the stem with the 1500-12000 grit pads, then wiped it down with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I finished polishing it with Before & After stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This is another pipe I am excited to finish. It is a Amphora X-tra 725 Bent Billiard with some beautiful grain. I put the pipe back together and buffed it lightly with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. 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 and hand buffed it with microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished stem. It really was a beautiful pipe. The mix of flame and straight grain shining through the rich browns/black stain on this Amphora X-tra Bent Billiard is nice 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 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.48 ounces/42 grams. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will be on the rebornpipes store in the Pipe From Various Makers section soon. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me as I worked over this pipe. 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.

Restoring a Bari Special Handcut Danish 01 Bent Brandy

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Blog by Steve Laug

For the next pipe, I chose a unique looking pipe that we picked up off EBay back in December of 2016 from a seller in Marlboro, New Jersey, USA. It has been here for a while and I am just now getting to it. This one is a Bari Special Handcut Bent Brandy. It has a really mix of flame and straight grain around the bowl and shank. It was stamped on the sides of the shank. On the left side it reads Bari [over] Special [over] Handcut. On the right side it reads Made in Denmark [over] 01 which is probably the shape number. The pipe was dirty with grime ground into the finish. The bowl had a thin coat of varnish on the bowl and shank that was spotty and worn. There was a thick cake in the bowl and lava overflow and darkening on the thin rim top. The inner edge of the rim was covered so thickly in lava it was hard to know what was underneath. The vulcanite stem was lightly oxidized and had tooth marks and chatter ahead of the button on both sides. HANDCUT was faintly stamped on the left side of the taper stem and coloured white. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up. He took photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show the condition of the pipe. The bowl is moderately caked and you can see the lava and darkening on the rim top around the bowl. The stem looks good other than the tooth mark on the underside of the button. Before I started working on it I did a bit of research on the brand to remind myself of the maker. I have worked on quite a few Bari’s in the past so rather than rework all of that I am including the information I found while working on a Bari Special Handcut Made in Denmark Dublin Freehand (https://rebornpipes.com/2020/07/22/cleaning-up-a-danish-made-bari-special-handcut-b-dublin-freehand/). I quote below from that blog.

I quoted a section from Pipedia on Bari pipes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Bari). It is good to be reminded of the fact that Viggo Nielsen was the pipe maker.

Pipedia states that Bari Piber was founded by Viggo Nielsen in Kolding, Denmark around the turn of 1950/51. His sons Kai and Jørgen both grew into their father’s business from a very young age and worked there till 1975. Both have become successful pipe makers.

Bari successfully adapted the new Danish design that had been started mainly by Stanwell for its own models. Bari was sold in 1978 to Van Eicken Tobaccos in Hamburg, Germany though the pipes were still made in Denmark. From 1978 to 1993 Åge Bogelund and Helmer Thomsen headed Bari’s pipe production.

Helmer 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 were what they turned out. The most famous series are the smooth “Classic Diamond” and the blasted “Wiking”.

I did a quick look at Pipephil’s site (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-b1.html) and did a screen capture of the section on Bari pipes.Now that I was reminded about the Viggo Nielsen connection it was time to work on the pipe on my end.

Jeff had done a great clean up of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer and took the cake back to bare briar. He cleaned up the remnants with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed internals of the shank and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He cleaned the exterior of the pipe with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime and the lava on the rim top. He scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub to remove the debris that had accumulated on it. The pipe looked clean and ready for the next step in the process. Here are some photos of it when I finally got around to working on it 5 years later. I took some close up photos of the bowl, rim top and the stem surface. It looked amazingly good. There was still some darkening on the rim edges. The varnish coat on the bowl and shank would also need to be removed. The stem looks good with a little oxidation at the shank end. There were also some tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button.I took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It was readable though faint on both sides of the shank and stem side.I removed the stem from the shank to show the components of the pipe. It is a great shape and is a beauty.I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on a cotton pad to remove the spotty varnish coat. It really looked better without the varnish. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. It really began to take on a shine. I rubbed the bowl down with some Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, renew and protect briar. I let it do its work for 15 minutes then buffed it off with a soft cloth. The pipe is really quite a beauty. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I scrubbed off the surface of the stem with Soft Scrub All Purpose Cleanser to remove the residual oxidation on the shank end of the pipe. It looked much better.I used 220 grit sandpaper to sand out the tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button. I started the polishing with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper to further blend in the sanded areas.I touched up the faint stamping on the left side of the taper stem. It read HANDCUT the H and the UT were deep enough to take the touch up. The rest of the stamping was not as deep and did not hold the Rub’n Buff Antique Gold. I polished the excess off and took photos of the stem at this point.I polished the stem on both sides using micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded the stem with the 1500-12000 grit pads, then wiped it down with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I finished polishing it with Before & After stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This is another pipe I am excited to finish. It is a Bari Special Handcut Danish 01 Bent Brandy. I put the pipe back together and buffed it lightly with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. 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 and hand buffed it with microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished stem with the golden acrylic spacer. It really was a beautiful pipe. The sandblasted grain shining through the rich browns/black stain on this Bari Special Handcut is nice 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: 2 ¼ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 2.12 ounces/60 grams. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will be on the rebornpipes store in the Danish Pipe Makers Section soon. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me as I worked over this pipe. 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.

Restoring a Ben Wade Hand Model London Made Large Pot

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Blog by Steve Laug

After a long week of dealing with insurance issues on flood damage to my basement office and now waiting for a plumber to come and give his report on Monday I decided it was time to take a break and just work on a pipe that interested me. I chose a unique looking pipe that we picked up off EBay back in December of 2016 from a seller in Marlboro, New Jersey, USA. It is a long shank Pot with a craggy and deep sandblast and an unusual shape to the bottom of the bowl. The yellow spacer on the pipe is a part of the stem. The pipe is stamped on the underside and reads Ben Wade in script [over] Hand Model [over] London Made. There are no shape numbers on the pipe. I have worked on quite a few English made Ben Wade pipes but never one that was stamped like this. It would be interesting to learn more about it. The pipe was dirty with a moderate cake in the bowl and some lava overflow in the sandblast on the rim. The edges of the bowl were in good condition. The saddle stem (vulcanite with a yellow acrylic spacer attached) was shiny but had tooth damage to the button on the underside. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up. He took photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show the condition of the pipe. The bowl is moderately caked and you can see the lava in the sandblast of the rim top toward the back of the bowl. The stem looks good other than the tooth mark on the underside of the button. Jeff took photos of the bowl and sides to give a sense of the sandblast and the depth of that finish. It is really a beautifully blasted pipe and well executed. You can also see the slight slope to the bottom of the bowl on the front. He took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank which was clear and readable as noted above. It is the source of the mystery for me – what and when was the Hand Model made.Now it was time to try and figure out the stamping on this pipe. I remembered chatting with Dal Stanton, the Pipe Steward about a pipe he was working on that had this stamping. At least I thought I had. I knew it was a while ago so I did a quick search on the blog for Ben Wade Hand Model London Made pipes and found what I was looking for. Here is the link to the blog Dal wrote and his research on it (https://rebornpipes.com/2019/02/13/rejuvenating-a-ben-wade-hand-model-london-made-billiard/). I am quoting extensively from what he wrote as there is no need to go back through the same sources he did.

I’ve discovered through the reading I’ve done about the name ‘Ben Wade’ that it has an up and down history. The Pipedia article is helpful in simplifying the history in four helpful ‘eras’ which I’ve summarized from the Pipedia:

The Family era (1860 to 1962) – the heydays of the English name when the pipes were stamped Made in Leeds, England.

Charatan / Lane second (1962 to 1988) – When Herman G. Lane purchased the name, the transition from a higher quality pipe during the long Family Era transitioned exclusively to the fabrication of machine-made pipes. Lane moved the production from the Leeds factory (closed in 1965) to Charatan’s Prescott Street factory. Ben Wade became essentially lower quality series pipes produced in standard shapes. The pipes during this period were stamped, “Made in London, England” or dropping the “London” and stamped with “England” alone. After Lane died, in 1978 his heirs sold the Charatan and Ben Wade names to Dunhill, which left the production of Charatan/Ben wade at the Prescott Street factor. In 1988 production came to an end for Ben Wade when the Charatan’s Prescott Street factory closed.

Ben Wade turns Danish (1971-1989) – During this era Preben Holm, from Denmark, was in financial difficulties and Herman Lane and he went into partnership producing the Handmade and fancy pipes. These pipes were marked “Ben Wade Made in Denmark”. These pipes gained great popularity, especially as the were marketed in the US. After Lane’s death, Preben Holm, not the businessman, was in financial difficulties and reduced his workforce and production, but at his death in 1989, production of the Danish Preben Holm pipes came to an end.

Resurrection – (1998 to present) – Duncan Briars bought the Ben Wade name from Dunhill in 1998 and production of Ben Wade pipes restarted at the Walthamstow plant, sharing the same space where Dunhill pipes are produced and reportedly benefiting from the same quality of production. During this present era, the stamping on the pipes is: “Ben Wade, Made in London, England”

The reason I went through this summary of Ben Wade’s morphing history is because in nothing I’ve read about Ben Wade (and I’m sure there’s more out there), I found no reference to a Ben Wade Hand Model with the COM, London Made. The stamping on the pipe before me is ‘Ben Wade’ [over] HAND MODEL [over] LONDON MADE. The saddle stem has the Ben Wade stamped on the upper side of the stem saddle. My first glance at the blasted finish made me wonder whether this Ben Wade came out during the ‘mystery’ Resurrection period in the Pipedia article. Here is the full text that made me wonder:

As said before Preben Holm’s death marked the third end of Ben Wade and for long years there were no Ben Wade pipes in the shops anymore. But then, all of a sudden they were back in the USA some years ago! Who made these pipes? A concrete manufacturer was not known at first.

The rumors spreading were considerable. Especially because these Ben Wades – originally all blasted and in deep black color – featured so perfect straight and / or ring-grain that they were almost suspicious in view of the prices. The supposition that “Mother Nature” had been given a leg up by means of rustication combined with subsequent blasting was evident as different sources confirmed.

Dal also posted the following with some anecdotal information that linked the pipe he was working to Charatan. I quote:

I sent out pictures of some pictures and the nomenclature to various pipe Facebook groups and the responses I did get, though they were anecdotal, pointed to an earlier period. Paul, from Pipe Smoker of America FB Group, said that he believed it was a Pre-78 and made in Charatan factory. He also said that these were some of his best smokers are London BWs. It sounds good to me!

Following Dal’s lead I posted pictures of the stamping and the pipe on Facebook groups I am part of and hope to learn some more. Tom Myron, a good friend replied on the Gentlemen’s Pipe Smoking Society and wrote as follows:

Yeah, Steve, that’s absolutely a Charatan shape in their ‘After Hours’ style – 60s / 70s.

Jeff had done a great clean up of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer and took the cake back to bare briar. He cleaned up the remnants with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed internals of the shank and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He cleaned the exterior of the pipe with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime and the lava on the rim top. He scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub to remove the debris that had accumulated on it. The pipe looked clean and ready for the next step in the process. Here are some photos of it when I finally got around to working on it 5 years later. Look at the craggy sandblast on this pipe! Wow. I took some close up photos of the bowl, rim top and the stem surface. It looked amazingly good. The damage on the underside of the stem button is not as bad as I expected.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above.I removed the stem from the shank to show the spacer and tenon on the pipe as it is quite unique. I also wanted to get a clear picture of the components of the pipe. It is a beauty.The pipe bowl was in such great condition that I did not need to do a lot of work on it. I rubbed the bowl down with some Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips and a horse hair shoe brush. The product works to clean, renew and protect briar. I let it do its work for 15 minutes then buffed it off with a soft cloth. The pipe is really quite a beauty. The depth of the blast is quite stunning. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I built up the tooth mark in the button surface with Medium Thick Black Super Glue. I sprayed it with a shot of accelerator to harden the surface and set the stem aside to cure overnight. In the morning I reshaped the button edge and surface with a small file.I sanded and reshaped the repaired area on the underside of the stem and the tooth chatter on the top side with 220 grit sandpaper. I started polishing it with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper.I polished the stem on both sides using micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded the stem with the 1500-12000 grit pads, then wiped it down with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I finished polishing it with Before & After stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This is another pipe I am excited to finish. It is a Ben Wade Hand Model London Made Long Pot. 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 buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine and hand buffed it with microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished stem with the golden acrylic spacer. It really was a beautiful pipe. The sandblasted grain shining through the rich browns/black stain on this Ben Wade Hand Model is nice 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 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: 1 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 2.08 ounces/59 grams. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will be on the rebornpipes store in the British Pipe Makers Section soon. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me as I worked over this pipe. 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.

Restoring a Brigham Made in Canada (1Dot) 189 Bent Acorn

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Blog by Steve Laug

Not too long ago my wife and I had dinner with some good friends here in Vancouver – first time since COVID-19 so it was good to see them. At the beginning of the meal he handed me a box that he said was for me. In it were some pipes that he was giving to me and a bunch of cigars. The pipes included two Brigham rusticated pipes that I have included photos of below. The two pipes in the photo were clean but well smoked. The bowls had light cake and some lava and darkening on the rim top. The stems were lightly oxidized and had tooth chatter on both sides ahead of the button. I decided I would work on them next. I finished the Sportsman Dublin first and now turned my attention to the second pipe. It is a classic Brigham Shape I call an acorn. It is well carved with a rusticated finish and a smooth rim top. It is stamped on the underside and reads 189 followed by Brigham [over] Made in Canada. There was one dot on the stem side and tooth chatter and oxidation. It was going to be a beauty once cleaned up. I took photos of the pipe when it brought it to the desk top. There was a moderate cake in the bowl in the bowl with lava overflowing into the rim top. There were some dark spots on the top of the rim on the front and the back sides. There was also some damage on the inner edge of the rim that would need to be dealt with. The shank and airways were dirty with tars and oil. The finish was dirty and would need scrubbing. I was hoping to bring it back to the natural finish. There was no Hard Rock Maple filter in the tenon and the pipe smelled of stale tobacco. The stem was lightly oxidized and there was some light tooth chatter to the top or underside of the stem. The button had no damage. Overall the pipe looked good even though it was a dirty one. I took photos of the rim top and the bowl to show the condition. The rim top was smooth with some nicks and dents in the surface. It also had some darkening around the top and damage to the inner edges. I also took photos of both sides of the stem to show the tooth marks and chatter. Over all the pipe was in okay condition.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is clear and t it reads as noted above.I took a photo of the pipe with the stem removed to give an overall picture of the pipe. It really is quite beautiful.For historical background for those unfamiliar with the brand I am including the information from Pipedia on Brigham pipes. It is a great read in terms of the history and background on the pipes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Brigham_Pipes). Charles Lemon (Dadspipes) is currently working on a book on the history of the brand. Until that is complete this article is a good summary. I have included it below.

Roy Brigham, after serving an apprenticeship under an Austrian pipesmith, started his own pipe repair shop in Toronto, in 1906. By 1918 the business had grown to include five other craftsmen and had developed a reputation across Canada for the high quality of workmanship. After repairing many different brands of pipes over the years, Roy noted certain recurring complaints by pipe smokers, the most common referred to as “tongue bite”. Tongue bite is a burning sensation on the smoker’s tongue, previously thought to be due to the heat of the smoke (i.e. a “hot smoking pipe”).

He soon began manufacturing his own pipes, which were lightweight, yet featured a more rugged construction, strengthening the weak points observed in other pipes. The problem of tongue bite intrigued him, and he decided to make overcoming it a future goal.

About 1938, Roy’s son Herb joined him to assist in the business. The business barely survived the great depression because pipes were considered to be a luxury, not a necessity, and selling pipes was difficult indeed. In approximately 1937 [1], after some experimentation, Roy and Herb discovered that tongue bite was in fact a form of mild chemical burn to the tongue, caused by tars and acids in the smoke. They found that by filtering the smoke, it was possible to retain the flavour of the tobacco and yet remove these impurities and thereby stop the tongue bite.

Just as Thomas Edison had searched far and wide for the perfect material from which to make the first electric light bulb filaments, Roy & Herb began experimenting with many materials, both common and exotic, in the quest for the perfect pipe filter. Results varied wildly. Most of the materials didn’t work at all and some actually imparted their own flavour into the smoke. They eventually found just two materials that were satisfactory in pipes: bamboo and rock maple. As bamboo was obviously not as readily available, rock maple then became the logical choice.

They were able to manufacture a replaceable hollow wooden tube made from rock maple dowelling, which when inserted into a specially made pipe, caused absolutely no restriction to the draw of the pipe, yet extracted many of the impurities which had caused tongue bite. The result was indeed a truly better smoking pipe…

Interestingly the pipe I have in hand is a 1 Dot grade but very well done. It is stamped with the shape number 189 followed by Brigham [over] Made in Canada.

Charles Lemon has also written a great article on the stampings and marking on the Brigham pipes that fit into a time line that he has drafted. It is well worth a read and is fascinating. (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Brigham_Pipes_%E2%80%93_A_Closer_Look_at_Dots,_Dates_and_Markings). I quote from the pertinent section on the time frame for this pipe.

Around the late 1960s or early 1970s, at the beginning of what I’ve called the Canadian Era (roughly 1970 – 1980), the stampings changed again as Brigham moved to modernize its logo. Pipes are stamped with the 3-digit shape number and “Brigham” over “Made in Canada”. Note these two variants of this stamping.

This solidly places the pipe I am working on in the period of Brigham production that Charles calls the Canadian Era (1969/70-1980). It is a great looking pipe with the classic rusticated style of finish.

The Original Brigham Dot System 1938 – 1980

Brigham pipes are renown in the pipe world for their famous “Brigham Dots”, a system of brass pins inset in the stem to denote the grade of each pipe. The original 8-grade pinning system, used for 42 years between 1938 and 1978 (spanning the Patent, Post-Patent and Canadian Eras) looked like this:I knew that I was dealing with a pipe made between 1969-1980 from Canadian Era. It sports 1 dot making it Brigham Standard pipe. There is a 189 shape number on the pipe. Now to do a bit of spiffing with the pipe itself.

I reamed the pipe with a PipNet pipe reamer to remove the light cake from the bowl walls. It was uneven and needed to be removed so I took it back to bare briar. I cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife and then sanded the bowl with a dowel wrapped with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the walls. I worked on the damage to the rim top and the inner edge of the rim with 220 grit sandpaper. It looked much better.I scrubbed the exterior of the pipe with a tooth brush with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap. I scrubbed it to remove the build up on the rim top. I rinsed it with warm water and dried it off with a soft cloth. I cleaned out the internals with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners to remove the debris and the oils from the shank and tenon as well as the airway into the stem and bowl.I polished the darkening on the rim top with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads to remove as much of the darkening as I could. Once it was complete I stained the rim top with an Oak stain pen to match the smooth portions of the finish on the shank end and underside. I rubbed the bowl down with some Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips and a horse hair shoe brush. The product works to clean, renew and protect briar. I let it do its work for 15 minutes then buffed it off with a soft cloth. The pipe is really quite a beauty. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I scrubbed it with Soft Scrub All Purpose cleaner to remove the oxidation as much as possible. It needed to be clean before I could address the tooth marks.Once it was clean I “painted” the tooth marks and chatter with the flame of a lighter. I was able to raise all of the damage on the underside of the stem and the majority on the topside. I lightly sanded the topside with 220 grit sandpaper to prepare for the repair. I filled in the tooth marks that remained with black superglue and set the stem aside to cure. Once it cured I flattened out the repaired area with a small file to start the process of blending it into the surrounding briar. I sanded the surface with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the remaining oxidation and also finish blending in the repair. I started polishing it with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. It is beginning to look quite good. I polished the surface of the stem on both sides using micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded the stem with the 1500-12000 grit pads, then wiped it down with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I finished polishing it with Before & After stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. I fit the clean and polished stem with the Brigham Rock Maple Distillator and took photos to show what it looked like. This is in essence a hollow Maple wood tube that serves to filter out the moisture and deliver a clean and flavourful smoke. I am excited to finish this 1969-1980 Brigham Made in Canada Acorn 189 – 1 Dot from the Canadian Era. I put the pipe back together and buffed it 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 buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine and hand buffed it with microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the rusticated finish. Added to that the polished black vulcanite stem with the shining brass pins was beautiful. This mixed grain on the rusticated Brigham Standard 1 Dot 189 Acorn is nice 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: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.45 ounces/41 grams. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will be on the rebornpipes store in the Canadian Pipe Makers Section soon. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me as I worked over this pipe. 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 Crown Duke, Dr. Grabow Bent Billiard for a Memory Box of Dad

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Blog by Steve Laug

I received an email a while ago from a lady who wanted to have one of her Dad’s pipe cleaned and restored. As we emailed back and forth it was clear that it was one of those pieces that was filled with memories. I pressed to see if she was sure that she wanted it cleaned as it would remove the remnants of debris and tobacco from her Dad’s use of the pipe. She was clear that she wanted it cleaned up to look as good as possible because she was going to make a shadow box to hold the pipe and a photo and other memorabilia of her late Dad. When it finally arrived here in Vancouver I could see why she wanted it clean. The pipe was very dirty and there was a crack in the shank. The pipe had not been smoked for a long time and there was no tobacco smell in it at all. There was a hard thin cake in the bowl and lava on the rim top. The stem was oxidized and had calcification on the button end. It was a filter pipe that had been smoked without a filter so the insides were dirty. The pipe was stamped on the left side and read Crown Duke [over] Dr. Grabow. On the right side it read Imported Briar. There was a blue Grabow Spade on the left side of the taper stem. It was dirty and worn looking with some obvious fills around the bowl. I took some photos of the pipe before I started to work on it. I took a photo of the rim top and bowl to give a clear picture of what I was dealing with. I also captured the crack in the top of the shank in the photo (I have outlined it in a red box). Other than being incredibly dirty the stem was in decent condition with light tooth chatter and light marks near the button edge.The stamping on the shank sides was faint but readable and reads as noted above.I took a better photo of the crack in the top of the shank and have included it below. It was quite wide open but came to an end in the squiggle at the end toward the bowl. I would need to glue and band it to make it solid again.I took a photo of the pipe with the stem removed to get a sense of the look of the Bent Billiard.I picked a band out of my box of bands. It is far too deep so I will need to take it down for a proper fit on the shank. I started the process by using a topping board. I then used my Dremel and sanding drum to remove the full amount I wanted gone. I finished the shaping of the band on the topping board.Once I had the fit correct, I removed it from the shank and cleaned up the area around the crack with alcohol and cotton swabs. I filled in the crack with clear super glue and clamped the crack shut. Once the glue cured I heated the band and pressed it onto the shank. I took some photos of the repaired shank and band. Now it was time to clean the bowl. I have often done the process in reverse but I really wanted to stabilize the crack before I worked on cleaning the exterior and interior of the bowl and shank. I did not want to chance making the crack worse. I reamed the cake out of the bowl with a Pipnet pipe reamer and took the cake back to bare briar. I cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall pipe knife and sanded the bowl walls smooth with a piece of dowel wrapped with 220 grit sandpaper. I wanted the bowl to be smooth for the display. I scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. I was able to remove the debris and grime around the bowl and clear off the lava on the rim top. I dried the bowl off with a cloth and took these photos. You can see the dark fills and spots around the bowl sides. The largest was a rough fill on the front of the bowl that was pink putty. I repaired the pink, rough fill on the front of the bowl with clear super glue. Once the repair cured I sanded it smooth with 220 grit sandpaper. It was now smooth to the touch. It would be interesting to try to blend it into the surrounding briar once I was staining it. I sanded the entire bowl with 1500 grit micromesh at the same time.I cleaned out the airway in the shank and the stem with cotton swabs, pipe cleaners and isopropyl alcohol. It took quite a few to get the tars and oils out of the airways.I buffed the pipe on the buffer with Blue Diamond and then stained it with a light brown stain. I applied the stain and then flamed it to set it. I used a black and brown Sharpie pen to stain the pinkish fill on the front of the bowl.I set the bowl aside for the stain to cure and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded out the tooth chatter and marks on the stem with 220 grit sandpaper and started the polishing with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. It is actually beginning to look much better. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with an Obsidian Oil impregnated cloth to give the pads a little more bite. I polished it with Before & After Stem Polish both Fine and Extra Fine and gave it a final rub down with Obsidian Oil. I set the stem aside to dry and worked on the bowl again. By this time the stain was dry and I was able to tackle the bowl again. I wiped it down with alcohol on paper towels to make the stain more transparent. Because of the fills in the bowl I decided to leave it dark as it did a good job masking them. I buffed the bowl on the wheel with Blue Diamond to further aid the transparency. It is hard to see in the photos but in person the grain is there and not terribly hidden. The fills are hidden and other than the large one on the front of the bowl they look good. I put the stem on the bowl and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I was careful when buffing around the stamping and the logo on the stem. I had decided to leave some of the nicks and marks in the briar as they were a part of the story of the pipe and its owner. I wanted it to still bear his definitive marks so that when it was in the shadow box those who knew him would remember the story of the pipe. I did not want the pipe to look brand new as that would remove the story from it. The nickel band worked well to bind together the crack in the shank. The aluminum spacer on the stem sits up against it and looks quite nice as a joint with the band. It almost gives the band the look of a ferrule. The pipe came out quite well. The darker stain is very similar to what was originally on the pipe when it was new. It also did a good job of masking the fills around the bowl. I will soon be packing it up and sending it back to the pipeman’s daughter so she can build her tribute to her Dad. Thanks for reading the blog.

Cleaning up a Lightly Smoked Italian Made C.B. Perkins Normandy 256 Dublin

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe I chose to work on is another C.B. Perkins pipe, different from the English Skater I just finished not only in the fact that it was lightly smoked and had an acrylic stem but also in that it was Italian Made. This one was an interesting shape that I call a Dublin with a taper variegated rose coloured acrylic stem. It came in the original box that is in great condition. It had a light cake and some tobacco remnants in the bowl and rim top that showed that some darkening on the inner edge. The finish very good and the pipe had some nice grain around the bowl and shank. There were no visible flaws or fills on the bowl sides or shank. It was stamped on the left side of the shank and read C.B. Perkins. [over] Normandy. Underneath that toward the stem is stamped the shape number 256. On the shank/stem union it is stamped Italy. It has an acrylic taper stem with no logo or marking. The stem has light scratching and tooth chatter on both sides. I took photos of the pipe when I brought it to the work table. I took photos of the bowl and rim top and the stem surfaces to show the condition of both. The bowl has a thin cake and the rim top and edges have some darkening and lava. The stem is also in great condition other than light tooth chatter on the surface ahead of the button. I took photos of the stamping on the left side of the shank. It took two photos to capture the stamping. It is clear and readable as noted above. On the underside of the shank it is stamped Italy.I took the stem off the shank to show the overall look of this interesting pipe. I just finished a Perkins earlier so I have included the information on the brand that I found for that blog. I checked first on Pipephil site (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-c1.html#c_bperkins) and found photos of various pipes. None of the photos include the Normandy or the Made in Italy stamp. I am including a screen capture of the pertinent information. There was no other information in the sidebars.Then I turned to Pipedia and was more successful with background information on the company (https://pipedia.org/wiki/C.B._Perkins). I quote a portion of that article below that gives a bit of history and more importantly cleared up where the pipes came from for me.

The first C.B. Perkins store opened in Boston in the early 1900’s. Perkins quickly became the leading retail tobacconist in New England, a position it held for over 75 years. In 1986 Perkins management sold their Pennsylvania and New Jersey stores to DES Tobacco Corporation.

DES is a wholly owned subsidiary of the S. Frieder and Sons Company. S. Frieder and Sons had been a cigar manufacturer since 1920. In 1978 S. Frieder sold its manufacturing business to United States Tobacco so it could focus all its assets and energy on the retail tobacco business under the name of DES Tobacco. Thus, the merger of C.B. Perkins and DES represented four generations of tobacco experience.

I started my work on this pipe by reaming the bowl. I reamed it with a PipNet Pipe Reamer and took the thin cake back to bare briar. I cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I sanded the walls of the bowl smooth with a piece of dowel and 220 grit sandpaper. I scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with a tooth brush and undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap. I rinsed it under warm running water to remove the grime and the soap. It is beginning to look good! I scrubbed out the internals of the shank and the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and isopropyl alcohol. It did not take much to remove the tars and oils. I believe that there was also some stain on the inside of the shank that came out in the process. Both are clean now. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads and wiping the bowl down after each pad with a damp cloth. It really is a nice looking piece of briar. I rubbed some Before & After Restoration Balm into the finish of the pipe. I worked it into the briar because the product cleans, enlivens and protects the briar. I let the pipe sit with the Balm for 10 minutes then buffed it off with a soft towel. The Balm did its magic and the pipe looked really good. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I turned my attention to the stem. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. Even though I know that Obsidian Oil is not necessary for acrylic I use it anyway as it gives some bite to the micromesh pads and also removes the dust. I wiped the stem down after each pad with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine then gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This lightly smoked C.B. Perkins Normandy 256 Dublin with a Rose coloured acrylic taper stem looks really good. The grain around the bowl and shank stands out with the contrasting brown stains. I put the pipe back together and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the wheel (being careful of the stamping on the stem so as not to damage that). I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and 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 dimensions of this pipe are – Length: 5 ¾ inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.45 ounces/41 grams. It is a great looking pipe and one that will be going on the rebornpipes store in the American Pipe Makers section. If you want to add it to your collection let me know via email to slaug@uniserve.com or by message. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me.

Cleaning up an UNSMOKED/NOS Ehrlich Select Panel Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe I chose to work on is another UNSMOKED/NEW OLD STOCK pipe. This one was Panel Billiard with a square shank and saddle stem. It had a perfectly clean and debris free bowl and rim top that showed that it had never been smoked. The finish was shop worn an dirty but had some nice grain around the bowl and shank. There was a peeling varnish coat on the outside of the bowl and shank. There were some small flaws and fills around the bowl. It was stamped on the left side of the shank and read Ehrlich Select [over] Imported Briar. The inside of the bowl appears to have some stain that has permeated the briar but it is clean. It has a vulcanite square saddle stem that is lightly oxidized. The stem bears Ehrlich “E” logo on the left side of the saddle. I took photos of the pipe when I brought it to the work table. I took photos of the bowl and rim top and the stem surfaces to show the condition of both. The bowl, rim top and edges look very good. The stem is also in great condition other than the light oxidation and speckles of grime stuck to the surface of the stem – on the saddle and on the blade.I took photos of the stamping on the left side of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above. The Ehrlich logo of circle E is on the left side of the saddle portion of the stem is also in good condition. The stamp is filled in and very dirty.I took the stem off the shank to show the look of the white spacer on the stem and overall look of this interesting panel pipe.I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I was able to remove the varnish coat on the bowl and shank with the pads. I wiped the briar down with a damp cloth between each sanding pad. The briar took on a rich shine and there was some nice grain around the bowl and shank sides. I rubbed some Before & After Restoration Balm into the finish of the pipe. I worked it into the briar because the product cleans, enlivens and protects the briar. I let the pipe sit with the Balm for 10 minutes then buffed it off with a soft towel. The Balm did its magic and the pipe looked really good. I set the bowl aside and did a bit of reading on the history. I have worked on quite a few Ehrlich pipes in the past and wanted to refresh my memory of the back story of the brand. I checked first on Pipephil (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-e1.html) and found photos of various pipes. The picture of the first pipe is stamped similarly to the one I am working on. The EHRLICH is stamped the same way. There are no photos of the SELECT. I am including a screen capture of the pertinent information. There was no other information in the sidebars.Then I turned to Pipedia and was more successful (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Ehrlich%27s). I quote a portion of that article below that gives a bit of history and more importantly cleared up where the pipes came from for me.

The David P. Ehrlich story – Pipemakers and Tobacconists for a Hundred Years, 1868-1968.

The David P. Ehrlich Company has remained solely in the hands of one family during its century of business, yet it has had several firm names and locations. David P. Ehrlich went to work in 1881 at the age of twenty for Ferdinand Abraham, who dealt in cigars and tobacco and who had begun business in 1868 at 1188 Washington Street in the South End, but in 1880 moved to the center of the city, where the firm has been ever since. David Ehrlich married the boss’s daughter. In 1916 the name became the David P. Ehrlich Company and Mr. Ehrlich devoted the rest of his life to this business. Since David’s death in 1912 it has been owned by – his nieces and nephews including Richard A. and William Ehrlich.

Ehrlich shop has since 1880 had a predilection for historic sites. 25 Court Street was close to the spot where from 1721-1726 James Franklin had, with the assistance of his brother Benjamin, published The New-England Courant. In 1908 the firm moved a few doors up Court Street to number 37, on the opposite corner of the alley that is grandiloquently named Franklin Avenue. This new location was on the site of the one-time printing office of Edes and Gill, publishers of the Boston Gazette, in whose back room some of the “Indians” of the Boston Tea Party assumed their disguises. Soon after the end of World War II at which time the store was located at 33 Court Street a move around the corner to 207 Washington Street brought the shop diagonally across from the Old State House and onto the site occupied from 1610-1808 by the First Church of Boston. The demolition of 207 Washington Street in 1967 caused still another move to 32 Tremont Street, adjoining King’s Chapel burying Ground, which is the oldest cemetery in Boston.

The David P. Ehrlich Co. has not just occupied sites intimately associated with Boston history and institutions; it has in the past century become a Boston institution in its own right. It has specialized in fine cigars, pipes, and pipe tobacco. In addition to the retail business, the firm has long specialized in the manufacture of pipes, both from Algerian briar root…

That gave the history of the brand and was written in a way that fascinated me. I included a lot of because of that. I knew that the pipe I was working on was stamped Imported Briar which generally points to a pipe made elsewhere for Ehrlich and brought to the US.

I turned my attention to the stem. It was lightly oxidized from sitting around in the store who had stocked it. I scrubbed it with cotton pads and Soft Scrub all purpose cleanser. I worked on it until the stem surface was clean and ready polish.I touched up the Circle E stamp on the side of the stem with Rub’n Buff Antique gold. The stamp was not deep so while it worked there are spots on the circle where it is light.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine then gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This UNSMOKED/NEW OLD STOCK Ehrlich Select Imported Briar Panel Billiard with a Saddle Vulcanite stem looks really good. The grain around the bowl and shank stands out with the contrasting brown stains. I put the pipe back together and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the wheel (being careful of the stamping on the stem so as not to damage that). I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and 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 dimensions of this pipe are – Length: 5 inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.20 ounces/34 grams. It is a great looking pipe and one that will be going on the rebornpipes store in the American Pipe Makers section. If you want to add it to your collection let me know via email to slaug@uniserve.com or by message. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me.

Restoring a Pre-Cadogan Orlik 90S Rhodesian with a Saddle Stem

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe on my work table is a shape I would call a Bulldog but Orlik called a Rhodesian. It is stamped on the left side of the shank and reads ORLIK [over] Straight Grain. On the right side it is stamped MADE IN ENGLAND [over] the shape number 90S near the shank/bowl junction. The bent saddle vulcanite stem is inlaid with a brass “O” on the top left side of the stem. The briar has great looking straight grain around the bowl and shank. This pipe was purchased in October of 2018 from an antique store in Brookings, Oregon, USA. The finish was dirty and but the briar was good looking. The rim top was caked with lava more heavily on the top back and inner edge of the bowl. There was a thick cake in the bowl and some tobacco debris. The shank and stem airway was very dirty. The stem was very oxidized, calcified and had some tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up. He took photos of the rim top and bowl to show the cake in the bowl, and the lava on the top and inner edge. The stem photos show the oxidation, calcification and tooth chatter and marks very well. Jeff took a photo of the heel and side of the bowl to highlight the condition and the grain around the bowl sides and base.He captured the stamping on the sides of the shank in the next photos. They are clean and readable as noted above. The stem also had a faint crown stamped on the left side. I turned to Pipephil (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-o2.html) to get a quick view of the Orlik Brand and see if there was a Straight Grain line. There was not a specific listing for the Straight Grain but I did a screen capture of the site’s information and have included that below.I turned to Pipedia (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Orlik) for a quick read. The site is worth reading the history of the Orlik brand and some information on dating the brand. I quote below.

Dating guide – In the Pre-Cadogan era of the Orlik, the name is ORLIK in a straight line, capital block letters. Also the MADE IN ENGLAND is in a straight line, capital block letters. However, there are a known model (ORLIK NATURAL T 1155) stamped with MADE IN ENGLAND in a straight line, capital serif letters. Date is unknown. The mouth piece have the Orlik logo, a circular O as a brass inlay.

After joining Cadogan the same origin stamp as other Cadogan brands like Comoy´s etc. was used, MADE IN LONDON in circular an below ENGLAND in straight.

In the margins on the Pipedia site there was a link to a catalogue scanned as a PDF. I have included the link here (https://pipedia.org/images/0/00/Orlik_Pipe_Shapes.pdf). I did a screen capture of the cover of catalogue and the page that had the 90S shape number. Orlik called it a Bent Rhodesian with the S signifying a saddle stem (I have drawn a red box around the shape). Jeff cleaned up the pipes with his usual thoroughness – reaming the bowl with a PipNet pipe reamer and cleaning up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed the internals of the shank and the stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He scrubbed the exterior with Murphy’s Oil Soap to clean off the dust and grime on the finish. When he sent it the pipe was ready to restore. I could not believe how good the rim top looked in comparison to what it was when he started. I took photos of the pipe when I unpacked it. The briar was clean and the grain quite stunning. The finish looked dull and lifeless. I took a close up photo of the bowl and rim top after Jeff had cleaned it up. The look of the rim top and edges is very good. There were some spots where the stain was worn away. He had been able to remove the cake and the lava very well. The bowl was spotless. The stem is also shown and was very clean. He had scrubbed it with Soft Scrub and then soaked it in Mark’s Before & After Deoxidizer. There was tooth chatter and deep marks still remaining.I took a photo of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above.I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the pipe to show the look of the pipe. It is a real beauty.The bowl was very clean and the briar looked good. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product cleans, enlivens and preserves the briar. I let it do its magic. It sat for 10 minutes and then I buffed it off with a cotton cloth. The bowl really is looking good at this point. I “painted” the tooth marks with the flame of a Bic Lighter. I was able to raise all of them except for one on the topside. I filled it in with a spot of black superglue. Once it cured I flattened the repairs with a small file to blend them into the surface. I sanded the stem with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I started polishing it with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I scrubbed the stem down with Soft Scrub to remove the deep oxidation on the stem surface. I was able to remove much of what was present.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine then gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. There is something about the amazing straight grain on this beautiful pipe. This Orlik Straight Grain 90S Bent Rhodesian looks great. The straight grain really stands out on the bent pipe. I put the stem on the shank and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the wheel (being careful of the stamping so as not to damage that). I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and 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 dimensions of this pipe are – Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.48 ounces/ 42 grams. It is a great looking pipe and one that will be going on the rebornpipes store in the British Pipe Makers section. If you want to add it to your collection let me know via email to slaug@uniserve.com or by message. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me.

A Lightly Smoked Pioneer Black Block Meerschaum Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table to refresh and refurbish is an interesting looking billiard that turns out to be rusticated black meerschaum. It has an acrylic shank extension that has the Pioneer “P” stamp on the left side and BLOCK MEERSCHAUM on the right side. We purchased it on December 7, 2021 from a fellow in Longview, Washington, USA. It is quite clean with some wear around the shank at the extension and on the rim top. The bowl and shank smell clean and there is no residual tobacco smell in the bowl or shank. The bowl is clean other her than dust in the rustication around the bowl and rim top. It is lightly smoked and the inside of the bowl is very clean. The fancy turned vulcanite stem is oxidized but there is no tooth chatter or marks which support the lightly smoked declaration. I took photos of the pipe before I started my refurbishing work. I took some photos of the rim top and bowl. You can see the scuffs on top of the rim at the front of the bowl and edges. There are also small scuffs at the joint the shank and the extension. The stem photos show the oxidation in the vulcanite and is coarse to the touch. It will need to be polished and buffed. I took photos of the stamping on the shank extension. The left side has a clear “P” stamp that is the log for Pioneer Pipes. The right side is stamped Block Meerschaum.I took the stem off the shank and took a photo of the pipe. It really is a nice looking pipe.To me the pipe looked a lot like many of the black or dark meerschaum pipes that I have worked on from the Isle of Man made by Manxman or Laxley Pipe Company. Yet the stamping was clearly a Pioneer Pipes Co. pipe with the stylized “P” logo on the shank extension. I wanted to see if there was a connection between the two companies so I turned to my normal two sources to see what I could learn. I went first to Pipephil (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-p3.html). I have included a screen capture of the information there as well as further info from the sidebar.Probably a brand of Pioneer Pipes Co., a Meerschaum and Meerschaum lined pipes manufacturer and distributor. Address (about 1960): 1817 Putnam Avenue, Brooklyn 27, N.Y. Pioneer also used to import meerschaum pipes from the MANXMAN PIPES Ltd factory (Isle of Man, UK) as shown by the markings of this pipe. (See “Man“). Wilczak & Colwell, op. cit. mention pipes with this label from Duncan Briars Ltd, Oppenheimer Pipes or Delacour Brothers.

There was the link I was looking for – Pioneer Pipes Co. used to import Manxman Pipes from the Isle of Man. My eye had not failed me and I am sure this is one of those imported pipes.

I turned then to Pipedia (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer) to see what else I could find out about the brand. Unfortunately the site did not have very much information. I quote below what was on the site.

Pioneer Pipe Company was owned by Wally Frank, who trademarked the name Pioneer in 1940. At the time of the application the name was alleged to have been used in commerce in 1925. The company listed its location at 1817 Putnam Avenue, Brooklyn, New York. Pioneer sold Turkish and later African meerschaum through the Wally Frank, Ltd. Catalogs and elsewhere.

There were also and example of one of their meerschaum pipe and a page of a pamphlet shown on the site. Both of these come to Pipedia by the courtesy Doug Valitchka. Now I knew what I was working on with this pipe. It was an imported Manxman pipe probably distributed by Wally Frank through their catalogue sales. It was likely African block meerschaum from Tanganyika or nearby that had been fashioned my the Isle of Man company for Pioneer. Now it was time to work on the pipe.

I started my work on the pipe by touching up the areas on the rim top and shank end where the stain was worn and damaged. I used a Black Sharpie Pen to restain them and blend them into the surrounding surface of the rustication. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the rusticated meerschaum with my fingertips and a horsehair shoe brush to clean, enliven and protect it. I find that the balm really makes the bowl come alive again. The contrasts in the rusticated surface give the pipe a sense of depth. I let the balm sit for 10 minutes and then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. The bowl really looks good at this point. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. To deal with the oxidation on the stem I put it in Briarville’s Deoxidizer overnight and let the deoxidizer do its work. When I took it out in the morning and rubbed it down with a coarse towel you can see the difference in the surface of the vulcanite. While it looks significantly better there is still some remaining oxidation. I decided to run pipe cleaners and isopropyl alcohol through the airway in the stem and also the mortise and shank. It removed the residual deoxidizer as well as the dust and debris of years of sitting in storage.With the internals clean of debris and deoxidizer I turned back to the externals of the stem. I scrubbed it down with cotton pads and Soft Scrub Cleanser and was able to remove the remaining oxidation. It looked better once I finished with the cleanser. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding it with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I polished it further with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both fine and extra fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. With a refurbishing the final moment when all the pieces come back together is the tell all! I put the pipe back together and buffed the meerschaum bowl with a shoe brush and the stem with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the meerschaum several coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the those parts with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the black fancy vulcanite stem. This Rusticated Pioneer Black Meerschaum is light weight and it is ready for you to load up a tobacco of preference and enjoy breaking it in for yourself. Have a look at it in the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 6 inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 34 grams/1.20 ounces. This is one that will go on the Ceramic and Meerschaum Pipes section of the rebornpipes online store shortly. 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 the next generation.

A Mystery Poker/Cherrywood with the initials BW stamped on the left side of the shank

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Blog by Steve Laug

This interesting pipe with a very simple and blurry BW stamp on the left side of the shank came to us from an online auction on in February, 2021 in Upland, California, USA. It is a mystery in that there is no record of who “BW” was or where he lived and carved. The pipe has some amazing grain around the bowl and shank. There was some darkening on the inner edge of the bowl and a stain mark on the left side near the top. The bowl had a moderate cake in the bowl with a light lava overflow on the back side of the edge and rim. The stem was oxidized and had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started the clean up work on it.He took photos of the rim top and bowl to show the condition of the bowl and rim. The rim top looked amazingly good under the grime with some amazing birds eye. You can also see the cake in the bowl. And the lava on back edge of the rim. He took photos of the stem surface to show the oxidation and the tooth chatter and marks on both sides ahead of the button. He took photos of the sides and heel of the bowl. The grain is really quite stunning and really stands out. Once it is cleaned up and polished it should really sing. He took a close up of the oil stain on the left side of the bowl near the rim top. Jeff was able to capture the stamping on the shank side. It appears to read BW but we cannot be certain. Perhaps someone reading this recognizes the stamp and can let us know.This pipe was better condition than many of the pipes we work on. I was curious to see what it would look like when I unpacked it. I was surprised at how good the bowl looked. Jeff reamed it with a PipNet pipe reamer and cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed out the internals of the shank and stem with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs until the pipe was clean. He scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime and grit on the briar and the light lava on the rim top. The staini mark on the side of the bowl looked better. The finish on the bowl looked really good when I got it. The rim top looked very good. The edges looked good as well. He scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub and the let it soak in Before & After Pipe Stem Deoxidizer. He rinsed it off and cleaned out the internals. The surface of the stem was clean and the tooth marks were light and less visible. I took photos of the pipe before I started my work on it. I took photos of the condition of the rim top and stem before I started working. The rim top looks very good and the bowl is spotless. The stem is clean and the light tooth chatter is very visible in the photos. I took a photo of the stamping on the left side of the shank. It looks like BW but is slightly overstamped. I took the bowl and stem apart and took a photo of the pipe to show the look of the pipe. The polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the briar down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad.I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the finish of the bowl, rim top and shank with my fingertips to clean, enliven and protect it. I find that the balm really makes the briar come alive again. The contrasts in the layers of stain and the separate finishes really made the grain stand out. I let the balm sit for 10 minutes and then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. The bowl really looks good at this point. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding it with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. I polished it further with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both fine and extra fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry. This well made mystery pipe that is lightly smoked. It is a Poker or Cherrywood Sitter with a slope on the front can be yours today. It is a well made pipe with a tall bowl and a great finish. The rim top is smooth and the inner edge is lightly beveled. The finish is a quite attractive around the bowl. The grain is straight around the sides of the bowl and shank and birdseye on the rim top and base. The left side of the shank is stamped BW or FW and no other stamping. The pipe looks great, feels great in the hand and should smoke very well. The contrast between the polished black vulcanite stem and the brown finished bowl works well together. This pipe is ready for you to load with a favourite tobacco and make it yours. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 inches, Height: 1 3/4 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 1/2 inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 46 grams/1.62 ounces. This well made, moderately priced pipe might be one to add to your collection.