by Steve Laug

This pipe came to us from a seller in Memphis, Tennessee, USA on 08/27/2024. It was a Dunhill sandblast Billiard with and oval shank. The pipe was stamped with the shape number 0543 on the heel of the bowl [followed by] Dunhill Tanshell [over] Made in England16. It was quite clear and readable but there was not any size stamp or circle T as would be expected as it may have been buffed off. There was a thick cake in the bowl and a heavy coat of lava overflow on the rim top. It looked like it may have some burn damage on the inner edge and rim top. The sandblast finish was dirty and dusty looking. The oval taper stem is vulcanite and is oxidized. There are tooth marks and chatter on both sides of the stem ahead of the button. Once I received the pipe I would find a lot more issues with the pipe but what is mentioned above is a good summary. Jeff took some photos of the pipe when he received it to show the general condition. Here is a close up of the bowl and rim top. You can see the heavy cake and the heavy, thick lava coat. The inner edge of the rim appears to have damage from burns on the front and back edge. It really looks to be in bad condition with some heavy damage but once it is cleaned I will know for certain. The photos of the stem show the oxidation, tooth marks and chatter in the stem on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the sides of the bowl to show the interesting grain in the sandblast. The swirls and depths of the sandblast are intricate and quite beautiful. The stamping on the underside of the shank is shown in the photo below. It looks very good and readable. There are a few faint spots but overall it looks very good. It reads as noted and explained above. One of the first things I like to do is to unpack the stamping and understand each element in it. I turned to Pipephil helpful site (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/tanshell1.html). The stamping is interpreted as follows: The number 0543 is the shape number for a Billiard. The Tanshell stamp refers to the finish. The 16 following the D of England gives the date the pipe.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 a 16 following the D in England. It is the same size as the D 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 following the “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 second column (suffix 11…39) led me to the section with a 16 after the D in England. There was a directive for dating the pipe spelled out as follows: 1960 + suffix which gives the pipe a date of 1976. I then turned to Pipedia’s section on Dunhill Root Briar to get a bit of background on the Dunhill finishes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill#Root_Briar). I quote:

Tanshell

The first lot was distributed in 1952 (usually made using Sardinian briar). The prototype was called “Root Shell “, produced in 1951. The Tanshell is a light tan sandblast. Sardinian briar was used for this sandblast. There is a distinct contrast in the sandblasts using Sardinian as opposed to Algerian briar. The Sardinian is much denser and much harder. The resulting pattern, when blasted, is far more even and regular both in terms of the surface texture and the finish.

The Tanshell was Dunhill’s fourth finish and its first major post-war line addition. Introduced in 1951/1952 the Tanshell was a naturally stained sandblasted pipe made exclusively from Sardinian briar through the 1960s. The Tanshell apparently was not simply a light stained Shell but rather was also the product of “certain processes [unrevealed] not previously employed.” Initially, it appears that the pipe was to be named the Root Shell and a stamp to that effect was ordered and received by Dunhill in May 1951. Ultimately, however, the name Tanshell was settled upon but the stamp for the Tanshell name was not received by Dunhill until the beginning of December. Thus while the Tanshell was in production in 1951 it appears that most if not all Tanshells made in that year did not enter into retail distribution until 1952 and were given a 1952 date code. Loring, J. C., The Dunhill Briar Pipe, The Patent Years and After (self-published, Chicago, 1998).

I have also included a chart from the site from Dunhill spelling out the Standard Pipe Finishes and giving short information and a timeline

I turned to work on the pipe itself. 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. At first glance the pipe looked good when I received it. I took a photo of the rim top to show the damage to top and inner edge. It is burned on the front inner edge and back inner edge of the bowl and the rim top. The top is not flat but there is a dip on the front and back in the burn. There also appears to be some cracks on the surface of the rim extending down the back side of the bowl. I will need to examine it further. I ran a finger on the inside of the bowl and the wall was damaged exactly under the cracks on the exterior. There was some significant damage that would need to be addressed. The stem looks quite clean with some light marks on both sides.I took a photo try to capture the stamping on the heel of the bowl and shank. It is clear in spots but also shows some fading. I took a photo with the stem off the shank to give a sense of what the pipe looks like.Now it was time to tackle all the damage on the rim top and edges and then the cracks in the bowl and the burn damage happening on the inside behind the cracks. It really was a mess that I was not expecting when I pulled the pipe out of the box to work on. I used a brass bristle brush to knock off the damage and clean off the remaining charred briar on the rim top. I needed to clean it so I could see the cracks. It was better but the cracks are not visible in the photo below. The first is in the middle of the rim top at the back in the photo below. The second one is not far from it on the right side. I have drawn arrows to point them out in the photo below. To further prepare the top for the repairs to the cracks across the rim and down the back of the bowl I decided to further remove the damage on the surface and inner edge. I used a wooden half sphere and some 220 grit sandpaper to flatten the top and clean up the inner edge. I then topped the bowl with 220 grit sandpaper on a topping board to take care of the dips in the rim top that made it uneven. I wiped the bowl and rim down with a damp cloth to remove the sanding dust and then used some clear CA glue to fill in the crack. I used a dental pick to trace it through the cracks on the bowl side and the rim top. I pressed some briar dust into the repaired areas to fill in the opening of the hairline crack. I pressed it into the glue with a dental spatula. I used a wire brush to knock of the high spots of the repair. I then used my Dremel and a burr to follow the patterns of the surrounding sandblast to blend the repairs on the surface into the surrounding briar. I used the same burr to clean up the repairs on the rim top and to approximate a sandblast style finish that I had removed to do the repairs. It came out looking quite good. I used a Maple and a Cherry Stain Pen to match the colour on the surrounding briar on the back side of the bowl and the rim top. The colour matched very well.With the external cracks repaired, I mixed up a batch of JB Weld to address the damaged area on the inside of the bowl behind the exterior cracks. I spread it over the damaged area with a dental spatula until the area was covered and the wall repair was smooth with no dips or divots in the surface. I set the bowl aside to let the repair cure. Once it cured I sanded the bowl walls smooth with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a piece of dowel. Once the repair on the inside had hardened to touch I gave the bowl a coat of Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the surface of the briar with my finger tips and a shoe brush to get it into the depths of the sandblast. I let it sit on the briar for 20 minutes then buffed it off with a soft cloth. It looked quite amazing. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I “painted” the stem surface with the flame of a lighter to lift the marks. I was able to lift some of them a lot and the those that remained I filled in with some rubberized Black CA glue. I set it aside to cure. Once it had cured I used a small file to flatten it into the surface. I sanded the repaired areas with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. It looked much better. I further sanded it with 320-3500 grit 2×2 inch sanding pads. I wiped the stem down after each sanding pad with a damp cloth. It began to look much better at this point.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 1976 Dunhill Tanshell 0543 Oval Shank Billiard with a taper fishtail stem has a beautiful, unique Dunhill Sandblast finish that is very deep and craggy. The repairs to the rim top and back of the bowl look very good. The inside is once smooth again. The reddish-brown finish highlights some great grain around the bowl and shank. It has some great rugged sandblast that Dunhill specialized in making. The polished black 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 Tanshell 0543 Oval Shank 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 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inch, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 1.23 ounces/34 grams. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. If you are interested in adding it to your collection I will be adding it to the British Pipe Makers Section of the rebornpipes store. Thanks for your time.