Tag Archives: fitting a stem

Caminetto New Dear Hand Made in Italy with an amber acrylic saddle stem

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the worktable is a nice looking Caminetto New Dear Billiard that has the unique finish that I have seen on Caminetto and Ardor New Dear pipes. We purchased from a seller in Macon, Georgia, USA on 03/08/2025. In the lot of pipes there were at least three of the New Dear series pipes. This one has an amber acrylic stem. The stamping on the pipe was very clear and readable. On the left side of the shank it reads Caminetto. [over] New Dear and below that and to the left it is stamped KS and a faint shield. On the right side of the shank it is stamped Hand Made in Italy [over] Cucciago (Co). The finish was in good condition though it was grimy and dusty. The grain shone through the grime and was beautiful. There was a thick cake in the bowl with spotty lava overflow on the rusticated rim top. The inner edge appeared to be in good condition. The amber acrylic fancy saddle was lacking the moustache logo. The stem was dirty and had some light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. It had a lot of potential. Jeff took photos of the pipe as he saw it at this stage of his examination. The first two photos are out of focus but you can see the shape clearly. Jeff took close up photos of the rim top from various angles to show the general condition of the bowl and rim. The rim top is rusticated and fits the rest of the finish. It is made to look a bit like a plateau finish. The photos show the heavy cake in the bowl and the lava build up in the rusticated finish on the rim top. The acrylic stem was dirty and had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took a photo of the sides and heel of the bowl to give an idea of the beauty of the New Dear style of rustication on the heel and sides of the bowl. The stamping on the sides of the shank is clear and readable as noted above. I turned to Pipephil (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-c1.html) to see what I could learn about the Caminetto New Dear. There were no photos of the New Dear line but still the photos showed the other stamping on the pipe clearly. I have included the sidebar information below the screen capture.Brand created in 1968 by Giuseppe Ascorti († 1984), Luigi Radice and Gianni Davoli as distributor.

  • 1979 : End of he first Caminetto period. Luigi Radice left the company. Giuseppe Ascorti produced the Sergio pipes (a short time) and moved into his new workshop with his son Roberto. (See also Capitello)
  • 1986 : New Caminetto period by Roberto Ascorti

With that information in hand I turned to Pipedia (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Caminetto) to see if I could glean further information on the specific line – New Dear – that I am working on. I quote a section of the article below. I have highlighted the information on the New Dear Line in red below.

There is also another factor in stamping, that is, which series the pipe falls in. The majority of Caminetto’s one sees are those of the “Business” series, which are stamped such with their collective shape (see photo of shapes below). Another stamp that sometimes follows the “Business” one is “KS,” which from what I know means “King-size” (this could be wrong, as there are pipes stamped with KS1, KS2, and KS3).

The other series is what is known as the “Prestige” series, though I have never seen a Caminetto stamped with “Prestige.” It appears that is the name of the collective series of smooth and specialty pipes made by Caminetto and featured in the Tinder Box brochure of old. There are so many different Prestige models, shapes, and finishes, and I have only seen about 5 or 6 of them. The list, per Harvey and other collective resources, is below:

    Bagdad (Super Briar and Black Briar Moustache–stained black and smooth)

    Damasco (gold ring affixed to top of bowl; smooth)

    Double Bowl

    Excellence, Excellence Extra, and Excellence Flame (natural, light chestnut or walnut; smooth)

    Green Briar and Green Briar Moustache (stained mahogany or walnut; smooth)

    Moustache, Moustache KS, KS1, KS2, KS3, and super Moustache (top of the line model; smooth)

    New Dear, New Dear KS, KS1, and New Dear Moustache (stained light chestnut with or without black smoke ring on rim; roughly carved)

    Red Briar (stained cherry; smooth)

    Sable D’Or and Sable D’Or KS, KS1 (black, chestnut, natural, mahogany, red or walnut; sandblast)

    Tinder Box Golden Anniversary Drainplug (250 made in black or natural sandblast; 51 made in Sable D’Or sandblast or Excellence smooth finishes)

    Torch (stained mahogany or walnut; smooth)

    Twin Bowl (only one in existence that I know of, featured in Hacker’s book)

Now it was time to work on the pipe. Jeff had done his usual thorough clean up of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer and finished with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed the exterior with Murphy’s Oil Soap and the interior with isopropyl alcohol, shank brushes, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. The rim top and edge of the bowl at the top had a black stain to give it a flumed appearance. It was faint but still visible. He worked on the acrylic stem with Soft Scrub. He rinsed it off with warm water. It has light tooth marks and chatter on both sides. I took photos of the pipe before I started work. I took some close up photos of the bowl/rim top and the stem to show the condition they were in at this point. The rim top and edges looked good and the bowl was clean. You can see the remnants of the fluming on the rim top in the photo. The stem had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button.I took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above. I removed the stem from the shank to give a sense of the pipe. I started my work on the pipe by addressing fading of the flume on the rim top and outer edge of the bowl. I used a Walnut stain pen to darken it and match the overall look of the top and edges. Black would have been too much of a contrast but the Walnut worked very well. I polished the smooth portions of the bowl and shank with micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded it with 1500-12000 grit micromesh pads. I wiped it down with a damp cloth after each pad. It really began to be beautiful. I rubbed the bowl and shank down with Before & After Restoration Balm to deep clean the finish on the bowl and shank. The product works to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I worked it in with my fingers and a shoe brush to get it into the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes then I wiped it off and buffed it with a soft cloth. The briar really began to have a rich shine. I took some photos of the bowl at this point to mark the progress in the restoration. It is a beautiful bowl. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded the stem with 2 x 2 inch sanding pads – dry sanding with 320-3500 grit pads and wiping it down after each pad with an Obsidian Oil cloth. I was able to blend in the tooth marks.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I did a final hand polish of the stem with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a coat of Obsidian Pipe Stem Oil. It works to protect the stem from oxidizing. I set it aside to dry. I am excited to put the finishing touches on this Caminetto New Dear KS Billiard with a fancy amber acrylic saddle 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 buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine and hand buffed it with microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished black, fancy turned vulcanite stem was beautiful. This Caminetto New Dear KS Billiard is nice looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 6 ½ 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 2.22 ounces/63 grams. It is a beautiful pipe and one that I will be putting in the Italian Pipemaker Section on the rebornpipes store. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me as I worked over this pipe. 

New Life for a Caminetto Super Moustache Dublin Hand Made in Italy

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the worktable is a nice looking Caminetto Dublin that appears to me to be a higher end large, smooth pipe. We purchased from a seller in Macon, Georgia, USA on 03/08/2025. The stamping on the pipe was very clear and readable. On the left side of the shank it reads Caminetto.. [over] Super Moustache. On the right side of the shank it is stamped Hand Made in Italy [over] Cucciago (Co). The finish was in good condition though it was grimy and dusty. The grain shone through the grime and was beautiful. There was a thick cake in the bowl with spotty lava overflow on the rim top. The inner edge had a nick on the left side mid bowl but was otherwise in good condition. The stem had a newer style large, raised moustache logo on the topside of the saddle. There was a white spacer at the end of the stem. The stem was dirty and had some light tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. It had a lot of potential. Jeff took photos of the pipe as he saw it at this stage of his examination. Jeff took close up photos of the rim top from various angles to show the general condition of the bowl and rim. The rim top is scooped at the front and back of the bowl with a rise in the middle of each side. The photos show the heavy cake in the bowl and the lava build up on the rim top. The acrylic stem was dirty and had tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took a photo of the sides and heel of the bowl to give an idea of the beauty of the grain on the heel and sides of the bowl. The stamping on the sides of the shank is clear and readable as noted above. I turned to Pipephil (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-c1.html) to see what I could learn about the Caminetto Super Moustache and the large moustache on the stem. The first item in the screen capture below is stamped the same as the one I am working on. I have included the sidebar information below the screen capture.Brand created in 1968 by Giuseppe Ascorti († 1984), Luigi Radice and Gianni Davoli as distributor.

  • 1979 : End of he first Caminetto period. Luigi Radice left the company. Giuseppe Ascorti produced the Sergio pipes (a short time) and moved into his new workshop with his son Roberto. (See also Capitello)
  • 1986 : New Caminetto period by Roberto Ascorti

With that information in hand I turned to Pipedia (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Caminetto) to see if I could glean further information on the specific line – Super Moustache – that I am working on. I quote a section of the article below. I have highlighted the information on the Super Moustache in red below.

There is also another factor in stamping, that is, which series the pipe falls in. The majority of Caminetto’s one sees are those of the “Business” series, which are stamped such with their collective shape (see photo of shapes below). Another stamp that sometimes follows the “Business” one is “KS,” which from what I know means “King-size” (this could be wrong, as there are pipes stamped with KS1, KS2, and KS3).

The other series is what is known as the “Prestige” series, though I have never seen a Caminetto stamped with “Prestige.” It appears that is the name of the collective series of smooth and specialty pipes made by Caminetto and featured in the Tinder Box brochure of old. There are so many different Prestige models, shapes, and finishes, and I have only seen about 5 or 6 of them. The list, per Harvey and other collective resources, is below:

    Bagdad (Super Briar and Black Briar Moustache–stained black and smooth)

    Damasco (gold ring affixed to top of bowl; smooth)

    Double Bowl

    Excellence, Excellence Extra, and Excellence Flame (natural, light chestnut or walnut; smooth)

    Green Briar and Green Briar Moustache (stained mahogany or walnut; smooth)

    Moustache, Moustache KS, KS1, KS2, KS3, and super Moustache (top of the line model; smooth)

    New Dear, New Dear KS, KS1, and New Dear Moustache (stained light chestnut with or without black smoke ring on rim; roughly carved)

    Red Briar (stained cherry; smooth)

    Sable D’Or and Sable D’Or KS, KS1 (black, chestnut, natural, mahogany, red or walnut; sandblast)

    Tinder Box Golden Anniversary Drainplug (250 made in black or natural sandblast; 51 made in Sable D’Or sandblast or Excellence smooth finishes)

    Torch (stained mahogany or walnut; smooth)

    Twin Bowl (only one in existence that I know of, featured in Hacker’s book)

Now it was time to work on the pipe. Jeff had done his usual thorough clean up of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer and finished with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed the exterior with Murphy’s Oil Soap and the interior with isopropyl alcohol, shank brushes, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He worked on the acrylic stem with Soft Scrub then let it soak in Briarville’s Pipe Stem Deoxidizer. He rinsed it off with warm water. It has a few tooth marks and chatter on both sides. I took photos of the pipe before I started my work. I took some close up photos of the bowl/rim top and the stem to show the condition they were in at this point. The rim top and edges looked good and the bowl was clean. The one nick in the inner edge on the left side in the middle is visible below. The stem had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button.I took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above. I also captured the moustache logo on the top of the saddle stem. I removed the stem from the shank to give a sense of the pipe. I started my work on the pipe by addressing the chip/nick on the left inside edge of the bowl. I sanded it with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper.I sanded the rim and bowl sides with 320-3500 grit 2×2 inch sanding pads. I wanted to minimize some of the scratches in the briar. I wiped it down after each pad with a damp cloth. It really began to shine. I polished the bowl sides and shank with micromesh sanding pads. I dry sanded it with 1500-12000 grit micromesh pads. I wiped it down with a damp cloth after each pad. It really began to be beautiful. I rubbed the bowl and shank down with Before & After Restoration Balm to deep clean the finish on the bowl and shank. The product works to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I worked it in with my fingers to get it into the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes then I wiped it off and buffed it with a soft cloth. The briar really began to have a rich shine. I took some photos of the bowl at this point to mark the progress in the restoration. It is a beautiful bowl. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded the stem with 2 x 2 inch sanding pads – dry sanding with 320-3500 grit pads and wiping it down after each pad with an Obsidian Oil cloth. I was able to blend in the tooth marks.I examined the moustache on the stem and saw white in the grooves. I used some white acrylic fingernail polish and worked it into the indentations in the stem surface with a tooth pick. Once it cured I scraped off the excess and sanded it with a 1000 grit sanding pad. I was able to remove it and the white left behind looked very good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I did a final hand polish of the stem with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine. I gave it a coat of Obsidian Pipe Stem Oil. It works to protect the stem from oxidizing. I set it aside to dry. The white band on the end of the stem and the white moustache looked good together. I am excited to put the finishing touches on this Caminetto Super Moustache Dublin with a fancy acrylic saddle 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 buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine and hand buffed it with microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished black, fancy turned vulcanite stem was beautiful. This Caminetto Super Mousetache Dublin is nice looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 7 inches, Height: 2 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inch wide x 2 inches long, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 2.82 ounces/80 grams. It is a beautiful pipe and one that I will be putting in the Italian Pipemaker Section on the rebornpipes store. Thanks for walking through the cleanup with me as I worked over this pipe.

New Life for a Svendborg Danish Hand Carved Sand Blast Bent Dublin with a 9MM filter saddle stem

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is one that has travelled much in its life. It went from Denmark to the Philippines and then to the US and now here in Canada. We picked it up in a batch of pipes we purchased from John Mags, a pipemaker in Lapaz, Philippines on 04/24/2025. The sandblast finish around a fluid Danish style Dublin works well to make this a great looking pipe. The pipe was stamped on a smooth panel on the underside of the shank and read P [over] Svendborg [over] Danish [over] Hand Carved. The rich dark brown/black stain on the sandblast finish looked very good. It had a lot of dust and debris in the valleys of the sandblast. The bowl had a moderate cake in it and it overflowed as light lava into the sandblast rim top. It was dirty but very interesting looking. The stem was quite oxidized but still had the Svendborg infinity looking logo on the left side of the saddle. It is a 9MM filter stem. There were light tooth marks on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the bowl before his clean up work to give a sense of its beauty even with the grime in the finish. He took photos of the rim top and bowl to show clearly the cake in the bowl and the overflow of lava in the sandblast rim top. The condition of the stem is also visible as noted above. The next photos capture the sandblast in the briar on the sides and heel of the bowl. It is a beautiful blast that shows the grain around bowl sides and the heel of a well shaped Dublin. He captured the stamping on the underside of the shank and the shape of the stem in the next photos. The stamping is faint in spots but still readable and reads as is noted above. Before I started working on the pipe I did a bit of research on the brand to remind myself of what I knew of the maker. I turned to Pipephil’s site first (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-s14.html). I did a screen capture of the information on the site. I did a screen capture of the pertinent information and have included it below.I copied and pasted the side bar information below:

Brand founded in 1970s by Henrik Jørgensen, Poul Ilsted and Tao Nielsen. They bought an old factory (Nordisc Pibefabriker) in Svendborg on Funen Island. Poul and Tao gradually bow out from machine manufactured pipes (1982) and Henrik Jørgensen manages the brand until its takeover by Design Berlin (D) in the late 90ies. Kaj C. Rasmussen jointed the firm for several years. 17 employees worked for this brand under Henrik Jørgensen direction.

That link gave me a bit of information on the brand – a joint venture of Henrik Jorgensen, Poul Ilsted and Tao Nielsen. I could see from the information that usually the carvers stamped their names on the shank of the pipe. In the case of the one I have there is no name stamp. I wonder if the P stamp above the name would point to possibly Poul Ilsted as the carver. If so it would put the date of the carving before 1982 when Ilsted and Nielsen left. It is stamped Hand Carved which also points to a pre-1982 date.

I then turned to Pipedia and found that an article on the brand that was helpful and interesting to read (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Svendborg). I have included the first part of the article below.

Jens Tao Nielsen and Poul Ilsted Bech met each other when working together for Erik Nørding and soon became close friends. Both felt a bit tired to make nothing but bizarre fancy shapes and agreed they wanted to produce pipes of more style and more classicism. They decided to establish their own brand “Tao & Ilsted” – But how to do it?

A good fortune brought them in contact with Henrik Jørgensen, a passionate pipe lover and a wealthy Copenhagen banker who was willing to retire from bank business and change his career to become a pipemaker. The trio joined in 1969 and decided to start a new pipe brand together. Nielsen and Ilsted started to search for a suitable workshop while Jørgensen took care of the finances. In early 1970 the partners found an old, closed down pipe factory in Svendborg on Funen, and bought it shortly after for a mere 16.500 Danish Kroner. It was the earlier Nordic Pipe Factory – Nordisc Pibefabriker – maybe the oldest Danish pipe factory. And now it became the home of Svendborg Piber.

The article also included this set of pages from a catalogue that were interesting. The philosophy that drove the brand is also there to read. It is well worth the time to pause and read about that passion.Now it was my turn to work on the pipe. Jeff had done an amazing cleanup of the pipe. He reamed the light cake with a PipNet reamer and cleaned up that with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed the internals of the bowl and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. He scrubbed the externals with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and rinsed the bowl off with running water. He soaked the stem in Briarville’s Pipe stem Deoxidizer and once it had soaked rinsed it off with warm water to remove the residual solution. He dried it off and rubbed it down to remove any oxidation that was still on the stem. The pipe looked very good when I received it. I took photos of the bowl and the rim top as well as both sides of the stem to show the condition of the pipe before I started my work. The rim top looked remarkably good. The next photos show the condition of the stem and how clean it came out.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank and the left side of the saddle stem. The photo of the stamping is faint but still readable. I also removed the stem and took a photo of the parts of the pipe.I went over the rim top with a brass bristle wire brush to knock off any debris in the shallow blast. Some came out and it looks quite good.I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips and a horsehair shoe brush. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes then I buffed it with a cotton cloth to deepen the shine. The briar really comes alive with the balm. I touched up the infinity style Svendborg logo stamp on the left side of the saddle stem with white acrylic fingernail polish. I worked it into the stamp with a tooth pick. Once it dried I sanded the excess off with a worn 1000 grit sanding pad. It looks significantly better.I sanded the surface of the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to smooth the tooth chatter out and remove remnants of oxidation. When finished the stem looked much better.I fit the tenon with a 9MM filter. The fit was perfect as expected and the airflow was unrestricted.I polished the vulcanite with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I used Before & After Pipe Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine to further polish the stem. This Svendborg Danish Hand Carved Dublin P with its fancy, vulcanite 9MM saddle stem is a beautiful sandblast pipe with a flowing shape that looks great. The rich browns and blacks of the contrasting stain makes the grain come alive with the polishing and waxing. 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 the 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 Svendborg Danish Hand Carved Dublin really is a beauty and fits nicely in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.76 ounces/50 grams. This pipe will soon be on the Danish Pipe Makers Section of the rebornpipes store 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.

Banding a Vauen Mokka 5277Danish Style Ball with a cracked shank

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by Steve Laug

A week ago, or so, I received an email from Derek in Edmonton, Alberta about a pipe that he had. The shank had broken into several pieces and the photo below shows the damage on the pipe. It is a great looking apple shaped pipe that is stamped Vauen Mokka 5277. The finish is sandblast and stained dark brown or coffee coloured. The acrylic stem has a briar ring on it. It is a 9MM stem. He had done a repair and glued the pieces together. He did a good job of putting the parts together in a snug way. The only issue to my eyes was the longevity of the glue repair and the fact that the fit of the stem was loose. The following are photos that Derek sent to me to show the repaired shank on the pipe. The first photo shows overall look of the bowl. It is a great looking pipe. The photos after that show the repair shank and also the fit to the shank end. I did some work on the Vauen Mokka line before I started working on the pipe itself. I turned to the Vauen site (https://www.vauen.com/pipes/detail/collection/mokka/current-range.html). On the site there was a section on the Mokka line. I have included that information below.

The deep brown sandblasted surface creates a harmonious contrast to the natural briar wood that appears at the top of the bowl and at the end of the stem. The relief-like protruding grain ensures optimum heat dissipation.

Mouthpiece: acrylic black. Bitetype: Fishtail mouthpiece

Google sent me to the Pfeifen Shop and the listings on the Vauen Mokka 5277. I found a great photo of the pipe I am working on. Here is the link (https://www.pfeifen-shop-online.de/Vauen-Mokka-Pipe-5277).The site described the Mokka line as follows:

Coffee has been a part of the human culture for centuries. It hasn’t always been the quick drink, we see it as today, but solely a luxury drink. The combination with a pipe, creates a delightful experience like no other. The Vauen Mokka taste excellent even without coffee. Thanks to its sandblasting a greater surface are is created, so that the smoke can loose its heat more quickly, which is both more pleasurable and easier on the pipe itself. The bright accents on the rim and stem are pure, bright briar wood and contrast the deep brown colour of the pipe very well.

  • Half-Bent: Ball
  • Surface: Brown, sandblasted
  • Drilling: 9 mm
  • Stem: Acrylic
  • Material: Briar
  • Length: 140 mm
  • Height of bowl: ca. 63 mm
  • Drilling of the bowl: 20 mm
  • Weight: ca. 60g

With that information I knew what I was working on. I turned to work on the pipe itself. I went through my nickel bands to find one that was deep enough to bind together the repairs. It was deep enough but did not hide too much of the stamping on the shank. I took photos of the parts. I fit the band on the edge of the shank end. I heated it with a lighter and pressed it onto the shank end by pressing it against a hard board. I heated and pressed, heated and pressed until it was even with the shank end. I restained the repaired areas with a Walnut stain pen to blend them into the surface of the briar. The match was a good blend. 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. I polished the nickel band and put the stem on the shank to capture a sense of what the repaired pipe looked like. I sent the photos to Derek to show him the look of the pipe. He liked what he saw.I set the bowl aside and turned to work on the stem. I sanded out the tooth marks and chatter on the stem surface with 320-3500 grit 2×2 inch sanding pads. I wiped it down with an Obsidian Oil Cloth after each sanding pad. It began to take on a rich shine.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. I am excited to be on the homestretch and look forward to seeing the Vauen Mokka 5277 Saddle Stem Ball put back together, polished and waxed. I put the bowl and stem back together and lightly polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to polish them. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe on the wheel with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The depths of the grain really pop with the wax and polish. The polished acrylic stem is a beautiful contrast to the combination of stains on the bowl and the band on the shank. This Vauen Mooka 5277 Ball was a bit of work to bring back to life. The pipe is light weight, comfortable in the hand and should feel great as it is warmed up when smoking. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 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 2.05 ounces/58 grams. I will be sending it back to Derek early next week and it should give him some great smokes through the years ahead.

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.

Restoring a Mr. Brog Bulldog no. 34

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe that I am working on came from a friend in Naples, Florida, USA on 07/17/2024. It was very dirty and had a heavy varnish coat around the Pearwood bowl and shank. It was a natural finish under the varnish. It was dirty and had hand oils ground into the finish. The bowl had a thick cake in the bowl and a coat of lava flowing onto the inner edge and the rim top. The thick taper stem was very dirty, oxidized and had tooth marks and chatter on both sides ahead of the button. There was a white spot on the topside of the stem. The fit of the stem to the shank is perfect. The pipe is stamped on the underside of the shank and read Mr Brog [over] no. 34 Bulldog. To the left of the stamping was a large stamped cloverleaf. Jeff took photos of the pipe so I could have a sense of what it looked like before he started his work on it. Jeff took photos of the bowl and rim top to show the cake in the bowl. There was a lava build up on the top of the rim and the inner edge of the bowl. Jeff took photos of the top and underside of the stem showing the tooth chatter and marks ahead of the button edge. Jeff took photos of the sides and heel of the bowl to show the condition of the finish. You can see the grime in the finish around the sides of the bowl and shank. Even under the dirt and debris of the years it looked very good. Jeff took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. The stamping was clear and readable as you can see from the photo. It read as noted above. Before I started working on the pipe I wanted to see what the original stem looked like and I wanted some background information on the Pear Wood Pipes. I decided to do a bit of digging on the history of the brand. I turned first to Pipephil’s site to get a quick overview (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-m8.html). From there I learned that the brand started in Poland in 1991 in the area known as the “St. Claude of Poland’. It was started by Zbigniew Bednarczyk along with Kazimierz Rog. Zbigniew kept the name after Kazimierz died in 2006.I turned to Pipedia for a bit more detail of the history (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Br%C3%B3g).

Pracownie Fajek Bróg was founded as Mr Bróg in Przemysl, “the Saint-Claude of Poland”, in 1991. Master craftsman Kazimierz Rog, the senior partner, had been a pipemaker since 1947, starting as an apprentice and later partner of Wiktor Winiarski and Zbigniew Mazuryk, followers of legendary Ludwik Walat. Zbigniew Bednarczyk was completely new to pipemaking, but as a non-professional sculptor, painter and poet he surely had pretty enough artistic disposition.

Mr Brog started out offering 10 models of briar pipes and 10 models made of wild pear, wild cherry and other unexpected materials, available both smooth and rusticated and polished with natural waxes only. The experience of the old master and the dynamic passion of his young friend made the brand soon well-known in Poland. Little by little they enlarged their program turning towards a more artistically minded way of pipemaking. This was the bedrock for success on international markets.

Kazimierz Róg, highly honored, passed away after a lengthy illness on June, 26th 2006. The firm is continued by Zbigniew Bednarczyk and his wife Renata.

I decided to check on the Mr. Brog Website (https://mrbrog.com/collections/pear-wood-pipes) to see what I could find out. The first information that I found was the following on the wood the pipe was made of. I quote

Pear wood is a great alternative to briar wood. Pear wood is very dense and a hard wood which is great for a pipe you can have for the years to come. Also, pear wood gives off a very pleasant smell and taste while smoking.

I then turned to the catalogue of pipes and shapes that were available in pear wood and looked specifically for the Bulldog No. 34. The shape and the shape number are shown in the photo on the site (https://brogshop.pl/en_US/p/Pipe-no.-34-Buldog-9-mm-Mr-Brog/290). I have included a picture from the website. As I scrolled through the photos on the site on this shape I found a photo of the various finishes on the pipe. The particular pipe I am working on is the first one at the top of the photo. It is labelled as Naturalny.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 rim top shows some damage on the top and the inner edge of the bowl. 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 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 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. Now the damage to the stem was very clear. Overall, the pipe looked far better. I took photos of the pipe when I received it 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 darkening to the rim top and the inner edge is very visible in the photo below. The stem was clean and the tooth marks and chatter can be seen in the photos.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside 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 started my work on the pipe by addressing the darkening to the rim top and sanding the bowl and shank. I used 320-3500 grit 2×2 inch sanding pads to remove the darkening on the rim top and the inner edge as well as clean up the bowl. It looked much better once finished. I polished the rim top with 1500-12000 grit micromesh sanding pads and wiped it down with a damp cloth to remove the sanding dust. It took on a rich shine. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm and worked it into the surface of the pear wood with my finger tips. I let it sit on the bowl for 10 minutes and buffed it off with a soft cotton cloth to raise a shine. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded the stem surface with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to remove the tooth marks and chatter. I smoothed it out but since it is acrylic it still shows the scratch marks in the surface.I sanded the scratches on the stem sides with 320-3500 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down after each pad with an Obsidian Oil cloth. But the end it was beginning to shine.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads – the stem began to take on a shine. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with Obsidian Oil. I finished the stem with Before & After Fine and Extra Fine Polish. I buffed the stem with a soft cloth to raise the shine. I fit the 9MM tenon with a Dr. Perl Junior 9MM filter. It slipped in with no obstruction and fit in the shank perfectly.The Mr. Brog Pear Wood Bulldog no 34 turned out really well. I put the 9MM stem back on the shank and buffed it lightly with Blue Diamond to raise the shine. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed it with a clean buffing pad. I hand buffed the bowl with a soft cloth to deepen the shine. This chubby Pear Wood shape that Mr. Brog calls Bulldog no 34 is quite nice. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Diameter of the Chamber: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.87 ounces/53 grams. I will be putting it on the rebornpipes store in the Pipes from Various Makers section. If you are interested in adding this pipe to your collection let me know. Thanks for reading through my thoughts and reflections as I worked on this pear wood pipe.

Another Resurrection – a Savinelli Roma Lucite 412KS Billiard

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe came from Curtis, the same pipeman whose Neerup pipe I restemmed. He sent me the two pipes for work. This one is stamped on a smooth panel on the underside of the shank. It was stamped Savinelli [over] Roma Lucite [followed by] Made In [over] Italy [followed by] the shape number 412 KS. It was a sandblast pipe with an interesting blast that showed the grain around the bowl and shank. The stem was a variegated orange/brown Lucite taper with a brass spacer at the end of the stem and a gold R Shield on the left side of the shank. The stem had light tooth chatter on the top and underside ahead of the button. It had a thick cake in the bowl and an overflow of lava on the rim top. To me those are easily dealt with and really are not an issue. What was an issue was the cracked shank. It cracked ¾ of an inch up the shank with a clean break. It was too far up the shank to band it to hold the parts together. It was a mess that I would need to be creative to fix. I left it over night to see if I could sort out a repair of some sort that would put the pieces back together again. I had some brass tubing that would work well in the shank together from the inside.I cut a piece of brass tubing that fit from the entry of the airway in the shank, across the cracked shank and ending at the bevel on the shank end. My thoughts on it were that I would reduce the size of the tenon on the stem so it would slide into the shank. It was thick enough that the thinning would not make it weak. I used a brass bristle wire brush to roughen the area of the repair on the shank to match the sandblast on the finish. It was close but I would need to do more. I found a deep set band that once in place combined with the internal tube should protect the shank. I pressed it on the shank. I worked over the repair on the shank with the wire brush and an etching tool. I wanted it to match the rest of the shank and bowl finish. It will look good once the section is restain. I restained the shank end with a combination of Mahogany and Black stain pens. Once it dried I buffed it with a soft cloth and the repair looked very good. I reamed the pipe with a PipNet pipe reamer using the second and third cutting heads to remove the thick cake in the bowl. I scraped the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife to remove the remainder of the cake in the bowl. I sanded the bowl with a piece of dowel wrapped in 220 grit sandpaper. It looked good. I cleaned up the rim top. I scraped off the lava coat with the Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. I scrubbed it with some warm water and a paper towel to remove the bulk of the grime. I used a 1500 grit micromesh sanding pad to polish off the remainder of the grim and the rim top look significantly better. I scrubbed the airway in the shank and the stem with pipe cleaners – both regular and bristle one and isopropyl alcohol.I rubbed the briar down with Before and After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the finish with my fingertips and let it sit for 10 minutes to let it do its magic. After that I buffed it off with a soft cltoh to polish and raise the shine on the bowl. It looks very good. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I polished out the tooth marks and chatter with 320-3500 grit 2×2 inch sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with an obsidian Oil soaked cloth. It is looking good.I polished the stem with 1500-12000 grit micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with each pad. I wiped it down with the Obsidian Oil after each pad. I finished polishing the stem with Before and After Pipe Stem Polish both Fine and Extra Fine polishes. I polished it with each polish and the stem began to have a rich glow. I am excited to be on the homestretch and look forward to seeing the Savinelli Roma Lucite 412KS Billiard put back together, polished and waxed. I put the bowl and stem back together and lightly polished the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond to polish them. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe on the wheel with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The depths of the grain really pop with the wax and polish. The polished variegated Brown Lucite stem is a beautiful contrast to the combination of stains on the bowl and shank. This Savinelli Roma Lucite Billiard was a lot of work to bring back to life. The pipe is light weight, comfortable in the hand and should feel great as it is warmed up when smoking. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ½ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.45 ounces/41 grams. I will be packing this one up with restemmed Neerup and getting them in the post to Curtis. I look forward to hearing from him regarding his two pipes.

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.

Resurrecting a 4th Generation Erik Stokkebye Churchwarden

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by Steve Laug

On Tuesday the local pipe shop dropped by 5 pipes for me to clean up and restore. I have finished and returned four of them. The last of them was a pipe they saw as pretty much a lost cause that they had sitting in their stock room. It was an Erik Stokkebye 4th Generation Churchwarden. It was new, unsmoked and other than being in pieces was in good condition. We spoke and figured it would be an interesting challenge to work on so they dropped it by. Yesterday I cut a piece of tubing and glued it into the airway in the bowl. I let it cure overnight before I began reconstructing the pipe.I cleaned up the end of the tube with a piece of sandpaper. I painted the extension of the tube with clear CA glue. I also used a tooth pick to coat the broken portion on the bowl and the shank with the CA glue. I slid the shank onto the tube and aligned the two parts until they were smooth and clamped the bowl until the glue cured. I took photos of the repair after it had cured. I let it sit for an hour while the repair hardened. It looked quite good. I sanded the repaired areas on the shank with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the repairs. It took a bit of work but was able to smooth out the repairs and blend them into the surface of the briar. The pipe was beginning to look better. I put the stem in place on the shank and took photos of the pipe. It is going to look very good once I smooth it out and restain it.I polished the bowl with 1500-12000 grit micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding it with the pads and wiping it down with a damp cloth to remove the sanding debris. The repair began to take on a shine. I used a Cherry, Walnut and Mahogany stain pen to restain the repaired shank after sadning it. The combination of colours worked very well with the surrounding stain on the briar. I rubbed the bowl down Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the surface of the briar with my finger tips. I let it sit on the bowl for 10-15 minutes. I wiped it down and buffed it down with a soft cloth. It looks quite good. I am excited to finish this Erik Stokkebye 4th Generation Churchwarden. I put the pipe back together and buffed it with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the grain just popping on all sides. This Eric Stokkebye 4th Generation Churchwarden is nice looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 10.90 inches, Height: 1.68 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 70.75 grams/ 2.50 ounces. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will be going back to the local pipe shop that dropped it by for a repair. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over this pipe. Thanks to each of you who are reading this blog.

What an Oddity a Clairmont 1Ano Destra Handmade Right Angle Pipe with a Cumberland stem

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by Steve Laug

This particularly interesting right-angle Billiard pipe was purchased from a seller in Santa Cruz, California, USA on 05/28/2024. It is carved in a way that chases the grain and a bent rounded shank with a Cumberland stem. It is stamped on the topside of the shank and reads Clairmont and on the underside of the shank it is stamped 1 Ano Destra and right next to the shank it is stamped Handmade. The smooth 90 Degree Angle Billiard shaped pipe is dirty but the grime does not hide the beautiful looking combination around the bowl and shank. The stain brings out the straight grain around the bowl and shank sides and the birdseye on the top and underside of the shank and the rim top and heel of the bowl. The pipe had a moderate cake in the bowl and a light coat of lava on the top and inner edge of the bowl. There was grime ground into the smooth finish. The shape of the rim is slightly crowned. The acrylic Cumberland taper stem is dirty and has what looks like debris left behind by a Softee Bit. It had light tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button. The pipe must have been a great smoker judging from the condition it came it. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his work on it. Jeff took photos of the rim top and the stem to show the condition of the pipe when we received it. You can see the cake in the bowl and the light lava on the rim top and inner edge of the bowl. The Cumberland acrylic stem was dirty and had light chatter and tooth marks on both sides near the button. He took photos of the sides of the bowl and the heel to give an idea of the shape and the condition of the briar around the bowl. It really is a nicely shaped pipe that has a very unique look. The next photos Jeff took shows the stamping on the top and the underside of the shank. It is clear and readable as noted above. I really wanted to understand who had made the Clairmont pipe. I had not heard of the brand before and have not worked on one. I turned to Pipephil’s site to see what I could learn from there (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-c5.html). Generally the site has a great summary of information and in this case it did as well. I have included a screen shot of the section and have included the side bar information below the photo.Brand created by Alberto Paronelli in the 1970’s. Pipes usually were crafted by Tom Spanu. “Clairmont” is a francization of “Chiaramonti”, birthplace of Tom Spanu (see dok). See also: Casteldoria, Castelsardo

With that information I knew that the pipe had been crafted by Tom Spanu for a brand created by Alberto Paronelli during the 1970s. The Clairmont name was a francization of the Italian word Chiaramonti which was the birthplace of Tom Spanu.

I turned to Pipedia for more information on the brand. It gave a one line confirmation of the information from Pipephil (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Pipe_Brands_%26_Makers_A_-_C). I have included the line below.

Clairmont – Alberto Paronelli / Tomassu Spanu; Gavirate (Varese). Highgrade pipes, discontinued.

The added information was that it was a Highgrade pipe that is no longer made.

From there I turned to an article on Tommaso Spanu (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Spanu). I quote the information below as well as an update on the death of Tommaso Spanu in the Fall of 2015. I have made the sections on the Clairmont pipes in bold.

Novarte S.N.C. di Spanu Tommaso

Update: We are sad to report that it has come to our attention that Tommaso Spanu passed from this World in the Fall of 2015 to join the many great Italian pipe makers that came before him. Our hope is that Tommoso’s sons and brother will continue the Spanu pipe making tradition. We can also enjoy the legacy he leaves in the many pipes he has made over the years.

In 1963 Tommaso Spanu left his home in Sardinia and wandered to Northern Italy to become a pipemaker. His uncle had managed an apprenticeship for him in Gavirate, in the province of Varese, with it’s many pipe manufactures. His exceptional talent soon attracted the attention of Alberto Paronelli (→ Paronelli), the grand seigneur of Italian pipe business. Paronelli, a famed pipe designer himself, arranged that the best pipe craftsmen schooled his young fosterling and personally taught him in pipe design and styles. Soon Spanu reached a remarkable level of skills and began to work on the Clairmont pipes, a high-grade brand produced for and distributed by Paronelli. A little later the bulk of the Clairmonts was made by Spanu who was even allowed to stamp them with his own name additionally.

Jeff had done a great job cleaning up the pipe as usual. He reamed the pipe with a PipNet reamer and cut back the cake back to the bare briar. He cleaned up the walls with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed the interior of the bowl, shank and the airway in the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol to remove the tars and oils. It was surprising how easily the pipe cleaners went through the curved shank to the bowl. 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 exterior of the stem with Soft Scrub. He rinsed it off with warm water to remove the cleaner. It looked very good when I brought it to the worktable. I took photos of the pipe when I brought it to the work table. The briar is really very stunning! I took close up photos of the rim top and the stem surface. I wanted to show how well it had cleaned up. The rim top and edges looked very good. I took photos of the stem to show the condition it was in. There were light tooth marks and chatter against the button edge on both sides. Green dot inset logo in the stem looks very good.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. You can see that it is stamped as noted above. It is clear and readable. I took the pipe apart and took a photo of the pipe. It is a good looking pipe with incredible grain. I polished the briar with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped the bowl down after each pad with a damp cloth to remove the sanding dust. By the end of the process they looked very good. 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 set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit sanding pads to remove the tooth marks and chatter against the button edge. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with a damp cloth. Once it was finished the stem looked really good. I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry 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 am excited to finish this Tom Spanu Handmade Clairmont 1 Ano Destra with a Cumberland acrylic taper stem. I put the pipe back together and buffed it with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. It looked excellent without the damaged spacer on the stem. The fit was excellent. I gave the bowl multiple coats of and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine and hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the grain just popping on all sides. This Spanu Made Clairmont 1 Ano Destra Handmade is nice looking and the pipe feels great in my hand. It is light and well balanced. Have a look at it with the photos below. The dimensions are Length: 6 inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 50 grams/ 1.76 ounces. It is a beautiful pipe and one that will be on the Italian Pipe Makers Section of the rebornpipes store soon. 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.

Fitting a new stem to a Neerup, Made in Denmark Bulldog

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe came to my table from a fellow I had repaired pipes for before. It has been awhile and he has moved further away but he remembered me and sent the pipes to me to repair. There were two of them – a Savinelli Billiard with a snapped shank and a Neerup Bulldog. The Bulldog looked very familiar to me and I did a bit of looking back and found that I had worked on it previously. I had fitted it with a new stem in the past and later replaced the tenon on it. Now it was back for a new replacement stem. It is obviously a favourite pipe. It has a black sandblast finish that is a bit dirty and a light cake in the bowl that had been recently reamed. There is an overflow of lava on the rim top. The pipe was still a beauty. The shank end of the vulcanite stem had been wrapped in tape but I am not sure the purpose of the tape. Under the tape was a polished nickel end cap on the stem for decorative purposes and perhaps Curtis would rather have it plain. The button end had been chewed and was missing a large piece of vulcanite on the underside of the button surface. The stem will need to be replaced. I took photos of the pipe before I began my work on it. I took a close up photo of the bowl and rim top to show the thickness of the cake and the condition of the stem when I received the pipe. It was a bit of a mess. The stem was in rough condition as noted above. You can see the damage on both sides of the stem – the chipped and broken underside of the button as well as the tooth damage on the topside of the stem. Looking at it you can see why we chose to restem it.The next two photos showed the stamping on the underside of the shank. It is faint and hard to read in the photos. In person it is faint but readable as noted above. I removed the stem and took a photo of the pipe to give a sense of perspective to the parts. I went back and reread my previous work on this pipe. I have been doing this long enough that I am doing repeat repairs on pipes that I had repaired before. This link is to the first restem on the pipe. Here is the link (https://rebornpipes.com/2022/12/22/new-life-and-new-look-for-a-neerup-made-in-denmark-bulldog/).

I reamed the bowl with a PipNet Pipe Reamer to remove the thin cake from the bowl – using a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife to scrape away the carbon coat. I sanded the walls smooth with a piece of dowel wrapped with some 220 grit sandpaper.I cleaned out the shank and the mortise with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and isopropyl alcohol to remove the tars and oils. I also cleaned out the airway in the stem I had chosen to use as well. I scrubbed the bowl with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush on the sandblast and the a brass bristle brush on the rim top. I rinsed the bowl with warm running water to rinse off the soap and the grime left behind. It looked better. I rubbed the bowl down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the sandblast with my fingertips and a horsehair shoe brush to get it deep in the grooves of the sandblast. I let it sit for 15 minutes and buffed it off with a soft cloth. I went through my stems and found this slightly longer taper stem that would need very little adjustment to fit in the shank. I took pictures of the old stem with the replacement stem in the photo to show the difference.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with a cloth impregnated with Obsidian Oil. The oil both preserves the rubber and also provides some needed friction for the micromesh pads. I polished it with Before & After Fine & Extra Fine Polish. I rubbed it down a final time with the oil and set it aside. This Neerup Made in Denmark Freehand Bulldog carved by Peder Jeppesen combines a great looking piece of sandblast briar with a multi-banded shank extension and a vulcanite stem to make a beautiful pipe. The removal of the thick shiny coat allows the grain to come alive with the polishing and waxing. I put the stem back on the bowl and carefully buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I gave the bowl and the 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 Neerup Made in Denmark Bulldog really is a beauty and fits nicely in the hand and looks very good. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ¾ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.80 ounces/51 grams. Once I finish the second pipe this one will be going back to Curtis to enjoy. Thanks for reading this blog and my reflections on the pipe while I worked on it. There are many more to come!

 

Restoring a Dunhill Shell Briar 127 F/T Chunky Billiard with a replacement taper stem

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by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is another one that came to us from the seller in Caldwell, Idaho, USA on 07/12/2025. It is a thick shank Dunhill Dark Sandblast bowl with a replacement stem. It is in dirty but in good condition other than that as can be seen in the photos below. The underside of the shank is stamped and readable. It reads 127 F/T on the heel of the bowl followed by Dunhill [over] Shell Briar [followed by] Made In [over] England followed by a superscript 0. That is followed by a circle 4 S identifying the bowl size as a Group 4 and the finish as a Shell Briar. It has rugged sandblast finish that is very tactile on both the shank and the bowl. The shape works very well with the sandblast grain. The finish was dusty and dirty with grime deep in the finish that is darkened. However, the grain really stands out. The bowl had a moderate cake and there was tobacco debris in the bowl. The rim top had a lava coat on the top and edges. The replacement vulcanite stem is dirty, lightly oxidized and has light tooth marks and dents on the top and underside of the stem. I took photos of the pipe to show what it looked like before I started working on it. I took a closer photo of the rim top and bowl to show the condition of the bowl and rim. You can see the light cake in the bowl and the darkening and lava on the top and the inner edge.The stamping on the smooth panel of the underside of the shank is clear and readable as noted above. I took a photo of the pipe with the stem removed to give a sense of the proportions of the pipe. Even with the deep gouge in the left side of the bowl it is a real beauty.I wanted to unpack the Dunhill stamping on the shank and work to understand each element of the stamp. I generally use the Pipephil site to gather as much initial information as possible (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/shell-briar1.html). The stamping is interpreted as follows: The number 127 is the shape number for a taper stem Billiard and the F/T is the stamp for the original Fish Tail stem. The Shell Briar stamp refers to the finish. The underlined, superscript number 0 following the D of England would give the date the pipe. The circle 4S tells me that the pipe is a group 4 sized pipe and the S is for the Shell finish. The photo below is of the stamping on a Don shape but the stamping is similar on this one.Pipephil also has some helpful dating keys on the site that are basically flow charts that you can walk through to date your pipe (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/cledat-en1.html). I turned to Part 1 of the Dating Key and followed the chart. This pipe has 0 following the D in England. There was no patent number so that took me to the section on the chart below (column one) which instructed me that the pipe could be dated as being made “posterior to 1954”.I followed the link under “Your pipe is posterior to 1954. Narrow down your dating”. That took me to Page 2 of the dating key (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/cledat-en1a.html). The first column – suffix [0] led me to the next section. Since the 0 after the D in England is raised, the date of the pipe is 1960.I then turned to Pipedia’s section on Dunhill Shell Briar to get a bit of background on the Dunhill finishes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill#Root_Briar). I quote:

Shell

A deep craggy sandblast with a black stain finish (usually made using Algerian briar) – the color of the stain used has varied over the years. Although there is some doubt as to them being the first to sandblast pipes, Dunhill’s Shell pipes, and the sandblasting techniques developed to create them are considered one of Dunhill’s greatest and most lasting contributions to the art of pipe making.

The documented history of Dunhill’s inception of the Shell is largely limited to patent applications — there are no catalogue pages or advertisements promoting blasted pipes at the time. The preliminary work on the English patent (No. 1484/17) was submitted on October 13, 1917. The patent submission was completed half a year later, on April 12, 1918, followed by the granting of the English patent on October 14, 1918. This was less than a month before the end of The Great War on November 11th.

In 1986 Dunhill released a line of premium Shell finish pipes – “RING GRAIN”. These are high-quality straight grain pipes which are sandblasted. Initially only Ring Grain, but now in two different finishes. In 1995 the “Shilling” was introduced with Cumberland finish – it is an extremely rare series. These pipes exhibit a deeper blast characteristic of that of the 1930’s – mid-1960’s (and the limited ‘deep blast’ pipes of the early 1980s) and show a fine graining pattern. These are considered the best new Dunhills by many enthusiasts today and are very rare. The finish is sometimes described as tasting like vanilla at first, with the taste becoming more normal or good as the pipe breaks in.

I began working on the pipe by reaming the bowl with a PipNet reamer. I used the third and fourth cutting heads to clean out the cake. I cleaned up what remained in the bowl with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife and scraped it back to bare briar. I finished by sanding the inside of the bowl with a dowel wrapped in sandpaper. The inside walls are free of burn damage or checking so the gouge does not go all the way through. I worked over the sandblast rim top with a brass bristle wire brush to remove the debris in the finish. While there was some darkening it looked much better. I cleaned out the inside of the shank and the airway in the stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and both bristle and regular pipe cleaners.I scrubbed the bowl and shank with a tooth brush and some undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap. I rinsed it off with warm water to remove the dust and soap from the finish. I dried it off with a soft cloth and it looked much better. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips to work it into the finish. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes then I buffed it with a cotton cloth to deepen the shine. The briar really comes alive with the balm. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded the surface of the stem with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to clean up the oxidation and tooth chatter on both sides. I sanded the stem with 320-3500 grit 2×2 inch pads to further adjust the fit of the stem to the shank. I wiped the stem down with an Obsidian Oil cloth after each sanding pad.I polished the vulcanite with micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit pads. I wiped it down with Obsidian Oil after each sanding pad. I used Before & After Pipe Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine to further polish the stem. This 1960 Dunhill Shell Briar 127 F/T Billiard with a replacement vulcanite taper stem has a beautiful, unique Dunhill Sandblast finish that is very deep and craggy. The Shell Briar mixed brown finish highlights some great grain around the bowl and shank. It has a unique sandblast that Dunhill specialized in making. The polished vulcanite taper stem adds to the mix. I put the stem back on the bowl and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel being careful to not buff the stamping. I gave the bowl multiple coats of Conservator’s Wax and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel and followed that by buffing it with a clean buffing pad. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The finished Dunhill Shell Briar 127 F/T Billiard is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ¼ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.48 ounces/42 grams. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. This one will be going on the rebornpipes store in the English Pipe Makers Section. Thanks for your time.