Tag Archives: building up a button with superglue

Rebuilding a Button on a BBB Bulldog

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Blog by Steve Laug

I picked up this older BBB Bulldog on EBay because I liked the shape of it. The bowl definitely needed some work as the lava had erupted over the front rim and down the contours of the pipe. The pictures below show the state of the bowl when it arrived. But that was not why I am writing about this pipe. That kind of refurbishing is part and parcel of buying older pipes on EBay. They always are pretty much in the state that this one was in. All of them require the same kind of procedures to clean them up and return them to a state of readiness for the new owner. But have a look at the button on the last three pictures below. It was virtually gone. I could have fit a new stem on the pipe but I wanted to retain the brass BBB logo and did not want to move it to a new stem. I also wanted to try to build up the button and see what I could do with it.

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I have used Super Glue or Krazy Glue to repair bite throughs in the stem but had not use it to do repairs this extensive. I love the process of trying to devise a workable fix and so I decided to give it a go. I greased a fluffy pipe cleaner with olive oil and inserted it in the airway at the button. I do this so that the glue does not fill the airway and grease it so that the pipe cleaner is not a permanent feature of the stem as the super glue will stick to anything including your fingers if you get it on them. (By the way there is a solvent that is available should that happen to you.) The surface of the button was dirty and oxidized so I cleaned that with my dental pick and some acetone. I clean the surface before putting in the glue. I also sanded it to roughen the surface so the glue would bond well. In the top picture of the stem you can see that the top of the button is indented and the lip is worn smooth. The second stem photo shows the underside and you can see the major dent that needed work and the lip that was pretty well gone. I filled the hole on the underside first so that it would bond. Then I gradually built up the dent, letting it dry between applications of the glue. I believe it took 5 or 6 applications of the glue. Once it was filled I added more to build it up so that I could re-cut the button. In the picture below the patch is clear. It is a very rough surface but it is ready for the sanding and filing that will go into restoring the stem to normal. I built up the deep dent and also built up the missing portion of the button. On the top side of the stem I also built up the button in the same fashion.

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I set the stem aside to dry until the glue patch was very hard and turned my attention to the bowl. You can see in the pictures below that I took off the lava and tars on the top and cleaned the inside and outside of the entire bowl. By the time I was finished with the exterior of the bowl and shank and cleaned out the bowl and the inside of the shank with pipe cleaners and a reamer the stem was ready to work on. I reassembled it for the picture below.

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You can see from the two profile pictures above that the button is present once again. The idea is to build up the end of the stem to the degree that the profile shows the button as it would have been on a pipe of this age. It took a layering process with the super glue to get it to the point it is in the above pictures.

The two photos below show the bottom of the stem as I worked on it with the files and the sandpapers. I used my small files, both the flat and the wedge file to cut away the material that I had built up to give a sharp button edge as differentiated from the surface of the stem. In the first picture you can see the initial cuts and the smoothing that I did to the surface of the stem with the files. I used 220 and 240 grit sandpaper to remove the rough surface of the glue on the stem and bring it to the right profile. The glue is very hard and it takes quite a bit of sanding to smooth it out. In the second picture you can see the final shaping that was done to the button and the surface of the stem is once again smooth. From this point all that remained was to sand it with 400 and 600 grit wet dry sand paper and then use the micro-mesh pads 1500, 1800, 2400, 3200, 4000 and 6000 grit on the stem. As usual I kept a bowl of water next to me to keep the pads wet as I sanded the stems. Each progressive grit polished the stem and button to a more clean and shiny stage. I also reworked the surface of the entire stem. Once that was done I took it to the buffer and used the Tripoli buff followed by the White Diamond buff to bring it to a sheen.

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The last three pictures show the finished pipe – both the bowl which had been cleaned and polished with White Diamond and a light touch and then finished with some carnauba wax to complete it. The stem is completed in terms of bringing back the button and the stem profile. The area around the logo on the stem will need to be worked on with the edges of the micro-mesh pads to get in close and remove the remaining oxidation. Then the entirety will need to be lightly buffed and waxed. The main reason I posted these pictures is to show that the profile is now clear and the new button is clearly visible. The last picture shows the top of the stem and the button is clearly visible. There is a bit of oxidation in the button that I will need to work on with the pads as well but at least the old BBB Bulldog is now very smokable.

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Reworking the button on a Perspex Stem on a GBD Prehistoric

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I was gifted this older GBD Prehistoric by a good friend who knows I like working on seeming irreparable pipes.  He knows that I enjoy the challenge and that I work to get them back to a workable condition. The stem was truly a mess as can be seen from the photos below. It had bite through holes on both the top and the bottom of the stem. The button was destroyed by the bite marks. This one would prove to be a bit of a challenge. My usual method of repairing bite throughs with Super Glue would not work as the hole was on both sides of the stem. You can tell by the three pictures below the size of the hole. I included even the blurry ones to show the extent of the problem that needed to be addressed.

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After carefully picking at the holes with my dental pick I could tell that the surrounding Perspex material around the holes was compromised and pieces continued to come off with very little pressure on the dental pick. It was clear then that I would have to shorten the stem back to the point on the stem where there was solid material to work with. To do this involved cutting off almost a ¼ inch of the stem. The two photos below show the stem after the material has been removed. I used my Dremel with a sanding drum on it to take back the stem to this point. Care must be exercised to keep the finished surface straight and level. But I have found that this is fairly easy to do with the Dremel set at the lowest speed.

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Once the stem is cut back to the solid material a new button has to be carved. I use a series of needle files to do this. Note in the picture below the three files that I used the most. The top one is a flat rectangular one that does a great job on the top and bottom of the stem to cut a straight 90 degree edge into the Perspex. The oval and the round file I used to open the slot in the button to match the shape of the one I cut off. Once the stem has been cut the airway at the end is merely a round hole or as in this case was barely flared. I like an oval slot in the button and the files do a great job in that process. I have two sets of needle files that I use. I clean the teeth on the files with Isopropyl alcohol and a brass tire brush. It keeps them from getting clogged with the Perspex dust.

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In the three pictures below you can see the button that has been cut in the stem. I also used sandpaper to thin the stem profile forward of the button to give it the proper slope and give the button some depth. Note the rough surface of the stem is caused by the use of 240 grit sandpaper to accomplish this task. The top photo is the top side of the stem at the button, the second is the underside of the stem and the bottom photo is a profile shot to show the look of the button. When the stem was at this point it still needed quite a bit of sanding to smooth out the new button and shape the stem. The edges in the profile are a bit sharp and needed to be rounded to match the part of the stem that remained untouched. I rounded the edges with the 240 grit sand paper to match the shape of the stem.

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The next two photos below show the stem after that reshaping has been done. I then had to polish the stem to get it back to it clear sheen. I started that with some 400 and 600 grit wet dry sandpaper that was used with water to give it the bite to cut through the scratches of the files and the sandpaper. The first photo shows the pipe next to another GBD Rhodesian for comparison sake. You can see in that photo how much of the Perspex stem I removed to cut the new button. The second photo shows the shaping and flow of the stem once I have finished with the polishing with the wet dry sandpaper.

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The last three photos show the finished pipe. The bowl was polished and the polishing on the stem was done with the micromesh pads through the 1500, 1800, 2400, 3200, 4000 and 6000 grits soaked in water to facilitate a good polish. Each grit level of micromesh took out more of the scratching that remained after the sanding. By the 3200 grit the surface was smooth and shiny. The last two grits gave it a thorough polishing and then I finished it on the buffer with White Diamond and carnauba wax.