Tag Archives: bowl topping

Restemming and restoring a WDC Wellington Jumbo

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by Steve Laug

In the box that Jeff recently sent to me there was a large Wellington bowl without the stem. We purchased it from an antique shop in Vancouver, Washington, USA on 04/03/2024. We had cannibalized the stem and sent it to a fellow who needed a Wellington stem. The stamping on the left side of the shank read WDC in a triangle (logo). Under that it is stamped Wellington is script. The nickel ferrule is heavily dented and is stamped WDC in a triangle over three faux hallmarks. Though it is dented it still looks good. The bowl had a thick cake on the walls and an overflow of lava onto the rim top and edges. The smooth finish was very dirty with debris and oils. There were some fills in the bowl sides and some nicks as well from looked like the bowl had been dropped. The nickel ferrule was dented in spots and a little rough but still in solid condition. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started cleaning it up. Have a look. Jeff took close up photos of the bowl and rim top to show the condition of the bowl and the rim top. You can also see the lava on the rim top, inner edge and the cake in the bowl. He also took photos of the nickel ferrule to show the condition of the metal. You can see the nicks and dents in the metal sides and shank end.He took a photo of the stamping on the left side of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above. The second photo shows the nicks and scratches in the finish on the bowl heel.I turned to Pipedia’s article on WDC (William Demuth) pipes. It is a great read in terms of the history of the brand (https://pipedia.org/wiki/William_Demuth_Company). I have included one of the advertising flyers on the Wellington Jumbo below. Look at the price of this pipe when was sold.Armed with the information above, I turned my attention to the pipe itself. Jeff had cleaned the pipe with his usual penchant for thoroughness that I really appreciate. He reamed it with a PipNet pipe reamer and cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed out the internals with alcohol, pipe cleaners, shank brushes 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 lava on the rim top. The finish looks very good with good looking grain around the bowl and shank. I went through my stems and found a relatively new Wellington stem that was in excellent condition. I have a few here that I have set aside for use on the bowls that come across our path. I fit it in the shank and took photos of the bowl with its new stem. Have a look below. I took close up photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show how clean the pipe was. The bowl was clean and the rim top and the inner edge looked good. The stem was clean on the outside but I would need to clean the internals. There was light tooth chatter on both sides and some spots of oxidation.I took a photo of the stamping on the left side of the shank. It is readable and read as noted above. I also removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the shank end to show some of the damage on the nickel ferrule. I heated the ferrule with a lighter and was able to remove it from the shank. I used a small furniture tack hammer and probe to tap out the larger dents in the metal. I fit it back on the shank end and tapped the shank end to carefully smooth out the damaged areas. I sanded the inner edge of the ferrule with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the sharp edges. While not perfect, it certainly was an improvement.I turned my attention to the briar. I sanded the bowl with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to try and minimize the scratches in the wood. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad and by the end the briar was smoother and had begun to take on a shine. There were some fills in the briar but there was also some nice grain that stood out. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down after each pad with the cloth. The bowl continued to develop a deeper shine. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the briar with my finger tips. I let it sit on the bowl for 10 minutes and then buffed it off with a paper towel and soft cloth. The product is a great addition to the restoration work. It enlivens, enriches and protects the briar while giving it a deep glow. It is a product I use on every pipe I restore. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded the light chatter on the stem surface and the scratches on the shank end of the vulcanite with 220 grit sandpaper. It looked better. Polishing would finish the work. I paused the polishing for a bit to clean out the airway in the stem. I immediately felt something in the airway that was blocking and reducing the diameter of the airway. It took a bit of work with long pipe cleaners but I eventually removed a Medico/Grabow style paper filter that had migrated up the stem inside. It came out and was very dirty. I cleaned out the inside of the stem with long pipe cleaners and used them straight and then repeated the process with them folded. I cleaned from both directions and it is clean and smells better.I continued the sanding process with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. After each pad I wiped the stem down with some Obsidian Oil to clearly show me the scratches and areas that still needed work. It was really looking good.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. Once again, I wiped it down between each pad with Obsidian Oil. I further polished it with Before and After Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it another rub down with Obsidian Oil. It looked very good. I am really happy with the way that this WDC Wellington Jumbo Bent Billiard turned out. It really is a beautiful looking pipe with a unique shape and combining a smooth bowl, a nickel ferrule and a vulcanite stem. The briar really came alive with the buffing. The rich brown stains of the finish gave the pipe a sense of depth with the polishing and waxing. I carefully buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel using a light touch on the briar. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished Wellington Jumber Bent Billiard really is a beauty and feels great in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 9 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 3/8 inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 95 grams/3.32 ounces. The pipe will be going in the mail to the pipe man who will carry on the trust with this old pipe. I think he will enjoy smoking it for years to come. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. It was a fun one to work on!

Restoring a Bjarne Handmade in Denmark War Club Billiard

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by Steve Laug

This large rusticated bowl, smooth rimtop briar pipe was purchased from an eBay seller on 08/27/2-24 from Memphis, Tennesse, USA. It is stamped on the underside of the shank and clearly reads Bjarne [over] Handmade [over] In Denmark. The bowl had a thick cake on the walls and a heavy overflow of lava onto the rim top and edges. The smooth rim top and inner edges also had burn damage leaving the bowl out of round. It obviously had been lit repeatedly with a torch lighter and the damage told the story. The rusticated finish is very tactile but dirty with debris and oils. The previous pipeman had cut a piece of wine cork to make a cork spacer on the stem. It still had the makers marks on the cork. His drilling to fit the tenon was off and not centred. It was not the same thickness from the outside to the center drilling. With it in place the tenon was quite short. The vulcanite taper stem has a bj stamped on the left side of the taper. The stem was lightly oxidized, calcified and had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. I really like the rustication on the bowl and shank even through the grime in the finish. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started cleaning it up. Have a look. Jeff took close up photos of the bowl and rim top to show the condition of the bowl and the rim top. You can also see the lava on the rim top, inner edge and the cake in the bowl. The burn damage on the top is very visible and has left the bowl is out of round. He also took close up photos of the stem to show its condition as mentioned above. He also took photos of the tooth marks and chatter on both sides of the stem. He took photos of the bowl sides and heel to show the details of the rustication around the bowl. The rustication is deep and has interesting characteristics that show up in the photos around the bowl and shank. He took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above. There is a bj logo on the left side of the stem that looks deeper enough to touch up. You can also see the wine cork and some of the writing on it in the second photo. It is also poorly cut. The next two photos show the look of the cork spacer on the stem. It is an obvious home made addition and one that I plan on removing. I have had many Bjarne pipes cross my work table over the years but all had been stamped only Bjarne or Bjarne Handmade. None of them had his full name stamped on it and none had a letter stamp which I assumed indicated the grade of the pipe. I did some research on Pipedia.com and found some helpful information on both the stamping of my pipe and the history of Bjarne Nielsen himself. I am including the link to the full article on Pipedia and also some pertinent sections of the article that I have edited for quick reference. https://pipedia.org/wiki/Bjarne

From the early 1990s Bjarne had seven pipemakers employed and the pipes were sold in no fewer than 32 countries. For more than six months each year, Bjarne traveled around the world to promote his pipes by meeting with dealers and customers. But sadly, it all ended in February 2008 when Bjarne, then 66 years old suffered a fatal heart attack. An unexpected blow first of all to his family, but also to the pipemakers who had been working for him, and to all lovers of his pipes from around the world. And as no one was willing to take over, the Bjarne pipe died together with its creator.

Among the pipemakers that worked for Bjarne were Johs (for the lower priced high volume pieces), and makers like Ph. Vigen, Ole Bandholm and Tonni Nielsen for high grade pieces. The cheaper line was stamped “Bjarne” while the highest grades were stamped “Bjarne Nielsen” (never with the pipemakers’ name) and graded, from highest to lowest, by the letters: AX, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, and J.

Now I knew that the pipe I had was made before 2008 and was one of his cheaper line stamped Bjarne.

Armed with the information above, I turned my attention to the pipe itself. Jeff had cleaned the pipe with his usual penchant for thoroughness that I really appreciate. He reamed it with a PipNet pipe reamer and cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed out the internals with alcohol, pipe cleaners, shank brushes 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 lava on the rim top. The finish looks very good with good looking grain around the bowl and shank. Jeff soaked the stem in Before & After Deoxidizer to remove the oxidation on the rubber. When the pipe arrived here in Vancouver for the second stop of its restoration tour it looked very good. I took photos before I started my part of the work. While I appreciated and understood the idea behind the cork spacer it bothered me. I looked at the tenon and could see that the length was the same as the depth of the mortise in the shank. I also noticed that there was hard glue on the stem that formed a ridge that held the cork in place. I used a flat file and a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to get rid of the glue and smooth out the surface of the tenon. It still needed to be polished but I wanted to see if it would fit. I turned it into the mortise and took photos of the look of the pipe without the cork. It was back to what it must have looked like when it left the factory. I like it and would proceed sans cork space. Have a look at the pipe without the cork spacer. What do you think? I took close up photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show how clean the pipe was. The bowl was clean and the rim top and the inner edge had significant burn damage and was slightly out of round. The stem was clean and showed light tooth marks and chatter.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is readable and read as noted above. I also removed the stem from the shank and took photos of the pipe to show the look of the parts.The rim top and inner edge of the bowl was in rough condition. I flattened out the damaged rim top by lightly topping it on a topping board with a new piece of 220 grit sandpaper. Once it was flat again I used a wooded sphere and half sphere to work over the inner edge of the bowl and give it a slight bevel to try and bring the bowl back to round. (NOTE: the second photo is staged as I had already put a coat of stain on the polished rim top before realizing I forgot this photo.) The third photo shows the rim top and edges after the sanding process. The burn marks are gone and it looks well. I sanded the rim top with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the top down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad and by the end the rim top had a shine and definitely looked better.I polished the rim top with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down after each pad with the cloth. The bowl continued to develop a deeper shine. I restained the rim top with a Cherry and Mahogany stain pen to match the shank end and panel on the underside of the shank. It would matched well once waxed and buffed.I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the briar with my finger tips and a shoe brush to get into the nooks and crannies. I let it sit on the bowl for 10 minutes and then buffed it off with a paper towel and soft cloth. The product is a great addition to the restoration work. It enlivens, enriches and protects the briar while giving it a deep glow. It is a product I use on every pipe I restore. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I “painted” the surface of the stem with the flame of a lighter to lift the tooth marks and had success. I sanded the light marks that remained with 220 grit sandpaper. It looked better. Polishing would finish the work. I continued the sanding process with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. After each pad I wiped the stem down with some Obsidian Oil to clearly show me the scratches and areas that still needed work. It was really looking good.I touched up the bj logo on the left side of the taper stem with white acrylic nail polish. Once it cured I scraped off the excess and used a 1500 grit micromesh pad to clean it up further.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. Once again, I wiped it down between each pad with Obsidian Oil. I further polished it with Before and After Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil. It looked very good. I am really happy with the way that rim top and edge reworking turned out on this Bjarne Hand Made Large Rusticated Billiard turned out. It really is a beautiful looking pipe with a unique shape and combining a sandblast bowl with a smooth rim and shank end. The vulcanite taper stem is really nice. The briar really came alive with the buffing. The rich brown and black stains of the finish gave the pipe a sense of depth with the polishing and waxing. I carefully buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel using a light touch on the briar. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished Bjarne Rusticated War Club Billiard really is a beauty and feels great in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 7 inches, Height: 2 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 2 inches, Chamber diameter: 1 inch. The weight of the pipe is 102 grams/3.63 ounces. The pipe will be going on the rebornpipes store in the Danish Pipe Makers Section if you would like to add it to your collection. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. It was a fun one to work on!

Breathing Life into a Peterson’s 2012 St. Patrick’s Day 80S Bent Bulldog

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is another Peterson’s Pipe. We recently purchased it from a seller in Wellsville, Kansas, USA on Facebook Pipe Exchange on Facebook on 12/09/2024. It is a nicely grained Bent Bulldog with mixed grain on the sides and birdseye on the front and the back of the bowl. The capped rim top also had mixed grain across the top. It is stamped on the left underside of the diamond shank and reads St. Patrick’s [over] Day and on the right underside it is stamped with the shape 80S. The nickel band is stamped with a shamrock on the left side and around the outside of the leaf it is stamped Peterson arched over the top and the date March 17, 2012 arched underneath. There was a moderated cake in the bowl and some darkening around the inner edge and light lava spots on the rim top. The mortise smelled of oils and tars but surprisingly there was little darkening in it. The stem had some oxidation, some white/sludge built up ahead of the edge of the button. There were some light tooth marks or chatter on the top and underside ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his cleanup work. They tell the story and give a glimpse of the promise that we see in this pipe. He took a photo of the rim top and bowl to show the current condition. The inner edge and the rim top showed darkening and spots of lava as mentioned above. The photos of the bowl walls show the moderate cake on the walls. The stem photos show the oxidation and light marks on the rim top on both sides. Jeff took photos of the sides and heel of the bowl to give a sense of the condition of the bowl and the grain around the bowl. It is a beauty.He took photos of the shank sides to capture the stamping on the shank and the band. The white “P” logo on the left side of the stem is also very clean. On Mark Irwin’s Petersonpipenotes blog he gives a great history of the St. Patrick’s Day pipes. It is a great read and includes a pictorial tour of the line. It is very helpful. Here is the link (https://petersonpipenotes.org/84-a-visual-history-of-the-st-patricks-day-pipes-1998-2018/).

He includes the following information and a photo of the pipe that is very similar to the 80S I am working on. It is notable that he comments that the shape is a classy, English-style 80s bent bulldog: perfect for your favorite Latakia bomb!Now it was time to work on the pipe. Since Jeff always follows the same pattern of work in his cleanup we do not include photos but rather just a simple summary. Jeff reamed the bowl with a PipNet pipe reamer and followed up with a Savinelli Fitsall pipe knife to remove the cake. He scrubbed out the mortise and the airway in the shank and the stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He scrubbed the exterior of the bowl, rim, shank and stem with a tooth brush and Murphy’s Oil Soap to remove the oils and tars on the rim and the grime on the finish of the bowl. He rinsed it under running water. He dried it off with a soft cloth. He was able to remove the spotty lava build up on the rim top and you could see the damages to the top and edges of the rim. I think this pipe may well been before we worked with Mark Hoover’s Before & After Deoxidizer so he cleaned the internals and externals. The stem was clean but lightly oxidized. I took photos of what the pipe looked like when I brought to my worktable. I took close up photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show how clean the pipe was. The bowl was clean and the rim top and the inner edge looked good. On the rim top on the right side there was a nick that upon examination was a spot where a fill had come out. I breathed a sigh of relief as when I first saw it I though it was a crack! I am thankful that is the case. The stem was clean and there were light tooth marks on the top and underside of the stem.I took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It is faint in spots but still readable and read as noted above. I also removed the stem from the shank and took photos of the pipe to show the look of the parts. I decided to deal with the flaw, or missing fill on the right side of the rim top first. It was very clean so I blew out any dust or debris the put a spot of CA glue and some briar dust in the area. I sanded it smooth with a small piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl surface down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad to remove the sanding dust. Once I finished the exterior of the briar was clean and the grain really stood out. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the surface of the briar with my fingertips to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I let the balm sit for 15 minutes and then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. The photos show the bowl at this point in the restoration process. I turned my attention to the stem. I touched up the stamp on the left side of the stem with white acrylic fingernail polish. I scraped the excess off. The stamp looked much better however, part of the P is missing on the right side. The pictures below show what it looks like.I set the bowl aside and turned to the stem. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. Once I had finished the polishing I gave it final coat of oil and set it aside to dry. I am excited to finish this Peterson’s 2012 St. Patrick’s Day 80S Classic Bent Bulldog with a polished nickel band and a taper vulcanite stem. I put the pipe back together and buffed it with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I hand buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with beautiful birdseye and cross grain on the sides of the bowl. Added to that the polished nickel band and the black vulcanite stem was beautiful. This smooth Peterson’s St. Patrick’s Day 2012 80S Bent Bulldog is great looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 50 grams/1.76 ounces. It turned out to be a beautiful pipe. I will be putting it on the rebornpipes store in the Irish Pipe Makers section. If you are interested in adding it to your rack let me know by message or by email to slaug@uniserve.com. Thanks for your time reading the blog. I appreciated it.

Restoring a Blatter Montreal Long Lumberman

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is one that we picked up in the lot from a seller in Barrington, Rhode Island, USA on 08/22/2024. The smooth finish on this Canadian made pipe and the Blatter stamping are what caught our eye. It is stamped on the left side of the shank and reads Blatter [over] Montreal. It has a classic Medium Brown stain on the smooth finish that is a stark contrast to the short vulcanite saddle stem. It is a long Lumberman shaped pipe with a vulcanite stem. The bowl appears to have been recently reamed and cleaned at first glance. The seller told us that he had cleaned it before selling it to us. The inner edge and the top look very good. The stem is lightly oxidized. It does not show any tooth marks or chatter on the top and underside ahead of the button. It is dirty with some sticky substance on the stem surface. The Blatter two spot logo – a white and a grey dot are on the left side of the stem and looks to be in good condition. Jeff took some photos of the pipe to show the general condition of the pipe before he started his clean up. He took some photos of the rim top and bowl from various angles to give me a clear picture of the condition of the rim top and bowl. It is quite clean and the inside of the bowl is very clean and shows that the pipe has been lightly smoked. He included photos that show the top and underside of the stem. It is as described above. Jeff took some photos of the sides and heel of the bowl to show the condition of the finish on the pipe. The photos showed some great grain around the bowl and shank. It is a great looking piece of briar. He took a photo of the stamping on the left side of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable as noted above. He also took a photo of the two dot logo on the left side of the saddle stem.Before I started my part of the restoration, I turned to Pipephil to confirm what I remembered about Blatter of Montreal. I wanted to read a bit of the history (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-b5.html). I have included a screen capture of information on the site below. I have also included information from the sidebar below the screen capture.Blatter & Blatter Inc. Pipemakers since 1907. Artisan: Robert Blatter See also: Rettalb

I learned from the above information on the screen capture that the pipe I am working on was a 1 red dot + 1 grey dot: Machine carved pipe but with exceptional grain.

I turned to the section on Pipedia on Blatter (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Blatter_%26_Blatter).   I quote from the site below with the aid of Google Translate:

The Blatter house (first known as “Blatter bros.”) was founded in 1907 in Montreal. Handmade Blatter pipes (“Select”) have been signed by Robert Blatter since 1968 and, more recently, also by Patrick Blatter. A Blatter is characterized by a classic, polished design: little extravagance or sculptural prowess. Pipes first thought for the use that will be made of them: smoking! They are sometimes even more beautiful.

History of the House:

Blatter was founded in Montreal in 1907 by Frédéric-Georges Blatter. Originally from France, Mr. Blatter had learned his craft as a pipe-maker in his country of origin. He had subsequently practiced his art in England, then in South Africa where the excellence of his work had also been highlighted. In 1907, the company had a factory and a store.

Frédéric-Georges is supported by his son, Ernest Blatter, and his half-brother, Henri Blatter. In the years that followed, the company grew rapidly. Soon, the factory employs fifty employees who supply pipes to five stores. But the years of the Great Depression and those of the Second World War were not kind to the company, which had to reduce its activities. At the turn of the 1950s, production and sales activities were brought together in a single establishment.

In the meantime (in the 1930s) Ernest Blatter’s son, Henri-Georges, joined the team and led its destiny until his death in 1967. One of his sons , Pierre, who had been there for a few years, then took up the torch, soon (1968) supported by his brother, Robert, who had since been making Blatter pipes.

In 1997, Patrick, one of Pierre’s sons, joined the duo and learned the rules of the trade from his uncle.

Thus, for 100 years now, five generations of Blatters have succeeded in managing this company, recognized since then by pipe smokers for the excellence of its achievements and the quality of the various services (choice of tobacco, repairs and maintenance, advice) that it offers to its customers.

In 1993, the firm (which clients simply call “the Blatter Brothers”) deserved to be among a select group of a few companies recognized in Quebec for the excellence of their commercial services.

The current production of Blatter pipes is some 300 pieces per year, entirely handmade by Robert Blatter who has acquired, over the years, an excellent reputation among smokers who own one or more of the remarkable objects he makes. For a few years, Patrick has also been making them, under the supervision of Robert.

The firm sources its raw materials from major manufacturers in Saint-Claude (France), with whose managers the Blatter brothers have established, over the years, cordial relations that substantially go beyond the status of simple business relations. Blatter pipes are, to a large extent, sold in the Montreal market (although the firm has a few customers in the United States and Europe), and house regulars often fight over the new pieces.

The demand for these pipes far exceeds the production capacity of the company and on a few occasions in recent years opportunities to relaunch the business on a larger scale have presented themselves. But the Blatter brothers (in good pipe smokers that they are first and foremost!) preferred to give up their big dreams of glory in order to keep intact the quality control they can exert on a small production of pieces. unique.

Pierre and Robert Blatter were inducted into the Confrérie des maîtres-pipiers de Saint-Claude in 1982. (yc)

Here is the information to enable you to connect with the shop.

Blatter & Blatter Inc. Fabricants de pipes depuis

375 President Kennedy

Montreal, Quebec, CANADA

Tel / Fax: 514-845-8028

Website: Blatter & Blatter Inc.

E-mail: mailto:info@blatterpipes.com

I have worked on quite a few Blatter pipes (and enjoyed a fair number in my own collection) through the years and it is always a pleasure as they are well engineered and made.

Armed with that information I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had done a great job cleaning up the pipe as usual. He cleaned up the inside of the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. The rim top and the inner edge of the bowl are in excellent condition. The bowl walls looked very good. He scrubbed the interior of the bowl and shank with shank brushes, pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol to remove the tars and oils. He scrubbed the exterior of the pipe with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime from the finish. He scrubbed the inside of the stem with alcohol and pipe cleaners. He scrubbed the exterior with Soft Scrub and then soaked it in Briarville’s Pipe Stem Deoxidizer. He washed it off with warm water to remove the deoxidizer. The stem looked very good. I took photos of the pipe before I started working on it. I took close up photos of the bowl, rim top and stem to show how clean the pipe was. The bowl was clean and the rim top and the inner edge look beautiful. The stem was clean and did not show either tooth marks or chatter.I took a photo of the stamping on the side of the shank. It is very clear and readable and read as noted above. I also removed the stem from the shank and took photos of the pipe to show the look of the parts. I polished the bowl and shank with 1500-12000 grit micromesh sanding pad – dry sanding it with the pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each pad. It began to take on a deep shine. The exterior of the bowl look better after sanding. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the briar with my finger tips. I let it sit on the bowl for 10 minutes and then buffed it off with a paper towel and soft cloth. The product is a great addition to the restoration work. It enlivens, enriches and protects the briar while giving it a deep glow. It is a product I use on every pipe I restore. It was ready for the next step. I polished it with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads and wiping the surface down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. It is really shining. I polished it further with Before & After Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it another coat of Obsidian Oil to finish this step. It was great to finish this Blatter Montreal Lumberman. I put the pipe back together and buffed it with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with deep sandblast all around it. Added to that the polished black, vulcanite, saddle stem was beautiful. This Blatter Montreal Lumberman is great looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 6 ½ inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 58 grams/2.05 ounces. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will soon be on the rebornpipes store in the Canadian Pipe Makers Section of the store. If you want to add it to your collection let me know. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over this pipe.

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

Breathing new life into a BBB Own Make Made in London England 636 Billiard

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the work table is a BBB pipe with a silver shank band and a vulcanite taper stem. We picked the pipe up from a seller in Ogden, Utah, USA on 12/12/2024. It is stamped on the left side of the shank and reads BBB in a Diamond with Own on the left side of the Diamond and Make on the right side. On the right side of the shank it is stamped Made in London [over] England [over] 636. The silver band is stamped Sterling Silver under BBB in a Dimaond on the left side of the band. It is oxidized and scratched. The finish is a reddish-brown colour that really highlights the grain around the bowl and shank. The bowl colour is a stark contrast to the silver band and the black taper stem. There is a BBB Diamond brass logo inlaid on the top of the stem. The bowl was moderately caked and there was some lava on the inner bevelled edge of the rim and the top. The vulcanite stem had some oxidation and some chatter and light tooth marks on the top and underside of the stem near the button. It also looks like it had a softee bit on the stem at one time as it left a defined line. Jeff took some photos of the pipe to show the general condition of the pipe before he started his clean up. He took some photos of the rim top and bowl from various angles to give me a clear picture of the condition of the rim top and bowl. You can see the moderate cake in the bowl and the lava on the rim edge and top. The next photos show the top and underside of the stem. It is oxidized and appears to have had a Softee bit on it at one time. Jeff took photos of the sides of the bowl to show the condition of the finish on the pipe. The photos showed some great grain. It is a pretty piece of briar. He took some photos of the stamping on the underside of the shank and the Sterling Silver band. The stamping was clear and readable on both shank sides and the band as noted above. He also took a photo of the BBB logo on the topside of the taper stem. Jeff did his usual thorough job cleaning the pipe which I really appreciate because of the freedom it gives me in dealing with pipes. He reamed it with a PipNet pipe reamer and got rid of the cake. He cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife so that we could see the walls of the bowl and assess for damage. He cleaned the internals of the shank and stem with alcohol, pipe cleaners and alcohol. He scrubbed the exterior with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. He rinsed the pipe under warm water. He dried it off with a cloth and then let it air dry. The stem was scrubbed with Soft Scrub and had a soak in Before & After Deoxidizer to remove the oxidation. One it was rinsed off, it came out looking very good. The finish on the bowl and the rim top cleaned up nicely. I took pictures of the pipe to show how it looked when I unpacked it. I took a close up photo of the bowl and rim top to show how clean the pipe was. The bowl was very clean and showed that the inner tube sitting in the bottom of the bowl. The stem looked good with very light tooth marks and chatter. Overall the pipe is a beautiful looking piece.I took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It read as noted above. It is very clear and readable. I also removed the stem from the shank and took photos of the pipe to show the look of the parts. I decided to start my work on the bowl by polishing the rim top and 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 to remove the dust and debris. I gave the bowl and shank a coating of Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the surface of the briar with my fingertips to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I let the balm sit for 15 minutes and then buffed with a cotton cloth to raise the shine. The photos show the bowl at this point in the restoration process. I polished the silver band with a jeweller’s cloth to remove the tarnish and oxidation. It took some elbow grease but the cloth works to clean and protect the silver from further tarnishing. It looks significantly better than when I started. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I polished it with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit sanding pads and water to wet sand the stem. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil on a cotton rag after each sanding pads. After finishing with the micromesh pads I rub the stem down with Before & After Fine and Extra Fine stem polish as it seems to really remove the fine scratches in the vulcanite. I finished polishing the stem with a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set the stem aside to let the oil absorb. This process gives the stem a shine and also a bit of protection. This BBB Own Make 636 Made in London England Billiard turned out to be a great looking pipe. With polishing, the grain shines through clearly. The black vulcanite stem is in excellent condition and works great with the polished briar. The polished silver is a touch of class. I put the stem back on the bowl and carefully buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel using a light touch on the briar. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel and followed that by buffing the entire pipe with a clean buffing pad. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished BBB Own Make 636 Billiard fits nicely in the hand and feels great. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe 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 43 grams/1.52 ounces. It is a great looking pipe that I will soon be adding it to the rebornpipes store in the British Pipemakers Section. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it.

Restoring a W.O. Larsen Handmade Made in Denmark 0

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by Steve Laug

I love working on older W.O. Larsen Handmade pipes. The shapes, the finishes and the feel of the pipe in the hand always catch my attention. The way the carvers capture the grain in the shapes of these pipes. This one is kind of a Diplomat shape with a slight bend to the stem. It is a smooth finished pipe that is stamped on the underside of the shank and clearly reads 0 [over] W.O. Larsen [over] Handmade [over] Made in Denmark. We purchased this pipe on 05/22/2024 from a friend in Denmark. The pipe was in good condition in terms of the finish on the bowl – just a few nicks and scratches on the bowl sides. The bowl had a thick cake on the walls and the rim top and inner edge had some darkening and some lava overflow. Otherwise it was a beautiful pipe. There is a vulcanite taper stem was in good condition with light tooth chatter but no deep tooth marks on the surface. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his clean up to capture the condition of the pipe when it arrived. It is a real beauty. He took photos of the bowl and rim top to show the lava on the top and inner edge of the bowl. It looks like a combination of burn damage on the front and back mid bowl. The stem was very dirty with grime and sludge build up from the button forward on both sides of the stem. Jeff captured the smooth finish and grain around the bowl sides and it is stunning. There is a lightly bevelled rim cap and inner edge. He took photos of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is faint in spots but it is still readable. The stamping reads as noted above.I wanted to refresh my memory about the pipes coming out of Ole Larsen’s Copenhagen tobacco shop. I knew that many famous Danish Carvers started their careers carving for the shop. I turned first to pipephil wesite to get and over view of the brand (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-l2.html). I did a screen capture of the section on the site showing a summary of the brand and the typical stamping. I have also included the information in the sidebar.In the 1960s Ole Larsen, owner of the Copenhagen tobacco store, retails pipes carved by Sixten Ivarsson, Poul Rasmussen, Sven Knudsen or Peter Brakner. Faced with the success and urged by Sven Bang (store manager), Sven Knudsen and Former (Hans Nielsen) are successively hired to carve pipes in the basement of the shop at the beginning and in the old Larsen cigar factory afterwards. Carver like Teddy Knudsen, Tonni Nielsen, Jess Chonowitch, Peter Hedegaard work a while in this context.

When Nils, son of Ole Larsen, succeeds his father he acquires the Georg Jensen pipe factory to focus on less expensive pipes. This turns out to be an error ending with the sale of W.O. Larsen trademark to Stanwell.

The famous tobacco shop at Strøget, Amagertorv 9 closed down for good on Dec 31, 2004.

I then turned to Pipedia to do a bit more reading about the brand and the various lines making it up. Here is the link (https://pipedia.org/wiki/W.%C3%98._Larsen). The link took me to some pages on the finepipes.com website. Here is the link to the summary of the history of the brand. I quote it in full. I have marked the pertinent section with bold font to mark out the section on the SELECT series (https://www.finepipes.com/pipes/danish/w-o-larsen?sort=20a&page=2&zenid=562ff4b9d62f4f612d0f6ee60cab1224).

W.O. Larsen was one of the most famous tobacco shops in Copenhagen, with a beautiful store located on Copenhagen’s famous “Walking Street.” During the flowering of the Danish pipe in the ’60’s, they first began retailing pipes by such carvers as Sixten Ivarsson, Sven Knudsen, Poul Rasmussen, and Brakner. Urged on by his store manager Sven Bang, the owner, Ole Larsen, decided to begin making pipes in the basement of the shop. He first hired Sven Knudsen as the pipe maker, who soon passed the job to his protégé Hans “Former” Nielsen. Larsen’s fortunes rose along with the rest of the Danish pipe business, and Former was soon managing a group of carvers in the old Larsen cigar factory. Among these were Teddy Knudsen, Tonni Nielsen, Jess Chonowitch, Peter Hedegaard and others, who were responsible for the Select and Straight Grain series before they branched out on their own. After Former left to start Bentley pipes in Switzerland, his duties were taken over by Soren Refbjerg Rasmussen, while the straight grains were made by Teddy’s student Benni Jorgenson. As Ole’s health began to fail, the reins were taken over by his son Nils. Nils became convinced that the way for Larsen to prosper was by entering the low-end market, and acquired the Georg Jensen pipe factory to make an array of less expensive pipes. This turned out to be a fatal error, and Larsen was recently sold to Stanwell, who continue to produce so-called “Larsen” pipes in their huge factory. Thus, ended an important part of Danish pipe history.

Armed with that information I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had done a great job cleaning up the pipe as usual. He cleaned up the inside of the bowl with a PipNet reamer and a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. The bowl walls looked very good. He scrubbed the interior of the bowl and shank with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol to remove the tars and oils. He scrubbed the exterior of the pipe with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime from the finish. He worked on the rim top lava and darkening with the soap and tooth brush. He scrubbed the inside of the stem with alcohol and pipe cleaners. He scrubbed the stem exterior with Soft Scrub and then soaked it in Briarville’s Pipe Stem Deoxidizer. He washed it off with warm water to remove the deoxidizer. The pipe looked far better. I took photos of the pipe when I received it before I started working on it. I took photos of the bowl and rim top to show how clean it was. The top and the inner edge of the rim show the darkening that I mention above. I am very pleased that it does not appear to be deep burn damage. The stem looks clean of debris and grime. The tooth chatter more or less disappeared with the cleaning.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank – it was faint in spots, but clear and read as noted above. The second photo below shows look of the bowl and stem taken apart.I started working on the pipe by addressing the rim edge and top darkening first. I started using a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the inner edge and remove the darkening. I sanded the bowl with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down after each sanding pad to remove the debris from the sanding process. I polished the bowl with micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded it with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. It looks very good now and the bowl is back in round. The pipe was clean and free of debris. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I worked it into the briar with my finger tips to make sure that it covered every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. I buffed it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded it with 320-3500 grit sandpaper to smooth out the remaining chatter on the stem surface. It also removed the remnants of oxidation on the stem surface.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – 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 cloth after each pad. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – Fine and Extra Fine. I wiped it down with a coat of Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry.I put the W.O. Larsen Diplomat back together and polished the stem and bowl with Blue Diamond polish on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The grain on the natural brown briar came alive with the buffing. The finish worked well with the polished black vulcanite stem. Have a look at it in the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.73 ounces/49 grams. This beauty will soon be on the rebornpipes store in the Danish Pipemakers Section. It will make a beautiful addition to somebody’s pipe rack. Thanks for walking through the restoration of this Danish take on the Diplomat shape from the 60s with me as it was a fun pipe to work on.

Restoring an A. Curtz 13 Amber Stemmed Churchwarden Sitter

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the work table is a long flat-bottomed pipe with a long amber acrylic stem. We picked the pipe up from a seller in Ogden, Utah, USA on 12/12/2024. It is stamped on the underside of the shank and reads A. Curtz 13. I had heard about the name in connection with Jeanie’s Smoke Shop in Salt Lake City when I worked on the brand in the past. The finish is deeply rusticated and has some great grain on the top and bottom of the bowl and shank. It was quite dirty but still had a charm about it. The bowl was caked and there was a light lava coat and spots on the top and the inner edge of the rim. The stem was amber acrylic and was a tapered. There were light tooth marks and chatter on both sides of the stem. There was an interesting 2 circle logo on the topside of the taper that looked like a large white circle with an offset red circle inside of it. Jeff took some photos of the pipe to show the general condition of the pipe before he started his clean up.He took some photos of the rim top and bowl from various angles to give me a clear picture of the condition of the rim top and bowl. You can see the cake in the bowl and the darkening and lava coat. It is hard to tell if there was any damage to the edge at this point. The next two photos show the top and underside of the stem. It is dirty and has calcification on both sides at the button. There is also some tooth chatter and some light tooth marks. The third photo shows the condition of the slot while the final photo shows the curve of the full stem. Jeff took some photos of the sides of the bowl to show the condition of the finish on the pipe. The photos showed deep rustication around the bowl sides. Under the oils and grime it was a nice looking bowl. It is a large pipe with a smooth rim top and heel.He took some photos of the stamping on the underside of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable. My guess at this point is that the “13” is a grade stamp but I will do some digging into that. He also took a photo of the inset dual circle logo on the stem top. To learn a bit more about the brand I turned to Pipephil to see what I could find out (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-c8.html). It turns out the pipe was made by an artisan named Arley Curtz who was from Utah. I did a screen capture of the photo and have included that below. I also included the side bar information below the photo.Artisan: “Arley” Curtz, Utah (USA).The stems of the A. Curts pipes are also marked with 2 dots (a red and a white).

I then turned to Pipedia to find out some more dedtail (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Curtz). The information was brief but helpful. I have included that article below.

Arley G. Curtz retired the director of the Bountiful Davis Art Center (Bountiful, Utah) and is now a pipe repairman and pipe maker. He was formerly the pipe repairman at Jeanie’s Smoke Shop, and has been making pipes ever since.

He makes about 70 pipes a year using Greek and Italian briar. His pipes are available at Edward’s Pipe & Tobacco Shop in Denver, CO, at the Tinderbox in Salt Lake City, on the web at The Pipe and Pint, and at Curtz Handmade Pipes and Pipe Repair in Salt Lake City, Utah.

I did a bit more searching to learn more about the repairman/pipe maker. I came across a 2018 article on a site called Utahstories (https://utahstories.com/2018/05/arley-curtz-pipe-making-and-memory-collecting/). The article included a photo of Arley Curtz that I have inserted below. I am also including a short section of the article that makes me want to meet this gentleman.

For Arley Curtz, a pipe is more than just a way to smoke tobacco. It summons up a time when pipe smoking was both acceptable and part of a gentler civility in our culture.

Curtz is a pipe maker and collector of smoking pipes. He has over 300, ranging from simple corn cobs to handmade antiques. Each one has a story. As the smoke from a pipe curls upwards, it allows Curtz a time to pause and reflect. “A pipe,” he says, “is a keeper of memories.”

Just as a pipe cannot be smoked in haste, a handmade pipe requires patience to craft. Curtz forms his pipes from briarwood, which grows in countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea.

I only wish I had found this earlier before I met my brother in Salt Lake City and visited Jeanie’s Smoke Shop. I would have certainly made a point to visit Arley at his own shop and gotten to meet him. Until my next trip to Idaho to visit my Dad and brother I will leave this on my wish list. Now to get on with working on his pipe.

Jeff did his usual thorough job cleaning the pipe which I really appreciate because of the freedom it gives me in dealing with pipes. He reamed it with a PipNet pipe reamer and got rid of the cake. He cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife so that we could see the walls of the bowl and assess for damage. He cleaned the internals of the shank and stem with alcohol, pipe cleaners and alcohol. He scrubbed the exterior with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. He rinsed the pipe under warm water. He dried it off with a cloth and then let it air dry. The stem was scrubbed with Soft Scrub and had a soak in Before & After Deoxidizer to remove the oxidation. One it was rinsed off, it came out looking very good. The finish on the bowl and the rim top cleaned up nicely. I took pictures of the pipe to show how it looked when I unpacked it. I took a close up photo of the bowl and rim top to show how clean the pipe was. There was some spotty varnish on the rim top and darkening on the inner edge of the rim on the back of the bowl. The stem looked good just some light tooth chatter and marks near the button. Overall the pipe is a beautiful looking piece.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It read as noted above. It is very clear and readable. I also removed the stem from the shank and took photos of the pipe to show the look of the parts. The stem is long but the pipe is really not a full Churchwarden, perhaps it is a mini warden.I decided to address the issues with the rim top first. I worked on the darkening on the inner edge of the rim. I worked over the edge to smooth out the rim edge and remove the darkening.I wiped down the rim top and the heel of the bowl with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the spots of varnish that remained.With the varnish removed a flaw in the heel of the bowl. It was a small flaw that followed the grain mid-bowl. I filled it in with some clear CA glue and set it aside to cure. Once cured I sanded it with 220 girt sandpaper to smooth it our and blend it into the surrounding briar.I sanded the smooth portions of the rim top and the heel of the bowl with 320-3500 sanding pads. I wiped the briar down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. It began to look very good.I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads and wiping down the briar after each sanding pad with a damp cloth. The briar began to shine. I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the briar with my finger tips and a horsehair shoe brush. I let it sit on the bowl for 10 minutes and then buffed it off with a paper towel and soft cloth. The product is a great addition to the restoration work. It enlivens, enriches and protects the briar while giving it a deep glow. It is a product I use on every pipe I restore. I set the bowl aside and worked on the stem. I sanded out the light tooth marks and chatter with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the stem down with an Obsidian Oil cloth after each sanding pad. The stem looked better at this point.  I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I polished it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I buffed the stem with a soft cloth to raise the shine. I gave it a final wipe down with Obsidian Oil to protect the stem from UV and slow down future oxidation. I don’t know what it is about finishing a restoration but I have to tell you that it is my favourite part of the process. It is the moment when everything that I have worked on comes together. I can compare it to where I started and there is always satisfaction that it does indeed look better than when we picked it up. As always, I put this A. Curtz 13 Rusticated Churchwarden 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 and hand buffed it to raise the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like along with the polished amber acrylic stem. This Arley Curtz Rusticated Sitter CW is a great looking pipe and I am sure that it will be comfortable in hand when smoking as it is light and well balanced for a pipe of this size. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 8 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.80 ounces/53 grams. It is another beautiful pipe and one that will be on the rebornpipes store soon. You can find it in the section of Pipes by American Pipe Makers. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over this pipe. Thanks to each of you who are reading this blog.

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

Cleaning up another of the 12 – A Wire Rusticated Dr. Grabow Belvedere Slim Dublin

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by Steve Laug

This is another of the pipes I received from Robert with a group 12 pipes that needed to be restored in various ways from cleanup to restemming. I have just two left now so I chose to work on this Dr. Grabow Belvedere Yachtsman with a vulcanite taper stem. The bowl and shank were very dirty with oils and tars on the surface of the smooth finish. There were also some worn spots. The wire rusticated bowl had been reamed recently so the bowl was almost free of cake other than a light ridge of carbon mid bowl. There was a light overflow of lava on the rim top. The pipe was stamped on the underside of the shank and read Belvedere [over] Dr. Grabow.  There was a Grabow logo on the left side of the stem. This one came with the original stem in place on the shank. The shank end had an aluminum fitting that provided a mortise of the threaded metal stinger/tenon on the pipe. The stem overclocked to the right leaving I crooked in the shank. It was oxidized and had what looked like pliers’ marks on the stem side. There were light tooth marks on the top and underside of the stem near the button. I took some photos of the pipe to show its condition before I started my work on it. I took some closer photos of the bowl and rim top to show its condition before I started my work on the pipe. You can see the relatively clean bowl with no cake and the thick lava coat on the rim top. The stem photos also show the general condition of the stem as noted above. I tried to capture the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is clear, though faint, still readable and reads as noted above. I also unscrewed the stem to give a sense of what the pipe looked like with two parts shown side by side. It is a Dublin shape with a taper stem.I turned to Pipephil (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-drgrabow.html) to see if I could find any information on the line and background on the brand. I have included that in the paragraph below. There was nothing listed on the Belvedere line.

Dr. Grabow pipes began with Louis B. Linkman († 1957), of the M. Linkman and Co. of Chicago in 1932 (Pat # 1 896 800). Linkman and Co. ceased producing the Dr. Grabow pipes around 1953. After this date the brand was owned by Henry Leonard and Thomas (HLT), Inc. of Queens, New York and produced by Sparta Pipes Inc. In 1969, US Tobacco acquired Sparta Pipes and rights to Dr. Grabow. Lane Ltd. acquired the Dr. Grabow property from US Tobacco. Lane Ltd. came under ownership of RJ Reynolds and British American Tobacco in about 2000. Dr. Paul E. Grabow died in 1965 at age 97. Production (2006): ~250,000 pipes/year.

I then turned to Pipedia to an article on the Grabow Models. I have included the link below. (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Grabow_Models_(Series,Line)_Names_Through_the_Years). I quote from the information listed on the Belvedere below:

BELVEDERE (c1955?) – One of the early RJR pipes. Some, perhaps the earlier ones, have #76 cleaner (“Rook” shape). Others use the #72b cleaner (“spoon” shape on end). Eventually, this pipe was dropped from the offers.

From that information I knew That I was dealing with an early RJR (RJ Reynolds) pipes as it had the “Rook” shaped stinger/tenon apparatus. That is known as a #76 cleaner. I also learned that it had been a coupon pipe and was dropped from the offers. It appears to have come out in or around 1955. Now it was time to work on the pipe.

I decided to begin by addressing the fit of the stem to the shank. The stem fit against the shank perfectly but was over clocked by about ¼ turn. I would need to deal with that. I used an old trick I learned from one of the old timers on ASP. I heated the metal stinger tenon with the flame of a lighter to soften the glue in the stem. I screwed it into the stem and tried to turn it. I repeated the process until the glue softened. I then was able to align the stem properly on the shank. I set it aside to let the glue reharden before I took the stem off. It looked very good at this point in terms of alignment. I used a brass bristle wire brush to clean up the lava on the rim top and the tars on the aluminum Rook style stinger.I scrubbed the exterior of the with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. I worked on edges of the rim top along with the rest of the bowl and the shank. I rinsed it off with warm running water and dried it off with a cotton towel. It is definitely looking better. I used a walnut stain pen to touch up the finish on the rim top, bowl edges and the shank end. I worked it into the wire brush rusticated finish on the bowl.I cleaned out the airway in the stem and shank, the mortise and the entry of the airway into the bowl. I used alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. It was dirty but cleaned up well.I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I worked it into the briar with my finger tips to make sure that it covered every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. I buffed it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. I set aside the bowl and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded out the oxidation on the stem surface with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I wiped it down with an Obsidian Oil cloth.I continued to sand the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with an Obsidian Oil impregnated cloth to remove the sanding debris. It began to take on a shine.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with some Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I polished it further with Before & After Stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine and then wiped it down another time with the oil. I put the Dr. Grabow Belvedere Slim Dublin and the stem back together. I polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to polish the briar and 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 hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The original brown stains gave depth to the beautiful grain around the bowl and worked amazingly well with the polished vulcanite saddle stem. The grain around the bowl and shank and looks quite remarkable. There are still some nicks for the pipe’s journey that I left as it is part of the story of the pipe. This is truly a beautiful Dr. Grabow Belvedere Dublin. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.16 ounces/35 grams. This pipe will be put in the box while I work on Rob’s remaining pipe in the 12 pipe lot. Once I finish them I will be mailing the lot back to him. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me. Cheers.

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

Cleaning a stubbornly Frozen Quiet Companion Metal pipe from the lot of 12 pipes

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by Steve Laug

Back in January I received an email from Robert with a group 12 pipes that needed to be restored in various ways from cleanup to restemming. I chose to work on second metal pipe next. It is a nice looking straight pipe with an apple style bowl and a metal base. It was a smooth bowl with no rustication. The rim top and the base of the bowl were both very dirty. The bowl had been reamed at some time so there was no cake in it. The rim top had an overflow of lava on it and some darkening around the inner edge. The underside of the bowl was dirty and it was coated with a varnish coat. The stem and bowl were stuck on the base and could not be removed at this point. The underside of the metal base was stamped Quiet Companion. The stem was dirty and had a lot of tooth marks and chatter on the top and underside ahead of the button. I took some photos of the pipe to show its condition before I started my work on it. To capture the condition of the bowl and rim top along with the stem I took the following photos. You can see the tar in the bottom of the bowl and the entrance to the shank is quite large. The bowl is not removable at the moment so once I am able to remove it I can do a better assessment of the condition. The rim top has a thick lava coat that is heavier on the back side. The stem is well chewed but none of the marks are too deep. The stem is also not removable at this point. I will need to see what I can find out about the internals so that I can take it apart.I tried to capture the stamping on the heel of the base. It read The [over] Quiet [over] Companion. It was clear and readable.This is a brand I had not seen before, let alone worked on. I had no idea how it came apart and it was solidly stuck. I could not remove the stem from the shank or the bowl from the base. Before I started to work on it I decided to see if I could find out how the parts were held together. Here is the link (http://www.smokingmetal.co.uk/pipe.php?page=83). I quote the information that was included along with the photos.

QUIET COMRADE

Department : METAL STEM & Plug in bowls

QUIET COMRADE stamped under cup and on the base of the bowl. The filter holder is designed such that smoke has to travel three time the length of the shank, the last run is enabled to take an absorbtion filter.

The bowl is retained by the filter holder locking into the bowl, this has to be pulled out before the bowl is released. Attempting to unscrew the bowl can have disastrous effects

Variety of bowls , smooth and carved.

Overall length is 5 3/8 inches (137 m/m)

19 Feb 1974 – US patent # 3,792,705 Inventor Robert J Frederick , Ashtabula, Ohio and manufactured by Mech.Tech.Inc., PO box 487 – 3128 State Road – Ashtabula, Ohio 44004 – USA I also found a link on another site selling the pipe that showed the way the pipe fit together (https://eliesfreehandpipes.com/Elie%27s_Comrade.html).Now I knew how to take it apart… I thought. Now the hard work began. I tried all the tricks up my sleeve from years of working on pipes. I tried the freezer trick – letting it sit in the freezer for repeated periods of time and having absolutely no success. I tried heating the shank with boiling water to try to loosen the internals from the metal base – I repeated the process of heating it several times to loosen it. Again – I had no success. I heated it with a heat gun repeatedly to remove the internals – no success. The only thing that worked at this point was that I was able to remove the stem. I soaked the shank in a bath of alcohol for several days hoping to break things loose. It did not work. I heated it again to combine the alcohol and heat. It did not work. I tried plugging the shank end and soaking the internals with acetone. It still did not work. I am stumped at this point. I decided to clean up the pipe as best as I could without taking it apart. So that is what I did today after work.

I wiped off the debris from the soaking that bowl had received and reamed it with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I took the cake back to bare briar and it looked much better. I cleaned out the airway in the shank and the inside of the bowl and the entrance of the airway at the bottom of the bowl with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs. I also cleaned the airway in the stem at the same time. It was beginning to look very good.With the internals clean I turned my attention to the briar bowl. It had started the heating/cooling process I described above with a thick varnish coat. One of the benefits of the long process was that the varnish had bubble and peeled off. I sanded it with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to remove the remnants of shiny varnish on the sides and top of the bowl. It actually had some nice grain underneath the coat. I continued to sand the bowl with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down after each pad with a damp cloth to remove the debris from sanding. By the last pad the bowl had begun to shine. I polished the briar bowl with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the bowl down after each pad to remove the debris. By the end the grain just popped. It is a pretty bowl. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I worked it into the briar with my finger tips to make sure that it covered every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. I buffed it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. I turned my attention to the other end of the pipe. I sanded out the oxidation and scratches in the surface with 320-3500 sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with an Obsidian Oil saturated cloth. Once finished it revealed deep marks and gouges in the surface.I filled in the marks and nicks on the surface of the stem with black, rubberized CA glue. I pressed it into the marks on the surface with a tooth pick. Once the repairs cured I sanded them smooth with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with some Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I polished it further with Before & After Stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine and then wiped it down another time with the oil. The frustratingly frozen pipe looked better. Even though I could not break down the internals I worked over the internals with alcohol and pipe cleaners. I put the Quiet Comrade Metal Pipe and stem back together. I polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to polish the briar and 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 hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The original brown stains gave depth to the beautiful grain around the bowl and worked amazingly well with the polished vulcanite saddle stem. The grain around the bowl and shank and looks quite remarkable. There are still some nicks for the pipe’s journey that I left as it is part of the story of the pipe. This is truly a beautiful Quiet Comrade Apple on a metal base. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 3/8 inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.45 ounces/41 grams. This pipe will be put in the box while I work on Rob’s remaining pipes in the 12 pipe lot. Once I finish them I will be mailing the lot back to him. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me. Cheers.

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

Cleaning up another of the 12 – An Imported Briar Lovat Style Pot

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by Steve Laug

This is another of the pipes I received from Robert with a group 12 pipes that needed to be restored in various ways from cleanup to restemming. I have just a few left now so I chose to work on this Kaywoodie like Lovat Style Pot with a short saddle stem. The bowl and shank were very dirty with oils and tars on the surface of the smooth finish. The bowl had been reamed recently so the bowl was free of cake. There was an overflow of thick lava on the rim top. The lava was thick and there as darkening on the inner edge. The pipe was faintly stamped on the left side of the shank and read Imported Briar.  There was no other stamping on the shank sides though there may well have been some originally. This one came with the original stem in place on the shank. The shank end had an aluminum fitting that provided a mortise of the threaded metal stinger/tenon on the pipe. The stem did not fit tightly against the shank for some reason that clean up would reveal. It was oxidized and calcified on the button end. There were light tooth marks on the top and underside of the stem near the button. The surface of the button is also tooth marked. There were no logos on the stem sides. I took some photos of the pipe to show its condition before I started my work on it. I took some closer photos of the bowl and rim top to show its condition before I started my work on the pipe. You can see the relatively clean bowl with no cake and the thick lava coat on the rim top. The stem photos also show the general condition of the stem as noted above. I tried to capture the faint stamping on the left side of the shank but it is not clear. I also took a photo of the right side to look for stamping. There was nothing visible in the photos. The left side had a faint stamp that read as noted above. I also unscrewed the stem to give a sense of what the pipe looked like with two parts shown side by side. It definitely is a pot but the long shank and the saddle stem give it the look of a Lovat. Since there was no stamping on the pipe there was really nothing to be learned about its history. It is kind of a mystery pipe. It could be a Kaywoodie I suppose but again there is no proof of that. I decided to begin my work by addressing the fit of the stem to the shank. There was a thick rubberized glue around the stem end of the threaded tenon. It filled in the last thread and also on the top of the stem face. This accounted for the fit to the shank at this point. I used a small pen knife to cut away the rubberized glue and cleaned up the tenon a bit. I turned it into the stem and found the answer to my question of why the rubber! The stem fit against the shank perfectly but was over clocked by about ¼ turn. I would need to deal with that.I used an old trick I learned from one of the old timers on ASP. I heated the metal stinger tenon with the flame of a lighter to soften the glue in the stem. I screwed it into the stem and tried to turn it. I repeated the process until the glue softened. I then was able to align the stem properly on the shank. I set it aside to let the glue reharden before I took the stem off. It looked very good at this point in terms of alignment.Once the stem cooled and the alignment was set I removed it from the shank and cleaned out the airway in the stem and shank, the mortise and the entry of the airway into the bowl. I used alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. It was dirty but cleaned up well.I scraped the lava off the rim top with the edge of the Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. It is better but there is still a lot of work to do on the inner edge and top. I sanded the inner edge of the bowl and rim top with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to clean it up. I wiped the briar down with some acetone on cotton pads to remove the shiny varnish coat and allow me to work on the rest of the bowl. It is finally beginning to look better. I scrubbed the exterior of the with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush. I worked on edges of the rim top along with the rest of the bowl and the shank. I rinsed it off with warm running water and dried it off with a cotton towel. It is definitely looking better. I worked on the bowl, rim top, edges and shank with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to further remove the darkening on the briar. I also worked over the aluminum shank/mortis piece at the same time. It is improving with each pad. I wiped the top down with a damp cloth to remove the sanding debris. I polished it with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads and wiped it down with a damp cloth after each pad. The pipe looked very good. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. It is a paste/balm that works to deep clean the finish, enliven and protect the briar. I worked it into the briar with my finger tips to make sure that it covered every square inch of the pipe. I set it aside for 10 minutes to let it do its work. I buffed it with a cotton cloth. The briar really began to have a deep shine. The photos I took of the bowl at this point mark the progress in the restoration. I “painted’ the surface of the stem with the flame of a lighter to try and lift the bite marks. It worked very well. There were two small marks left on the surface – one on each side. I filled them in with some black rubberized CA glue. Once it cured I sanded out the repairs with 220 grit sandpaper to blend them into the stem surface. I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each pad with an Obsidian Oil impregnated cloth to remove the sanding debris. It began to take on a shine.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with some Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I polished it further with Before & After Stem polish – both Fine and Extra Fine and then wiped it down another time with the oil. I put the Imported Briar Lovat Style Pot and the stem back together. I polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to polish the briar and 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 hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The pipe polished up pretty nicely. The original brown stains gave depth to the beautiful grain around the bowl and worked amazingly well with the polished vulcanite saddle stem. The grain around the bowl and shank and looks quite remarkable. There are still some nicks for the pipe’s journey that I left as it is part of the story of the pipe. This is truly a beautiful Imported Briar Pot. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 3/8 inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.55 ounces/44 grams. This pipe will be put in the box while I work on Rob’s remaining pipes in the 12 pipe lot. Once I finish them I will be mailing the lot back to him. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me. Cheers.

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