Tag Archives: repairing checking cracking in a bowl with JB Weld

De Profundis: Rescuing a Peterson 301

Blog by Kenneth Lieblich

If this pipe could talk, surely it would say, “Out of the depths I have cried unto Thee, O Lord…”. This great pipe has truly come from the depths of … who knows where. It’s a handsome, rugged Peterson 301 System rusticated bent pot with a P-lip. As is often the case, this pipe (and the others in the photo below) came from an old gentleman, now deceased, who lived on Vancouver Island. The first two pipes below are both 301s and the third is perhaps/maybe a 317 (not sure yet). I have no idea what he did with these pipes (dropped them down the mines perhaps), but boy-oh-boy, these are pretty rough. No problem – it’s my job to sort things out.The only markings to be found on this pipe are the 301 found on the underside of the stummel, the K&P [over] Peterson on the nickel ferrule, and the double-stamped, stylized P on the stem. That’s annoying! Mark Irwin of Peterson Pipe Notes has written a few good articles about the 301s on his blog and I recommend reading one here and another one here. Of course, Steve has also written restoration blogs about the 301, including this one and it contained an important tidbit of information that I quote here:

I learned previously that the shape 301 was not introduced until 1975. Considering the Republic stamp, this one would likely date between 1975 and 2000.

This was significant because, due to the markings being almost entirely worn on this pipe, there was nothing on the wood other than the number 301 – and I couldn’t tell an age from that. Charles Lemon from Dad’s Pipes also has a post about a 301, which he describes as coming from the “1970’s era”. Now, what’s interesting about Steve and Charles’ pipes is that the patch of briar which shows the marks is quite different from mine. Below are Steve’s, Charles’, and my pipes, respectively. The first two are sort of freeform oval-ish shapes. Third (mine) is a rectangle and I wonder if that indicates a different era. I don’t know, but any of you reading this do, please let me know! This pipe is filthy beyond description – but must have been smoked frequently and with great affection. The stem has dirt everywhere, severe toothmarks aplenty, and calcification as I have seldom seen. Meanwhile, the stummel looks as though oily dirt has been rubbed into the surfaces of the rustication. The rim is coated in lava, the front edge of the rim is bashed, and the bowl is clogged with cake. Some spots on the rustication are really worn – the old fellow must have really loved his pipes. I began by cleaning some of the calcification on the outside of the stem. I took a blade (an old butter knife, actually) and began gently scraping at all that build-up. Obviously, I took it easy, as I did not want to damage the stem’s vulcanite any further. The butter knife worked quite well and I got a good amount loose. I followed that up with some Murphy’s on some cotton rounds to try and scrub the rest away. I broke out the isopropyl alcohol and pipe cleaners, and got to work on the inside of the stem. Predictably, it was unbelievably dirty and I went through a good number of pipe cleaners in order to clean it up.As I mentioned, there were quite a few dents in the stem. Some were obviously tooth marks, but other dents looked like blunt force trauma! Time to break out the BIC lighter to see if it could raise some of them. Quite frankly, it did not do much – this repair was going to require some considerable sanding etc. Before that, however, the stem went for an overnight soak in the deoxidizer. The following day, the oxidation had migrated to the surface and would be fairly straightforward to remove. I scrubbed vigorously with SoftScrub to remove the leftover oxidation. At this point, I painted the accidentally-duplicated P on the stem, as it was pretty rough – just like everything about this pipe.

Once clean, I set about repairing the dents. Before I moved on to the Micromesh pads, I built up the dent damage on the stem with black cyanoacrylate adhesive and let it fully cure. It turned out that this was not as straightforward as I had hoped. It took more than one application of adhesive to sort this problem out. I sanded the lumps down with my needle files and my grey pads, to make the stem look sort of normal. I then used all nine Micromesh pads (1,500 through 12,000 grit) to bring out the lovely black lustre on the stem. I also used Obsidian Pipe Stem Oil in between each of the last five pads. On to the stummel – this is where the lion’s share of the work was. The insides (both bowl and shank) were overwhelmed with cake and tar and anything else you’d care to mention. The bowl really needed to be reamed, so I used the KleenReem to scrape off as much built-up cake as possible. Generally, I prefer to sand the chamber down to bare briar. When restoring, it is important to ensure that there is no damage to the briar under the cake. There are a few situations when I might leave some cake in the bowl, but not today. There were definitely some craze lines in the briar on this pipe. I’ll come back to that later. Just like the bowl, the shank was absolutely disgusting. It had never been cleaned – or, not for many decades. I started cleaning the inside with isopropyl alcohol, Q-tips, and pipe cleaners. This took a while. The inside was very dirty and required and extraordinary number of Q-tips and pipe cleaners. Eventually some cleanliness came to it.I threw the stummel in my alcohol bath in the hope that it would loosen some of the ground-in filth on the outside of the bowl. After 24 hours, this worked a bit, but not enough. I added some scrubbing with Murphy’s and a toothbrush. This made things much better, but it’s a case of two steps forward and one step back: sure, it’s clean, but lots of the stain in now gone too. I decided to de-ghost the pipe despite what I had just done with the alcohol bath. I thrust cotton balls into the bowl and the shank and saturated them with 99% isopropyl alcohol. I let the stummel sit overnight. This caused even more oils, tars and smells to leach out into the cotton. The bowl was nice and clean after this.On to the ferrule – which was bashed and discoloured from years of mistreatment. Somewhat to my surprise, the ferrule came off very easily and required no special effort. I began by cleaning the metal with some SoftScrub on cotton rounds. This was quite good at removing the unsightly bits. I used some of my MicroMesh pads (only 3,600-12,000) to eliminate some of the minor scratches on the metal. It also gave a nice shine which clearly hadn’t been seen for decades. I used a jewelry cloth to give the final polish to the nickel. This ferrule would always retain some small dents etc. from its hard life, but it looks much improved. And this is where I stopped for a looooong time. It occurred to me that the amount of work involved in this pipe was tremendous. I was torn about how invasive I wanted to be in my pipe surgery. What about the damage to the rim? What about rematching the stain? What about the heavily worn sections of the rustication? Perhaps my temperament didn’t suit this pipe too well. I freely admit that I set aside the pipe for nearly six months before coming back to it. That sounds absurd, I know, but it was either that or chucking it in the fireplace.

Back in the present day, I began by working the rim back into shape. I sanded it down on my topping board so that it was level (it wasn’t before). I used some tools, including my Dremel and some modified screwdrivers, and re-rusticated the rim. It looked great, but too sharp. So, I sanded the sharp bits to add some softness to the rim. At this point, six months on, I couldn’t remember what cleaning I had and had not done to the pipe. I dragged out some soap and some tube brushes and scrubbed the insides. I’m glad I did – it still needed it.I wanted to have another look at the underside of the stummel for any sign of markings. I used a piece of chalk and pretended this was an old gravestone rubbing. The 301 came out more clearly, but, sadly, nothing else was revealed. It was worth a shot.I knew I had to stain the stummel, but I wanted to address the heat crazes inside the bowl first. I prepared some heat-resistant epoxy and filled the cracks and gouges, ensuring that the epoxy was evenly spread throughout the bowl. Of course, I did plug the draught hole with a folded pipe cleaner (coated in petroleum jelly) to make sure none of the epoxy made its way up there. Once done, a good 24 hours was needed to ensure that the epoxy was properly set.Having completed that, it was time for staining. This would require more than one colour and some finessing to get right. I applied black leather dye with a cotton dauber to colour the recesses (or valleys, if you like) of the rustication. I flamed it with my BIC lighter and let it set. This dye is alcohol-based, so I used isopropyl alcohol to wipe down the pipe and remove excess stain. This wasn’t sufficient, so I also used some 0000-grit steel wool. I coated it again with cordovan leather dye, flamed it again, and let that set too. As before, I wiped it down with alcohol to provide depth, nuance, and variation to the colour. I was pleased – and would be more pleased soon. At long last, I was off to my bench buffer to put the final touches on this pipe. I first gave it a thorough going-over with Red Tripoli. This may seem strange, but I needed to lighten the colour of the high points of the stummel. Then I used the White Diamond compound. Following that, several coats of conservator’s wax created a beautiful, glossy seal on the pipe and moved closer to closure for this long and involved repair.At this point, I glued the ferrule back in place. Then I gently sanded the inside of the bowl to provide a rough surface for what was to come next. I thinly coated the entire inside of the bowl with a mixture of activated charcoal and my wife’s homemade yogurt. Once hardened, this provided a good, slightly rough surface for a new cake to build.This rugged and handsome Peterson 301 System rusticated bent pot has come out of the depths and is back to life. I am pleased to announce that this pipe is for sale! If you are interested in acquiring it for your collection, please have a look in the “Ireland” pipe section of the store here on Steve’s website. You can also email me directly at kenneth@knightsofthepipe.com. The approximate dimensions of the pipe are as follows: length 5¾ in. (145 mm); height ¾ in. (45 mm); bowl diameter 1½ in. (38 mm); chamber diameter ¾ in. (20 mm). The weight of the pipe is 2 oz. (60 g). I hope you enjoyed reading the story of this restoration as much as I enjoyed restoring it. If you are interested in more of my work, please follow me here on Steve’s website or send me an email. Thank you very much for reading and, as always, I welcome and encourage your comments.

Redemption of a Mayfair 1005 Bent Tree Stump Pipe

11 Replies

Blog by Steve Laug

I can see what attracted Jeff to this pipe right away because it also grabs my attention. It has a rugged looking rustication that is somewhere between an aged piece of leather and a gnarled tree stump. There is something very charming about the appearance of the pipe that is for certain. The briar by and large appears to be in decent shape. The stamping on the shank reads MAYFAIR over 1005 with Italy stamped next to the stem shank junction. First thought was it may be a Sasieni or Charatan but I do not think it is. There is something almost Lorenzo like in terms of the look of the carving and the shape. The way the stamping is done and the Italy stamp makes me think that it is a basket pipe made for a pipe shop called the Mayfair Shop. In my I found that there is a shop in Edmonton, Alberta Canada called Mayfair Smoke & Gift Shop. There is also an area on London called Mayfair that at one time housed many pipe and tobacco shops. My own feeling is that the pipe probably came from the shop in Edmonton – the Italy stamp on the shank makes me think that rather than and English shop. The next close up photos show more of the carving on the bowl close up and the condition of the rim and cake in the bowl. In the first photo below there is a small chip out of the rim edge that shows up but should be easy to hide in the rustication. The rim top is quite dirty with the overflow of cake from the bowl. It is hard to see under the thick cake on it but there are curved strokes around the rim top that go clockwise. They include larger deeper strokes and fine hairlike strokes that are also in the grooves of the rustication on the bowl sides.The next photo shows the stamping on a smooth portion on the bottom of the shank. Does anyone know who made the Mayfair brand of pipe that was stamped like this?Other than being deeply oxidized the stem was in decent shape. There were not any tooth marks or deep tooth chatter on the stem surfaces. There was a cursive stylized T on the left side of the saddle portion of the stem.My brother cleaned up the pipe and sent it my way in Vancouver. As usual he did a thorough job of reaming and cleaning the inside of the shank, mortise and airway in the stem. They were spotless. I took the next four photos to show what the pipe looked like when it arrived.His cleanup of the rim revealed the curved clockwise strokes around the top surface.I took a close up picture of the rim top and if you look into the bowl a serious issue that would need further exploring.Even after the cleanup the stem looked in decent shape.I used a dental pick to probe the serious spidering cracks and crevices on the inside of the bowl. These were far worse than the recent ones that I addressed in the bowl of The Tobacconist Inc. Rhodesian recently using pipe mud (https://rebornpipes.com/2016/12/22/a-reclamation-project-the-tobacconist-inc-made-in-england-rhodesian/). These were deep and intricately burned gouges in the surface of the bowl. I used the Savinelli Fitsall Knife to scrape out as much damage on the walls as possible and without gouging out more and further damaging the surface. The next series of photos show the bowl as I turned it around examining the damage. I have to tell you at this point I was seriously considering throwing the pipe into the discard box and not bothering working any further on it. The stem could be salvaged and parts of the briar may be salvageable for repairs. It really was a desperate looking situation. It appeared to be a bowl on the very edge of being burned out all around – one of the worst messes on the inside of a bowl I had seen. But… and this is where I took a chance. I really like the rustication pattern on the briar and the shape also grabbed me so I decided to try a remedy that Charles Lemon of Dadspipes has used far more than me. I thought it might just work on this old bowl and provide a possible redemption to ongoing service.

I picked at the wood with a dental pick to remove any loose chips or chunks of briar to get the wood back to as solid a base as possible. I cleaned out the interior of the bowl with a cotton swab and alcohol until I removed all of the dust and debris from the cracks.I wanted a clean surface to work with. I set the bowl aside to dry and went to the hardware liquidation store down the street. I picked up some JB Weld (or rather a brand called Steel Weld which was made by JB Weld). I mixed the base and the hardener on a patch of paper with a wire until I had it well blended. Using a dental spatula I pressed the mixture into all of the cracks on the inside of the bowl. I slathered on (technical term) the coat of the mixture until all the inside walls of the bowl were smoothly covered. I dampened a cotton pad with alcohol and wiped off the JB Weld that had gotten on the rim top and inner edge of the bowl. I did not want it to harden as then it would be impossible to remove from the strokes on the surface. I set the bowl aside to let the bowl repair harden. Once it was cured overnight I would sand the surface clean leaving the repair only in the cracks themselves.

Being impatient by nature and by choice, I wanted to keep working on the pipe. I know that I have many more to work on but I wanted to see what the exterior of this old timer looked like once it was restained. So when the internal repair had hardened to touch (about an hour later) I decided to stain the briar. I used a Dark Brown aniline stain and applied it to the briar with a folded pipe cleaner. I flamed the stain to set it in the grooves and grain. I repeated the process until the coverage was what I wanted. With the stain coat done I took two photos to show the rim and interior of the bowl to show how the repairs looked before I sanded them down. The JB Weld still needed to cure but you can see how the walls looked at this point.I wanted to protect the bowl from the dust and the debris that would fly when I sanded out the bowl so I gave it a first coat of Conservator’s Wax. I buffed it with a shoe brush. I set the bowl aside until the afternoon to let the repair cure and turned my attention to the stem. I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the oxidation on the surface and smooth out the pitting.I polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding the stem with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. After each set of three pads I gave the stem a rub down with Obsidian Oil. After the final rub down I set the stem aside to dry until I had finished the bowl. When I came back to the bowl in the afternoon I took some photos of the interior before I sanded it to show what the dried JB Weld looked like. The surface is rough to the touch and hard. The cracks however are completely filled in.I used the Dremel and sanding drum to remove much of the excess fill/repair material. I set the Dremel at the lowest speed and slowly worked it over the inside of the bowl walls. I was able to remove much of the overage that way but I could not get all of the material off. My goal was to leave the JB Weld only in the crevices and cracks in the walls and not on the walls themselves. I wrapped a piece of 220 grit sandpaper around a wine cork, roughened the end to give some leverage on it and sanded the inside of the bowl. This further took back the JB Weld. I finished sanding the inside with a piece of 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around my index finger. When I was finished the cracks were filled and the bowl was smooth to touch. I wiped down the inside walls of the bowl with cotton swabs and clean water and the shank with pipe cleaners and clean water to remove all of the sanding dust and debris left behind by my work in the bowl. The next photos show the repairs on the walls of the bowl. The bowl is solid and feels undamaged. My next step in the repair is to coat the walls with a mixture of sour cream and charcoal powder – a bowl coating. This will further protect the walls and provide insulation until a cake can be formed.I walked down to the local supermarket and purchase a small package of sour cream. I put a spoonful of sour cream into a small bowl and broke open the last of my activated charcoal capsules into it. I mixed it with a spoon until the mixture was a dark grey colour and well blended.I know at this point many of you are thinking “sour cream in a pipe”. But that is exactly what I used. I mixed it well and put it on the walls of the pipe with a dental spatula and spread it evenly across the walls with a folded pipe cleaner. I had inserted a pipe cleaner in the shank to keep the airway clear of the bowl coating. I can assure you after many years of using this mixture – one by the way that is used by many pipe makers – that the mixture dries and has no residual smell or tasted. It is absolutely neutral. It provides a good insulator for the bowl while cake is formed. In this case it also covers the lines of JB Weld in the cracks of the bowl interior so it serves a dual purpose. I put the bowl aside to let the bowl coating cure and harden. I let it sit overnight to cure. I knew that once it had hardened it would be completely neutral in smell and taste. This morning the bowl coating had dried to a solid black colour with a little grit from the charcoal. The sour cream smell was gone and the bowl was smooth and black to the bottom. This morning I gave the bowl several more coats of Conservator’s Wax, buffed it with a shoe brush and finished by buffing it with a clean buffing pad to bring a shine to the smooth and rusticated portions of the bowl. I buffed the stem with Blue Diamond Polish on the buffing wheel and gave it several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. I hand buffed the whole pipe with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine and give the pipe a sense of warmth that this last step gives it. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It may seem like a lot of work to redeem this old pipe but the look of the finished pipe says it all to me. This one will be a pleasure to fire up and hold. The tactile nature of the rustication is complex and interesting to hold and study. Would you have done this work on one you have on the table? The only way that you will be able to answer that question is when you lay eyes on one that grabs a hold of your attention. Until then you may wonder at my madness. Thanks for walking with me through this exercise.