Tag Archives: repairing and replacing fills with super glue

Restoring a Fleur de Lis Squat Meerschaum Lined Bulldog 9240 made by GBD

Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is a squat Bulldog with a meerschaum lining. The pipe has a short saddle and long stem that is different. The bowl shape was very similar to GBD pipes that I have worked on. The meerschaum lining was more like a sleeve than a full bowl as it ends above the airway entry into the bottom of the bowl. At first I thought it was missing but the more I studied it the more I realized that it was made this way combining the best of briar and meerschaum in a unique way. It is a well-shaped straight Bulldog that had some nice grain poking through the grime. It was stamped on the top left side of the diamond shank and read Fleur de Lis over Meerschaum-lined. The stamping on the right side of the shank reads France over the shape number is 9240. The briar that showed has a combination of brown stains that highlights the grain. There were a few fills that stood out on the right side of the bowl below the twin rings under the cap. The finish was very dirty with a heavy coat of grime ground into the bowl and rim top as can be seen in the photos. The bowl had a thick cake with a heavy lava overflow on the inner edge of the top around the bowl. There was too much lava on the rim top and edge to know what they looked like but more would be revealed once it was cleaned. The stem was oxidized and there were light tooth marks and chatter on both sides and on the top and bottom edges of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he cleaned it up so you could see what we saw. Jeff took photos of the rim top to show lava build up around the rim and cake in the bowl. The lava actually was running down the edges of the cap of the bowl and had filled in over half of the beveled meerschaum lining. In the third photo you can see where the meerschaum lining ends. Jeff took some photos of the bowl sides and heel to show the grain that showed beneath the grime as well as the fills in the briar. I think that this will be a beautiful pipe once we are finished. The stamping on each side of the shank is shown in the photos below. They are clear and read as noted above. There is a Fleur de Lis on the left side of the saddle stem. The stem was a good fit to the shank. It was oxidized, calcified and had debris stuck to the surface of the vulcanite. It also shows the light tooth marks on the stem and on the button surface. I turned to Pipephil (www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-f3.html) to read about the Fleur de Lis Pipes. The screen capture matches the pipe I am working on. The one in hand is also a meerschaum lined pipe with a four digit shape number that reminded me of GBD pipes and a country of origin in France. There was no further information on the brand to be found there.I turned to Pipedia to check out information on the Fleur de Lis pipe brand and to see if there was a GBD connection (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Fleur_de_Lis). The article was very brief and linked the brand to the French GBD Factory. I quote:

Fleur de Lis pipes were made in the French GBD factory. It appears all the Fleur de Lis pipes had a meerschaum lining.

There was also a series of photos of a Fleur de Lis pipe with the box it came in that definitively linked the brand to GBD. I have included one of those photos below.

Example and details, courtesy Doug Valitchka

Now I knew that there was a connection so I did further checking on the idea that the number stamped on the shank side was a GBD shape number. I checked out the GBD shape numbers on to check my guess about the number 9240 (https://pipedia.org/wiki/GBD_Shapes/Numbers). I have a screen capture below of the shape number and description. It perfectly fit the pipe that I am working on. The 9240 GBD was the number of a squat Bulldog with a straight diamond shank and that is what I had in hand. Armed with that information and a clearer picture of the original pipe I turned to work on the pipe on my work table. I was really looking forward to what the pipe would look like once Jeff had worked his magic. What would the rim top look like? What would the meerschaum insert/sleeve look like? I had no idea. When I took it out of the box I was struck great job cleaning up the pipe Jeff had done. It was impressive! He carefully reamed the pipe with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. 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 Before & After 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 as well as the stem to show how clean they were. You can see that there is still some darkening to both the briar rim top and the beveled meerschaum edge. The stem is clean and the tooth damage on both sides is very clear in the photos. Lots more work to do on this pipe.I took a photo of the stamping on the sides of the shank. The stamping is readable as noted above. The Fleur de Lis stamp on the left side of the stem is very clear and deep enough to fill in with some colour.I took a photo of the pipe with the stem removed to show the overall look of stem, tenon and profile of the pipe. It really is a beautifully shaped pipe.I decided to start my work on the pipe by addressing the darkening on the meerschaum and the briar rim top. I sanded it with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper on a topping board. I was able to remove the darkening to the top of both materials. I would polish the rim top with micromesh when I polished the bowl. I repaired the putty fills on the right side of the bowl with clear super glue. Once the repair cured I sanded it smooth with 220 grit sandpaper. I touched up the stain on the rim top using a Maple stain pen to blend in the briar rim top and repaired areas on the right side of the bowl with the rest of the bowl colour. I polished the bowl and rim with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I worked over the rim top and edge of the bowl with the pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each pad to remove the sanding debris. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips to get it into the crevices. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 10 minutes while I worked on the stem. After the time passed 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 stem with 220 grit sandpaper to finish the shaping and to remove the remaining oxidation. I started polishing the stem with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. I wiped the stem down with Obsidian Oil before further polishing it. I used some Antique Gold Rub’n Buff to touch up the stamp on the stem. It looked better.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 French Made GBD Meerlined Fleur de Lis 9240 Squat Bulldog with a saddle stem is really quite nice. The meerlining is a sleeve that ends just above the entrance of the airway into the bowl. The mix of brown stains highlights the beautiful mixed grain around the bowl sides, top and bottom. The finish on the pipe is in excellent condition and the contrasting stains work well with the polished black vulcanite saddle stem. 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 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 straight squat Bulldog is very nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. It is a petite pipe whose dimensions are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 2 inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. This pipe will be going on the rebornpipes store shortly. If you are interesting in adding it to your collection let me know! Thanks for your time.

Refreshing a French Jeantet D’Orsay Billiard Found in Burgas

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Blog by Dal Stanton

The first time I saw the Jeantet D’Orsay was looking at a picture of it on my iPhone 6s. My fellow colleague, Gary, who also lives and works here in Bulgaria, was with his wife on the Black Sea coast strolling down the main walking street of Burgas. Gary has previously culled pipes for me during his travels as he keeps his eyes open and sends pictures of possibilities. Gary also is my main supplier of ‘quality’ cigar ash which is the main ingredient in making ‘Pipe Mud’ to coat the inside of bowls. The picture he sent was of two pipes, the Jeantet (top in picture below) and a nice hefty bent Billiard marked only with Bruyere [over] Garantie. My primary interest was the product of Saint Claude, France, the Jeantet, but I encouraged him to do a bundle deal which landed both in my ‘Help Me!’ basket. Thank you, Gary!I’ve not been restoring pipes long, but among my earliest restorations were French made and I enjoyed those initial forages of discovery of a pipe’s heritage and the geopolitical significance of the name. My first restoration of a Jeantet was a Fleuron and it was discovered at my favorite antique shop, dubbed, The Hole in the Wall, here in Sofia. It was then I discovered the historical importance of Saint Claude, the pipe production center in Europe for much of the 1800 and in the 1900s until pipe production peaked in the 1960s, causing many corporate closings and consolidations (See Pipedia’s article on Jeantet). Saint Claude became the a center for pipe production and the place many prominent pipe houses called home, not because of the accessibility of briar, but it was where industrious monks and artisans turned their abilities from making toys and religious paraphernalia to pipe making after briar pipes first started being mass produced (See: fumerchic.com) when briar was discovered to have heat resistant qualities. The Jeantet D’Orsay now on my worktable enjoys a part of this heritage, though most likely produced toward the closing chapters of Jeantet’s history. On my worktable, I take more pictures of the Jeantet D’Orsay to fill in the gaps. The nomenclature is stamped on the left side of the shank, with ‘Jeantet’ (in fancy script) [over] ‘BRUYERE’, and to the right of this is ‘D’Orsay’ (in diagonal fancy script). The stem bears the ‘J’ ensconced in a heptagon. As I research the D’Orsay line, I have found a dearth of information as I’ve looked for and through catalogues trying not only to ID the D’Orsay, but even finding any systematic information on Jeantet pipes in general is a challenge. If there is any clue in the name ‘D’Orsay’, I’m not sure what it is. Today, Orsay is a smaller suburb of Paris, primarily known as a center in the development of technology with different educational institutions based there. Historically, this Wiki article is informative:

There has been a village called Orsay on this site since 999, and the first church there was consecrated in 1157. From the sixteenth century, the town and surrounding area were owned by the Boucher family, and it was in honour of this family that Louis XIV gave the quai d’Orsay its name. This is the reason that the Musée d’Orsay is not in Orsay. In the eighteenth century, the family of Grimod du Fort bought the land and received the title of comte d’Orsay. In 1870, during the Franco-Prussian war, Orsay was occupied by the Prussian army. 88 young “Orcéens” were killed in the First World War.

Interesting, but not too helpful regarding the heritage of this French made pipe. Generally, the pipe is in great condition. The chamber has moderate cake. The rim has trace amounts of lava and grime – not too much to clean. The stummel has nice grain, but many very small fills to be examined. Not much in the way of oxidation or tooth chatter on the stem. Of interest to me is the long stinger system which reaches all the way to the draft hole – visible looking down the chamber. I will keep the stinger since it’s such a goliath. Perhaps it does help deliver the dryer, cooler smoke which has been the holy grail in pipe technological innovations. The cleanup and recommissioning of this Jeantet begins with placing the stem in the OxiClean bath after covering the ‘J’ stamp with petroleum jelly to protect it. Even though it has little oxidation, I’ll let it soak. I also easily remove the stinger as I discover that it is threaded and unscrews with a little help. The nickel divider band also comes off. I use the Pipnet Reaming Kit to address the moderate cake. Starting with the smallest blade, I remove the cake, bringing the fire chamber to fresh briar. I use two of the four blades available. To fine tune the reaming, I switch to the Savinelli Pipe Knife and scrape the chamber wall further. Then, wrapping a piece of 240 grit paper around a Sharpie Pen, I sand the bowl removing the vestiges of carbon. Finally, I wipe the chamber with a cotton pad wetted with alcohol. The chamber looks good – no problems that I see. Next, using undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a cotton pad, I scrub the external briar surface and rim. I also use my pin knife to scrape the crusting on the rim. I do this by dragging the blade over the surface rather than pushing the blade to not cut into the briar. Afterwards, I rinse the stummel in tap water. Examining the stummel more closely, the cleaning reveals a gouge on the internal rim lip. I also picture several of the small fills in the surface. I use a sharp dental probe to test the strength of the fills to see if they need replacing. What I discover is mixed news – some need more attention than others. I dig out the weaker fills and will need to refill them. I will simply use clear CA glue to fill them, but first I will darken the pits with a dye pen to improve blending. I use Special ‘T’ CA glue and spot drop on each pitted fill using a toothpick. I place a bit of glue on the toothpick and gravity pulls it to the tip and I apply it to the pit. I spray them with an accelerator to quicken the curing time. In all, 6 fills were patched. The pictures show the progress. Using a flat needle file, I bring each of the CA glue patches down near to the briar surface. Then I use 240 grit sanding paper to bring the patch flush with the briar surface. I try as much as possible with both the file and sand paper to file/sand only on the patch footprint. The second picture below shows a ‘slip’ off the footprint by the lower patch – ugh. The pictures show the progress. Turning now to the rim gouge mentioned earlier. There was already an internal bevel on the rim. To erase the damage, using 240 grit paper then 600 grit paper, I recut the bevel. That does the job. With the stummel repairs completed, I take a medium grade sanding sponge and apply it to the surface to remove surface nicks and to start blending the fill patches. I follow with a light grade sponge.Before I proceed further on the external surface, I need to address the internal unpleasantness. I’m curious what collects in the mortise with the tenon extending right to the draft hole? Unless, its design is to bypass all the sludge. Well, it didn’t take long to discern the latter to be the case! With cotton swabs, alcohol and a bit of scraping the edge with a needle file the mortise started cleaning up. Later, I will still utilize a Salt/Alcohol soak to clean and freshen further for the new steward of this classic Billiard.The stem has been soaking in the OxiClean bath and I take it out to start removing the light oxidation on the vulcanite. After reattaching the stem with the stummel, divided by my separation disk, I wet sand using 600 grit paper followed by 0000 grade steel wool. I’m not sure how I did it but it looks like I nicked the Jeantet ‘J’ circle during the sanding – that is a grand bummer. I’ll try to fix it later. The tooth chatter was removed by the 600 grit and steel wool. The pictures tell the story. Before moving further on the external sanding, I need to clean the internals. Using bristled and smooth pipe cleaners and isopropyl 95%, I do the job – the internals take more effort than I was expecting. I also use a long, wired, bristled brush to work on the stinger. In the end, I soak it in alcohol to make sure it’s clean. Turning back to the stummel, I plunge into the micromesh sanding by wet sanding with pads 1500 to 2400, then dry sanding with 3200 to 4000, finishing with 6000 to 12000. With the completion of the micromesh process on the stummel, my work-day here in Bulgaria will soon demand my full attention. Before heading out the door, I want to give the bowl a Salt/Alcohol soak through the day. I pour kosher salt, leaving no aftertaste, into the bowl until almost full. Then I twist and stretch a cotton ball to act as a wick in the mortise – drawing out the remaining tars and oils. I palm the top of the bowl and shake it causing the salt to settle into the internals and set the stummel in the egg carton. Then, with a large eye dropper I fill the bowl with isopropyl 95% until it surfaces over the kosher salt. I wait a few minutes as alcohol is absorbed, and then I top the bowl off again. I set the egg carton aside and let the alcohol and salt do their thing – off to work! Back from work! The salt has darkened a bit, but not much. This means that the job of cleaning was well along the way. After cleaning away the expended salt with paper towel and a bristled bush in the mortise, I put a cotton swab into the mortise to make sure and it came out clean. Clean as a whistle – nice! After the salt/alcohol soak, I see a fill on the inner rim lip that I did not see earlier. After digging it a bit with a dental probe, I drop fill it with ‘T’ CA glue, let it cure, file it down with a half-circle needle file, sand it with 240, 600 and then the full spectrum of micromesh pads – all these focused on bringing this patch up to the speed with the rest of the stummel! The Jeantet D’Orsay Billiard’s stinger was soaking in alcohol. I take it out and the alcohol had cleaned it up. I buff it with 0000 grade steel wool. While I was at it with the steel wool, I also buffed up the nickel band divider to clean and shine it.I love the classic leather brown look on work-horse Billiards. To blend the fills overall, I use Fiebing’s Light Brown Leather Dye to do the job. I set up my staining workstation and take a picture of it. I wipe the stummel down with a cotton pad wetted with alcohol to clean dust off the surface. I use a whittled cork in the stummel as a handle and I warm the stummel using a hot air gun to expand the grain helping it to be more receptive to the dye. When warm, I use a folded-over pipe cleaner to apply liberally the dye to the stummel – I want full coverage. Then, with a lit candle, I fire the stummel – burning off the alcohol in the dye which sets the pigment in the grain. I repeat this process after a few minutes, then I put the fired stummel aside to rest for several hours. With the dyed stummel resting, I turn to the stem. Earlier, I was using MagicEraser on the Jeantet’s ‘J’ stem stamp and I noted then that the paint was readily coming off because of it. I decide to go ahead and remove the paint and clean the stamp with the MagicEraser with the view to refreshing the ‘J’ stamp later. I then wet sand the stem – mindful of the ‘J’ stem stamp, with micromesh pads 1500 to 2400. Then I follow successively with pads 3200 to 4000 and 6000 to 12000, and applying Obsidian Oil after each set to revitalize the vulcanite stem. I’m hoping that there is enough tread left in the Jeantet ‘J’ stem stamp to hold new paint. Using white acrylic paint, I dab paint onto the area of the stamp. Instead of waiting for it to dry, I gently wipe the excess off while wet. Then I dab a little more wet where it is thin, and gently wipe off the excess. After some time has elapsed, it’s time to ‘unwrap’ the fired, dyed stummel. After mounting the felt buffing wheel on the Dremel, setting the speed to slow – 20%, I buff off the crust by applying Tripoli compound. The second picture below shows the contrast and progress. After the application of the more abrasive, Tripoli compound is completed (1^st picture), I wipe down the stummel using a cotton pad and isopropyl 95% to both lighten the stain and blend it. The alcohol wipe leaves a cloudy film on the stummel. I remove this by going to the next compound, Blue Diamond. I mount a cotton cloth buffing wheel on the Dremel and increase the speed to 40% and buff the briar surface. During this buffing, the grain starts to come out more distinctly and I like the deep rivers of grain that divide the stummel like a watermelon rind. I use a little CA glue and reattach the nickel band divider to the shank. I then use the Blue Diamond compound on the stem and band as well. The pictures show the progress. After completing the Blue Diamond buffing, I hand buff the stummel and stem with a felt cloth to remove the compound dust before waxing. I mount a cotton cloth buffing wheel on the Dremel, also at 40% speed, and apply a few coats of carnauba wax to both the bowl and stem. Completing the restoration, I give the pipe a rigorous hand buffing with a microfiber cloth to heighten the shine and distinctiveness of the briar grain.

When I started this restoration, I saw a classic straight Billiard that had potential. The Jeantet D’Orsay that Gary found for me in the antique store in Burgas, on the Black Sea, has proven to be a very attractive pipe with the light brown leather-look finish. The grain pops. I like the band divider – it’s not a precious metal but it provides a nice accent. This Jeantet D’Orsay is ready for a new steward! If you are interested in adding this pipe to your collection you can check it out in The Pipe Steward ‘Store Front’. All the pipes I restore benefit the Daughters of Bulgaria – women and girls we work with here in Bulgaria who have been trafficked and sexually exploited. Thanks for joining me!