Tag Archives: Stem repairs

Next on the table is an Edward’s Algerian Briar 706M5 Prince

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Blog by Steve Laug

Courtesy Doug Valitchka

The next pipe on the work table is an Edward’s pipe that we bought from a fellow in Los Angeles, California, USA. It is a classic Prince in terms of the flow of the stem and shank. The bowl had a thick cake and lava overflow on the rim. It was hard to estimate the condition of the rim top with the cake and lava coat but I was hoping it had been protected from damage. The bowl was smooth and a natural finish. The finish was dusty and tired but had some nice grain under the grime and the finish appeared to be in good condition. There were small fills all around the right side of the bowl. A lot would be revealed once Jeff had worked his magic on it. The stem was dirty but came with tooth chatter and deep tooth marks near the button on both sides. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he started his cleanup work. Jeff captured the condition of the bowl and rim top with the next series of photos. You can see the work that is ahead of us in the photos. The cake is very thick and heavy. The rim looked like it might have some damage on the back inner edge of the bowl. The next two photos of the stem show the top and underside of the stem. It is oxidized and calcified an you can see the tooth marks and chatter on the surface of both sides. Jeff took some great photos of the sides of the bowl and heel showing what is underneath the grime and debris of time and use. You can see the fills in briar on the right side. It will be interesting to see what happens as the pipe is cleaned and restored. He captured the stamping on the sides of the shank. They are clear and readable. The left side reads Edwards. On the right side it reads Algerian Briar 706M5.I turned to Pipedia to have a look at a bit of history on the brand and refresh my memory of the pipe line (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Edward%27s). I quote the article in full below.

Edward’s pipes were originally produced in Saint-Claude, France when Francais actually was a world-class pipe maker with longstanding business & political connections to Colonial Algeria that allowed them to obtain the finest briar.

During the tumultuous 1960’s, Edward’s created a business model to offer the finest briar available in both Classic and Freehand shapes – all at a fair price. They bought the company & equipment and cornered the market on the finest, choice Algerian Briar just before the supply vanished in political turmoil of Algeria’s independence. Edward’s packed up both machinery and briar-treasure to America, safely caching the essentials to create a new pipe-making dynasty. This was a coup, for the 70’s and 80’s were grim years for pipe smokers as quality briar all but disappeared.

Edward’s Design Philosophy is hard to pin down, think of their style as the “American Charatan” with unique & clever twists all their own. Today, they fashion pipes in several locations across the USA. All of Edward’s pipes are Algerian Briar – a fact very few pipe companies can claim, and all are oil-cured utilizing natural finishes – no strange concoctions are used to interfere in your tastebud’s dance with the briar. Algerian, Calabrian, Sardinian, Corsican – take your pick, but Algerian Briar is generally considered the finest smoking briar ever used. When combined with oil-curing, Algerian takes on a magical quality that even Alfred Dunhill recognized as far back as 1918 as the choice for both his Bruyere and Shell.

Now it was time to work on the pipe. I took it out of the box from Jeff and looked it over. It was amazingly clean and looked like a different pipe. He reamed it with a PipNet pipe reamer and cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed out the internals with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs until the pipe was clean. He scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime and grit on the briar and the lava on the rim top. The bowl looked very good. Jeff scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub to remove the grime and soaked it in Before & After Deoxidizer. When he took it out of the soak it came out looking far better. I took photos before I started my part of the work. I took some photos of the rim top and stem. The rim top is clean but there is a lot of damage to the inner edge on the front half of the bowl. The bowl itself looks very clean. The close up photos of the stem shows that is it very clean and the deep tooth marks are very visible. It almost looks as if the  previous owner had lightly carved grooves to emulate a dental bit on the top of the stem.I took photos of the stamping because they had cleaned up very well.I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the bowl and to give a sense of the proportion of the pipe. It is a classic Prince for sure.I decided to take care of the damage on the rim top and inner edge first. I worked over the inner edge with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper and repaired the existing bevel to obscure the damage to the edge. Once I had finished the bowl was round and the edge looked very good.I polished the briar and the shank with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit pads. I was able to blend in the repairs into the side of the bowl. I wiped the bowl down after each pad with a damp cloth. The grain really began to stand out and the finish took on a shine by the last sanding pad. The photos tell the story! I worked some Before & After Restoration Balm into the surface of the smooth briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, enliven and protect the briar. I let the balm sit for about twenty 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 to deal with the stem. I “painted” the surface of the stem with the flame of a Bic lighter to lift the tooth marks on the underside and grooves on the top side. I was able to lift most of them significantly. The few that remained I filled in with Loctite 380 CA glue. Once it had hardened I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper and 400 grit wet dry sandpaper to blend it into the surface of the vulcanite. I polished the vulcanite stem with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped it down after each sanding pad with a cloth containing some Obsidian Oil. I finished polishing it with Before & After Pipe Stem Polish – both Fine and Extra Fine and buffed it off with a cotton cloth. One irritation for me is that the repairs of the grooves on the topside with the Loctite 380 CA glue are not quite the same black as the stem surface. Because of that the grooves in the stem show even though they are smooth too the touch!! Arghhh. This oil cured Edward’s Algerian Briar 706M5 Prince was another fun pipe to work on and I really was looking forward to seeing it come back together again. With the grime and debris gone from the finish it was a beauty and the grain just pops at this point. I put the stem back on the bowl and buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel. I carefully avoided the stamping on the shank during the process. I gave the bowl and the stem multiple coats of carnauba wax on the buffing wheel and followed that by buffing it with a clean buffing pad on the buffer. I hand buffed the pipe with a microfiber cloth to deepen the shine. The rich natural finish on the bowl looks really good with the polished black vulcanite stem. It is very well done. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 inches, Height: 1  ¼ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 35grams/1.23oz. This is truly a great looking Edward’s. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. I will be adding it to the American Pipe Makers section of the rebornpipes store soon. If you want to add it to your collection send me an email or a message! Thanks for your time.

Cleaning up a Great Looking L.H. Stern Sterncrest 266 Bent Apple

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe on the table is one that Jeff picked up from an antique store on the Oregon Coast, USA early in 2019. It has been sitting here for a long time. It is a nice looking bent Apple with great grain. The stem is a taper that looks very good. The stamping on the left side of the shank read LHS in a diamond with Sterncrest [over] the top of the diamond and with Imported Briar under the diamond. On the underside of the shank it is stamped with the shape number 266. The shank had a line around the entirety that appeared to be left behind by a missing band. The finish has great grain that flairs up from the heel of the bowl. It is unique and attractive. There was a lot of grime and grit ground into the finish of the bowl. There was a heavy cake in the bowl  and a heavy overflow of lava on the sandblast rim top. The fit of the stem in the shank was smooth and flawless. On the left side of the stem was a silver diamond LHS logo inlaid on the stem. The stem was vulcanite and it was lightly oxidized, calcified and had some wear on both sides near the button.  Jeff took photos of the bowl and rim top to show the cake in the bowl. The rim top showed thick coat of lava was heavier on the backside and was thick enough that I hoped it would protect the rim edge. You can also see a fill on the back of the bowl toward the top. He took photos of the top and underside of the stem showing the tooth chatter, scratching, oxidation and calcification on the stem surface and wear on the edges of the button.   Jeff took a photo of the heel of the bowl to show the condition of the finish. You can see the well done shape and he amazing grain around the bowl and shank. Even under the dirt and debris of the years it looked very good. The stamping is clear and readable as noted above. You can see the line in the briar from where the band had previously been set. I turned first to Pipephil to get a quick review of the brand (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-lhs.html). I quote the information listed below.

The L&H Stern Inc. was established by Ludwig Stern (1877-1942) in 1911. His brother Hugo (1872-?) acted as vice-president & secretary. The firm moved to 56 Pearl St. Brooklyn in 1920. It closed down in the 1960s. LHS was one of the main pipe supplier for US soldiers during WWII.

I also did a screen capture of the section on the Sterncrest line. I have included it below. Sure enough the pipe originally had a sterling silver band. I would need to look through my bands and see if I could find a band that would fit the shank.I then turned to Pipedia to have a look at the history of the LH Stern brand and see if there were any pipes like the one in hand (https://pipedia.org/wiki/LHS). There were photos of many different LHS Sterncrest pipes but none quite like this one. The history was worth a read and I have included a summary of that below:

Ludwig Stern, a successful pipe manufacturer since 1893 and closing around 1960, reorganized his company along with his brother Hugo Stern, opening a factory in 1911. They named the company L&H Stern Smoking Pipes & Holders. The newly formed company was moved into a six story building on the corner of Pearl and Waters street Brooklyn, NY.

Thoroughly organized in all departments, and housed in a well-lighted and ventilated modern office and manufacturing building, the firm of L&H Stern Inc. is located near the first arch of the Manhattan bridge, near the river and convenient to the Brooklyn bridge, which makes it accessible from all the hotels in the metropolis for visiting buyers. The structure is six stories with a seventeen-foot basement, with light on three sides through prismatic glass windows, the first floor being seven feet above the sidewalk. Light enters the upper floors from all four sides.

L&H Stern is known to every important wholesaler and jobber in the country. LHS manufactures a complete line of briar pipes. Ginmetto wood pipes are also made, as well as Redmanol goods, the man-made amber. The first substitute for amber. Everything, even down to the sterling silver and other metal trimmings are made under one roof.

With the information I learned in the above articles I had the background on the pipe. Now it was time to work on it.

I am really happy to have Jeff’s help on cleaning up the pipes that we pick up along the way. He reamed the bowl with a PipNet pipe reamer and cleaned up the reaming with a Savinelli Fitsall Pipe Knife. He scrubbed out the internals with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs until the pipe was clean. He scrubbed the exterior of the bowl with Murphy’s Oil Soap and a tooth brush to remove the grime and grit on the briar and the lava on the rim top. The finish looks much better and the rim top was actually very visible and it looked good. Jeff soaked the stem in Before & After Deoxidizer bath for several house. He rinsed it off with warm water and clean out the internals. He scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub All Purpose Cleaner to remove the remaining oxidation on the stem. When the pipe arrived here in Vancouver it looked very good. I took some close up photos of the rim top and the stem surface. The rim top looked very good with a little darkening along the inner edge of the bowl at the back. I took close up photos of the stem to show the condition of the surface and button. The stem was very clean with tooth chatter on both sides near the button. There were some deep scratches on the topside.I took a photos of the stamping on the sides 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 and has some great grain on the bowl and shank.I decided to start my restoration work on this one by polishing the briar with micromesh sanding pads. I worked it over with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth to remove the dust. 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 smoothed out the marks from the missing band as best I could and readied the pipe shank for a new silver band. I found a sterling silver band in my collection of bands. I smeared the shank end with glue and pressed the band in place on the shank.I wiped the band down with a jeweler’s cloth to remove the tarnish. It did not take a lot to remove the tarnish and when it was finished it looked very good. With that done the bowl was finished other than the final buffing. I set it aside and turned my attention to the stem. I looked at the worn areas on the stem and decided to sand them out with 220 grit sandpaper and start polishing it with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper.     I polished the stem 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.   It is fun to come to end of the restoration of the LHS Sterncrest 266 Bent Apple. It turned out to be a nice looking pipe. The finish came alive with the work I had done on it. 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 hand buffed the pipe with a clean buffing pad to raise the shine. It is fun to see what the polished bowl looks like with the polished shank ring and black vulcanite saddle stem. It really was beautiful. This LHS Sterncrest 266 Bent Apple 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: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ½ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inch, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 47grams/1.66ounces. It is a beautiful pipe that I will soon put on the rebornpipes store in the American Pipe Makers section. If you are interested in adding it to your collection let me know. Thanks to each of you who are reading this blog. Remember we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next pipeman or woman.

 

 

New Life for a Patent Era 1915-18 Dunhill A Bruyere 42 Dublin

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Blog by Steve Laug

This Dunhill Standing Billiard is the last of five Dunhills that came to us in the same lot as the 1922 Dunhill Bruyere Reading Pipe, and included a cracked shank 1962 Dunhill Shell Briar Pot, a 1928 Dunhill Bruyere EK7 Panel Billiard, a 1915-18 Dunhill Bruyere 66 Standing Billiard, a 1936 Dunhill Bruyere 35 Billiard and the 1905 BBB Calabash Reading Pipe and 1911 BBB Glokar Poker. I have drawn a red box around the pipe in the picture to the left. It is an interesting canted Dublin. The pipe is stamped on the left side of the shank DUNHILL [over] Duke St. S.W. On the right side of the shank it was stamped MADE IN ENGLAND [over] “INNER TUBE” [over] PATENTED MARCH 9-15 that is followed by the shape number 42. Other than the shape number the pipe is stamped the same way as the Standing Billiard shape 66 that I finished recently.

It was another filthy pipe with a thick cake in the bowl and a heavy lava overflow on the rim top. The finish was tired and dirty with grime and debris stuck to the surface of the briar. The stem has a small white dot on top and the button on the topside had a deep tooth mark and damage. There was tooth chatter and marks on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he did his clean up work.He took photos of the bowl and rim to give a picture of the thickness of the cake and lava on the rim top. This must have been a favourite pipe to have that thick of a cake and lava buildup. The stem has tooth chatter and marks on both sides. The top is worse than the underside with deep marks in the top of the button. The pipe is old enough that it had an ivory white spot on the topside. Jeff took photos of the bowl from various angles to give a sense of the dirtiness of the finish but also the unique shape of the billiard sitter. It is going to be a real beauty!Jeff took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank . The stamping is quite faint and could not be captured with a camera. There are some faint spots but over all it is readable as noted above. I turned to Pipedia’s section on Dunhill Root Briar Pipes to get a bit of background on the Dunhill finishes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill#Root_Briar). I quote:

Bruyere

The original finish produced (usually made using Calabrian briar), and a big part of developing and marketing the brand. It was the only finish from 1910 until 1917. A dark reddish-brown stain. Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red.

There was a link on the above site to a section specifically written regarding the Bruyere finish (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill_Bruyere). I turned there and have included the information from that short article below.

Initially, made from over century-old briar burls, classified by a “B” (denoted highest quality pipe); “DR” (denoted straight-grained) and an “A” (denoted first quality), until early 1915. After that, they became a high-end subset to the Dunhill ‘Bruyere’. The DR and B pipes, a limited production, they should be distinguished as hand-cut in London from burls as opposed to the Bruyere line which was generally finished from French turned bowls until 1917, when the Calabrian briar started to be used, but not completely. Only in 1920 Dunhill took the final step in its pipe making operation and began sourcing and cutting all of its own bowls, proudly announcing thereafter that “no French briar was employed”.

Bruyere pipes were usually made using Calabrian briar, a very dense and hardy briar that has a modest grain but does very well with the deep red stain.

“Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red. The Shell finish was the original sandblast with a near-black stain (though the degree to which it is truly black has varied over the years). Lastly, the Root finish was smooth also but with a light brown finish. Early Dunhill used different briars with different stains, resulting in more distinct and identifiable creations… Over the years, to these traditional styles were added four new finishes: Cumberland, Dress, Chestnut and Amber Root, plus some now-defunct finishes, such as County, Russet and Red Bark.”

There was also a link to a catalogue page that gave examples and dates that the various finishes were introduced (https://pipedia.org/wiki/File:Dunnypipescatalog-1.png).I turned to Pipephil’s dating guide to show how I arrived at the date of manufacture for this pipe (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/cledat-en1.html). I am including a chart that is provided there for the dating of a pipe. I have drawn a red box around the pertinent section in the chart. Since the pipe I am working on has no clear patent number but says Patented March 9-15 I take that to clearly show that the pipe was made prior to 1921 and would have been included in the exceptions.I also turned to John Loring’s, The Dunhill Briar Pipe – The Patent Year and After, to work on understanding the DUNHILL [over]DUKE ST. S.W. I found information on page 5 of the book. It read as follows:

The Bruyere pipes were stamped DUNHILL over DUKE ST. S.W. on the shank with an “A” near the bowl to indicate first quality (the reverse side stamping in 1910 is presently unknown) and given shape numbers beginning with 31.

I read earlier sections of the book to do some checking on the Patent Stamping on this pipe. I found what I was looking for on page 58 where he spells out the Smooth Finish Patent Nomenclature Usage. In a very helpful chart he identifies PATENTED MARCH 9-15 that links the pipe to a US Patent for the years between 1915-23.On page 9 it reads:

…Dunhill applied for Canadian and American patents (granted in 1914 and 1915 respectively).

On page 12 it reads:

…From 1910 through October 1918 Dunhill branded its pipes with DUNHILL over DUKE ST. S.W….Inner tube patent numbers or references also serve to denote the earliest the pipe could have been manufactured., e.g. an English patent reference (PAT. No 5861/12) would not have been stamped prior to the 1913 grant, nor a Canadian patent reference (PATENTED 1914) prior to the 1914 grant nor a US patent reference (PATENTED MARCH.9-15 or PAT.AMERICA1915) prior to the 1915 grant.

I now knew that I was working on a Bruyere that came out in between 1915 and 1918 when the Duke St. SW stamp ceased to be used. The shape of the pipe was one of many Billiards that Dunhill put out and that the 66 was a normal Billiard Sitter shape with a taper stem.

I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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 Before & After Deoxidizer and once it had soaked rinsed it off with warm water to remove the residual solution. He dried it off and scrubbed it down with Soft Scrub All-Purpose cleaner to remove any oxidation that was still on the stem. The pipe looked very clean when I received it.  I took a photo of the rim top to show the condition. You can see the darkening on the rim top. It is roughened and slightly out of round with nicks on the inner edge. The stem had deep tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button and on the button itself. The oxidation was gone.  The damage on the topside at the button can be seen in the second photo of the stem surface below.I took photos of the sides of the shank to show the stamping. It is faint but readable as noted above. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the pipe parts to show what I was working with. It is another nice looking 100+ year old pipe.I decided to start the restoration on this one by working on the damage on the inner edge of the bowl. It had darkening and some damage to the edge. The pipe is over a 100 years old so it is not surprising that there was burn and reaming damage marks on the edge from a previous pipeman. I worked it over with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to remove and minimize the damage. When I finished with it, the bowl and the rim top looked much better.I polished the rim top and bowl with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. The grain on the pipe is quite beautiful. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 15 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 work on the stem. I filled in the tooth marks in the stem surface and the edge of the button on the top side. Once the repairs cured I recut the edges of the button with a file and smoothed out the repairs. I sanded them with 220 grit sandpaper to blend them into the surface. I started polishing the stem with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper.

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 Dunhill A Bruyere 42 Patent Dublin from 1915-18 is a beautiful looking piece of briar that has a shape that follows grain. The Bruyere is an early finish that Dunhill specialized in making. The finish on the pipe is in excellent condition. The red and brown stain on the bowl works well to highlight the grain. The polished black vulcanite panel 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 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 1915-18 Dunhill A Bruyere 42 Patent Dublin is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that like the other pipes I am working that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ 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 29grams/1.02oz. I am still working through what I am going to do with this old timer. I will keep it with me for a while until I decide. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. This pipe is classic reminder that we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.

 

 

New Life for a Patent Era 1915-18 Dunhill A Bruyere 66 Standing Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

This Dunhill Standing Billiard was one of five Dunhills that came to us in the same lot as the 1922 Dunhill Bruyere Reading Pipe, a cracked shank 1962 Dunhill Shell Briar Pot, a 1928 Dunhill Bruyere EK7 Panel Billiard and the 1905 BBB Calabash Reading Pipe and 1911 BBB Glokar Poker. I have drawn a red box around the pipe in the picture to the left. It is an interesting flat bottom silver banded Standing Billiard. The pipe is stamped on the left side of the shank DUNHILL [over] Duke St. S.W. On the right side of the shank it was stamped MADE IN ENGLAND [over] “INNER TUBE” [over] PATENTED MARCH 9-15 that is followed by the shape number 66.

It was another filthy pipe with a thick cake in the bowl and a heavy lava overflow on the rim top. The finish was tired and dirty with grime and debris stuck to the surface of the briar. The stem has a small white dot on top and the button on the topside had a deep tooth mark and damage. There was tooth chatter and marks on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he did his clean up work. He took photos of the bowl and rim to give a picture of the thickness of the cake and lava on the rim top. This must have been a favourite pipe to have that thick of a cake and lava buildup. The stem has tooth chatter and marks on both sides. The top is worse than the underside with deep marks in the top of the button. The pipe is old enough that it had an ivory white spot on the topside. Jeff took photos of the bowl from various angles to give a sense of the dirtiness of the finish but also the unique shape of the billiard sitter. It is going to be a real beauty! Jeff took photos of the stamping on the left side of the shank . The stamping on the right side is quite faint and could not be captured with a camera. There are some faint spots but over all it is readable as noted above. The second photo shows the band on the shank stamped Sterling Silver.I turned to Pipedia’s section on Dunhill Root Briar Pipes to get a bit of background on the Dunhill finishes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill#Root_Briar). I quote:

Bruyere

The original finish produced (usually made using Calabrian briar), and a big part of developing and marketing the brand. It was the only finish from 1910 until 1917. A dark reddish-brown stain. Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red.

There was a link on the above site to a section specifically written regarding the Bruyere finish (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill_Bruyere). I turned there and have included the information from that short article below.

Initially, made from over century-old briar burls, classified by a “B” (denoted highest quality pipe); “DR” (denoted straight-grained) and an “A” (denoted first quality), until early 1915. After that, they became a high-end subset to the Dunhill ‘Bruyere’. The DR and B pipes, a limited production, they should be distinguished as hand-cut in London from burls as opposed to the Bruyere line which was generally finished from French turned bowls until 1917, when the Calabrian briar started to be used, but not completely. Only in 1920 Dunhill took the final step in its pipe making operation and began sourcing and cutting all of its own bowls, proudly announcing thereafter that “no French briar was employed”.

Bruyere pipes were usually made using Calabrian briar, a very dense and hardy briar that has a modest grain but does very well with the deep red stain.

“Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red. The Shell finish was the original sandblast with a near-black stain (though the degree to which it is truly black has varied over the years). Lastly, the Root finish was smooth also but with a light brown finish. Early Dunhill used different briars with different stains, resulting in more distinct and identifiable creations… Over the years, to these traditional styles were added four new finishes: Cumberland, Dress, Chestnut and Amber Root, plus some now-defunct finishes, such as County, Russet and Red Bark.”

There was also a link to a catalogue page that gave examples and dates that the various finishes were introduced (https://pipedia.org/wiki/File:Dunnypipescatalog-1.png)I turned to Pipephil’s dating guide to show how I arrived at the date of manufacture for this pipe (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/cledat-en1.html). I am including a chart that is provided there for the dating of a pipe. I have drawn a red box around the pertinent section in the chart. Since the pipe I am working on has no clear patent number but says Patented March 9-15 I take that to clearly show that the pipe was made prior to 1921 and would have been included in the exceptions.I also turned to John Loring’s, The Dunhill Briar Pipe – The Patent Year and After, to work on understanding the DUNHILL [over]DUKE ST. S.W. I found information on page 5 of the book. It read as follows:

The Bruyere pipes were stamped DUNHILL over DUKE ST. S.W. on the shank with an “A” near the bowl to indicate first quality (the reverse side stamping in 1910 is presently unknown) and given shape numbers beginning with 31.

I read earlier sections of the book to do some checking on the Patent Stamping on this pipe. I found what I was looking for on page 58 where he spells out the Smooth Finish Patent Nomenclature Usage. In a very helpful chart he identifies PATENTED MARCH 9-15 that links the pipe to a US Patent for the years between 1915-23.On page 9 it reads:

…Dunhill applied for Canadian and American patents (granted in 1914 and 1915 respectively).

On page 12 it reads:

…From 1910 through October 1918 Dunhill branded its pipes with DUNHILL over DUKE ST. S.W….Inner tube patent numbers or references also serve to denote the earliest the pipe could have been manufactured., e.g. an English patent reference (PAT. No 5861/12) would not have been stamped prior to the 1913 grant, nor a Canadian patent reference (PATENTED 1914) prior to the 1914 grant nor a US patent reference (PATENTED MARCH.9-15 or PAT.AMERICA1915) prior to the 1915 grant.

I now knew that I was working on a Bruyere that came out in between 1915 and 1918 when the Duke St. SW stamp ceased to be used. The shape of the pipe was one of many Billiards that Dunhill put out and that the 66 was a normal Billiard Sitter shape with a taper stem.

I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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 Before & After Deoxidizer and once it had soaked rinsed it off with warm water to remove the residual solution. He dried it off and scrubbed it down with Soft Scrub All-Purpose cleaner to remove any oxidation that was still on the stem. The pipe looked very clean when I received it. I took a photo of the rim top to show the condition. You can see the darkening on the rim top. It is roughened and slightly out of round with nicks on the inner edge. The stem had deep tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button and on the button itself. The oxidation was gone.  The damage on the topside at the button can be seen in the second photo of the stem surface below.I took photos of the sides of the shank to show the stamping. It is faint but readable as noted above. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the pipe parts to show what I was working with. It is a nice looking pipe.I decided to start the restoration on this one by working on the damage on the inner edge of the bowl. It had darkening and some damage to the edge. The pipe is almost 100 years old so it is not surprising that there was burn and reaming damage marks on the edge from a previous pipeman. I worked it over with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to remove and minimize the damage. When I finished with it, the bowl and the rim top looked much better. I polished the rim top and bowl with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. Even though there were small marks on the briar from the pipe’s journey it began to take on a shine.   I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 15 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 work on the stem. I filled in the tooth marks in the stem surface and rebuilt the edge of the button on the top side. Once the repairs cured I recut the edges of the button with a file and smoothed out the repairs. I sanded them with 220 grit sandpaper to blend them into the surface. I started polishing the stem with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. 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 Dunhill A Bruyere 66 Patent Standing Billiard from 1915-18 is a beautiful looking piece of briar that has a shape that follows grain. The Bruyere is an early finish that Dunhill specialized in making. The finish on the pipe is in excellent condition. The red and brown stain on the bowl works well to highlight the grain. The Sterling Silver Band is a great break between the briar and the stem. The polished black vulcanite panel 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 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 1915-18 Dunhill A Bruyere 66 Patent Standing Billiard is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that like the other pipes I am working that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 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 31grams/1.09oz. I am still working through what I am going to do with this old timer. I will keep it with me for a while until I decide. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. This pipe is classic reminder that we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.

New Life for another Dunhill – A Patent Era 1928 Dunhill Bruyere EK7 Panel Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

This Dunhill Panel Billiard was one of five other Billiards that came to us in the same lot as the 1922 Dunhill Bruyere Reading Pipe, a cracked shank 1962 Dunhill Shell Briar Pot and the 1905 BBB Calabash Reading Pipe and 1911 BBB Glokar Poker. I have drawn a red box around the pipe in the picture to the left. It is an interesting square shank Panel billiard. The pipe is stamped on the left side of the shank DUNHILL [over] LONDON. On the right side of the shank it was stamped “INNER TUBE [over] PAT. NO 116989/178 that is followed by the shape number EK7.

It was another filthy pipe with a thick cake in the bowl and a heavy lava overflow on the rim top. The finish was tired and dirty with grime and debris stuck to the surface of the briar. The stem has a small white dot on top and the button on the topside had a deep tooth mark and damage. There was tooth chatter and marks on both sides ahead of the button. Jeff took photos of the pipe before he did his clean up work.   He took photos of the bowl and rim to give a picture of the thickness of the cake and lava on the rim top. This must have been a favourite pipe to have that thick of a cake and lava buildup. The stem had a chip out of the button on the topside and tooth chatter and marks on both sides. It was a square stem that looked very good with the pipe. Jeff took photos of the bowl from various angles to give a sense of the dirtiness of the finish but also the unique shape of the panel billiard. It is going to be a real beauty! Jeff took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank . There are some faint spots but over all it is readable as noted above.There was also a Reg. No. stamped on the stem that read REG.NO. [over] 654638. I looked up what the Reg. No. stamp meant in John Loring’s The Dunhill Briar Pipe – The Patent Year and After, pg. 42. I quote the pertinent section below.

Prior to the war the bottom of the Dunhill black vulcanite bit had a “REG. No 654638” stamped (without color) on thee underside of the bit near the meeting point with the shank. I have yet been able to determine what the number refers to but I am fairly certain it is not to the White Spot trade mark since the stamping has been consistently found on pipe bits dating back to the 1918 while the White Spot trademark stamp was not awarded until 1922.

I turned to Pipedia’s section on Dunhill Root Briar Pipes to get a bit of background on the Dunhill finishes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill#Root_Briar). I quote:

Bruyere

The original finish produced (usually made using Calabrian briar), and a big part of developing and marketing the brand. It was the only finish from 1910 until 1917. A dark reddish-brown stain. Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red.

There was a link on the above site to a section specifically written regarding the Bruyere finish (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill_Bruyere). I turned there and have included the information from that short article below.

Initially, made from over century-old briar burls, classified by a “B” (denoted highest quality pipe); “DR” (denoted straight-grained) and an “A” (denoted first quality), until early 1915. After that, they became a high-end subset to the Dunhill ‘Bruyere’. The DR and B pipes, a limited production, they should be distinguished as hand-cut in London from burls as opposed to the Bruyere line which was generally finished from French turned bowls until 1917, when the Calabrian briar started to be used, but not completely. Only in 1920 Dunhill took the final step in its pipe making operation and began sourcing and cutting all of its own bowls, proudly announcing thereafter that “no French briar was employed”.

Bruyere pipes were usually made using Calabrian briar, a very dense and hardy briar that has a modest grain but does very well with the deep red stain.

“Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red. The Shell finish was the original sandblast with a near-black stain (though the degree to which it is truly black has varied over the years). Lastly, the Root finish was smooth also but with a light brown finish. Early Dunhill used different briars with different stains, resulting in more distinct and identifiable creations… Over the years, to these traditional styles were added four new finishes: Cumberland, Dress, Chestnut and Amber Root, plus some now-defunct finishes, such as County, Russet and Red Bark.”

There was also a link to a catalogue page that gave examples and dates that the various finishes were introduced (https://pipedia.org/wiki/File:Dunnypipescatalog-1.png).I turned to Pipephil’s dating guide to show how I arrived at the date of manufacture for this pipe (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/cledat-en1.html). I am including two charts that are provided there for the dating a pipe. I have drawn a red box around the pertinent section in each chart. Since the pipe I am working on has a suffix 8 that is raised superscript it points to 1920+ 8 for a date of 1928 on the charts below. I also turned to John Loring’s, The Dunhill Briar Pipe – The Patent Year and After, to do some checking on the Patent number on this pipe. I found what I was looking for on page 58 where he spells out the Smooth Finish Patent Nomenclature Usage. In a very helpful chart he identifies the Pat No. 116989/17 as occurring between 1918? and 1934. The date stamp of 8 coincided with that identifying the year as 1928.

I now knew that I was working on a Bruyere that came out in 1928 because of the date stamp 8. The shape of the pipe was one of many Billiards that Dunhill put out and that the EK7 was a normal Panel Billiard shape with a taper stem. The Reg. No. on the underside of the stem also fits well within that date time.

I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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 Before & After Deoxidizer and once it had soaked rinsed it off with warm water to remove the residual solution. He dried it off and scrubbed it down with Soft Scrub All-Purpose cleaner to remove any oxidation that was still on the stem. The pipe looked very clean when I received it.  I took a photo of the rim top to show the condition. You can see the darkening on the rim top. It is roughened and slightly out of round with nicks on the inner edge. The stem came out looking quite good. There are light tooth marks and chatter on both sides near the button but the oxidation was gone.  The damage on the topside at the button can be seen in the second photo of the stem surface below.I took photos of the sides of the shank to show the stamping. It is clear and readable as noted above. I removed the stem from the shank and took a photo of the pipe parts to show what I was working with. It is a nice looking pipe.I decided to start the restoration on this one by working on the damage on the inner edge of the bowl. It had darkening and some damage to the edge. The pipe is almost 100 years old so it is not surprising that there was burn and reaming damage marks on the edge from a previous pipeman. I worked it over with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to remove and minimize the damage. When I finished with it, the bowl and the rim top looked much better.I polished the rim top and bowl with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. Even though there were small marks on the briar from the pipe’s journey it began to take on a shine.     I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 15 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 work on the stem. I greased a pipe cleaner with Vaseline and inserted it in the button and filled in the damaged areas with black rubberized Loctite 380 CA glue. I sprayed the repair with an accelerator and removed the pipe cleaner. I checked and the airway was wide open… Whew! Once it cured I used files to sharpen the edge of the button and smooth out the top and undersides. I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper to blend it into the surrounding vulcanite. I started polishing it with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. 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 Dunhill Bruyere EK7 Patent Panel Billiard from 1928 is a beautiful looking piece of briar that has a shape that follows grain. The Bruyere is an early finish that Dunhill specialized in making. The finish on the pipe is in excellent condition. The red and brown stain on the bowl works well to highlight the grain. The polished black vulcanite panel 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 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 Bruyere EK7 Panel Billiard is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that like the other pipes I am working that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 inch, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 29grams/1.02oz. I am still working through what I am going to do with this old timer. I will keep it with me for a while until I decide. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. This pipe is classic reminder that we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.

Restemming and Restoring a Sasieni Windsor London Made Oom Paul 80

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe I chose to work on was a Sasieni Windsor Sandblast |Bowl sans stem that was purchased from a shop in Oregon when Irene and I visited my brother on the coast there. It has been sitting in my box of bowls since that time. Jeff cleaned it up and mailed it to me. I have been postponing restemming any of the pipes for a while now but after restemming that little gourd calabash a couple of days ago I was ready to do a few more. I pulled this one out of the box and set aside to be the next pipe to work on. It has a very deep sandblast that is quite stunning on the full bent pipe. Overall it is a pretty pipe. The bowl had thick cake in the bowl and there was a coat of lava in the grooves of the rim top. The finish had a lot of dust and debris in the valleys of the blast. The stamping on the smooth panel on the underside of the shank was clear and readable. It was stamped Sasieni [over] Windsor [over] London Made. To the right of that it was stamped with the shape number 80. To the left of the Sasieni stamp on the heel of the bowl it is stamped Made in England in a rugby ball shaped stamp. Jeff took some photos of the bowl before he cleaned it up. The next three close up photos show the condition of the bowl and rim top. You can see the lava coat on the inner edge of the bowl and the debris in the rustication of the rim top. Jeff took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It read as noted above and is  faint and readable.I turned to Pipephil’s site to get a read on the Sasieni Windsor line to see if I could find out more about the stamping (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-sasieni2.html). The pipe was in the section on the site as a Sasieni seconds and sub-brands. The pipe in the second photo had very similar stamping to the bowl I was working on. I did a screen capture of the section on Pipephil. I have included it below.  There were also photos that were included on Pipephil of what the sandblast looked like on the Sasieni Windsor originally.The third photo of the underside of the shank shows a similar stamping to the pipe I am working on. The pipe originally had a saddle vulcanite stem. The stem was long gone when Jeff and I picked it up so I had some decisions to make about the stem I would use to restem it.I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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. The pipe looked very clean when I received it. The rim top cleaned up really well as can be seen in the close up photos below. I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It really is faint but readable. I went through my can of stems and found turned freehand style vulcanite stem that would work well with the bowl and shank. The bend in it was a little too high and would need to be heated and bent for the Oom Paul shape. There were tooth marks in surface of the top and underside of the stem at the button that would need to be dealt with in the restoration.   I took a photo of the stem and bowl together to give a sense of the look of the pipe and the proportion of the stem. I put the stem in place on the shank and took photos of combination of the bowl and stem. It is going to look very good once it is cleaned up. 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 15 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 put a pipe cleaner in the stem and then heated the stem with my heat gun until the vulcanite was supple. I bent it to the angle that matched the bowl. I filled in the tooth marks and rebuilt the button top with black super glue and set it aside to cure. Once it had cured I used files to reshape the edge of the button and flatten the repairs on the stem surface. I blended the repairs into the surface of the vulcanite with 220 grit sandpaper. I started polishing the stem with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. The stem was looking much 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 restemmed, sandblasted Sasieni Windsor 80 Oom Paul is a beautiful looking pipe. The brown stains on the bowl work well to highlight the finish. The polished black vulcanite saddle stem adds to the mix. I put the finished stem on the bowl and buffed it 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 Sasieni Windsor 80 is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished Oom Paul a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: ¾ of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 46grams/1.62oz. It will soon be added to the British Pipe Makers section on the rebornpipes store. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. Remember we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.

 

Restoring a Badly Burned Kaywoodie Super Grain 86B

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Blog by Alex Heidenreich

Earlier this week I received and email with an attachment from Alex about a Kaywoodie pipe he had restored for a friend. He wanted my opinion on the restoration and on the piece he had written about it. I took time this weekend to read over the piece and study the photos and I have to say I was quite impressed with his work. I wrote him back with some questions and asked if I could post his piece on the blog. He said he was thrilled and honoured to be asked so without further ado I introduce you to Alex Heidenreich’s Kaywoodie Super Grain 86B restoration.

Introduction:

Kaywoodies are some of my favorite pipes. I love the history of the company and the amazing quality briar used in the older pipes. So, when I saw this poor Kaywoodie on eBay, I was quick to bid on it. When it arrived in the mail, I took a closer look at it. It was in even worse shape than the pictures had led me to believe. It was dented and dinged on the outside of the bowl. The rim was badly chewed up and then caked over with a thick coating of lava that had spilled all the way down onto the shank. The stem was badly oxidized, and I couldn’t get a pipe cleaner through the stem or the shank. This pipe looked like a lot of work. So, I ended up setting it aside for a while. Later, a friend of mine from our pipe group on PipeTobaccoDiscord said he was looking to add a Kaywoodie to his collection. I sent him some pictures of the ones in my restoration pile and despite the damage, he fell in love with this one, and thus the work began.

Acquisition Pictures: History:

As Steve has talked about many times, finding the exact date of a pipe can be difficult. Kaywoodie has a rich history, and a good amount of it is documented over on https://pipedia.org/wiki/Collector%27s_Guide_to_Kaywoodie_Pipes. The first thing I did was head over to their documentation on the shape numbers: https://pipedia.org/wiki/Kaywoodie_Shape_Numbers. This told me that the 86B shape number was a Large Apple with a flat top bowl and was produced from 1947-1971. For many shapes of Kaywoodies, the logo was printed on top of the stem until the late 1940s or early 1950s. Since this logo was on the side of the stem, I surmised it was probably a post-1955 model. Just after this time (somewhere in the mid-50s or 60s), Kaywoodie also moved from a 4-hole stinger to a 3-hole stinger. Since this pipe has the logo on the side, but still had a 4-hole stinger, it was likely made in that interim period from 1959-1965.

Picture from a 1955 Catalog showing the 86B (notice the logo is on the top of the stem)Picture from: https://pipedia.org/wiki/Collector%27s_Guide_to_Kaywoodie_Pipes courtesy ChrisKeene.com

Restoration:

I took the pipe apart to see how bad it was. It was extremely dirty, and the finish was badly damaged. There were burn marks and lava all over the rim and shank.

I started by reaming the pipe. The bowl is large. So, it took a lot of reaming to get clean. The outside was extremely dirty. So, I cleaned the pipe 4 or 5 times with Murphy’s Oil Soap. I really soaked the rim well to try to soften the lava. It took a ton of scrubbing and a little work with a knife, but I was able to get most of it off and remove a lot of the burn marks on the shank. Unfortunately, this revealed a great deal of damage to the rim. There were also multiple fills, and I even had to remove a protruding grain of sand from the briar. To repair the damage to the rim, I carefully sanded back the damaged areas on a topping board, careful not to change the shape of the rim. I put a dab of Vaseline on the logo to protect it, then soaked the stem in an oxyclean bath. This would help loosen up all the gunk inside and make it easier to clean the oxidation off the outside. I also filled the bowl with cotton balls, stuck pipe cleaners in the shank, and then used a syringe to fill the bowl with alcohol to help remove any ghosting in the pipe, as well as loosen up any remaining cake inside the bowl to make it easier to clean.   After I got the stem out of the oxy bath, it revealed a lot of oxidation that would need to be cleaned up. The internals of the stem were also gooped up, but I was able to now force a pipe cleaner through it. I cleaned much of the surface oxidation with a Magic Eraser, then moved on to the internals.I sanded the stem with 600, 800, 1000, then moved into micro mesh pads from 1200 – 12000. Once finished, I oiled the stem with Obsidian Stem Oil and let it soak in. I turned my attention back to the bowl and did my best to clean out the inside of the shank and bowl with Q Tips and Pipe Cleaners soaked in alcohol. Then I set it aside for day 1.

Cleaning the shank and the stem took A LOT of pipe cleaners and Q Tips… After letting the pipe dry over night, I was able to see more clearly the inside and outside of the pipe. No surprise with how burned the outside of the pipe was that there were also heat fissures inside the bowl. I inspected them carefully and gauged their depth with dental picks. They, luckily, were not too deep. I was also now able to see some of the fills, scratches, and sand pits better on the outside of the bowl. I used a wet rag and a hot iron to try to raise them a bit. Then I carefully cleaned them out with my dental picks. At this point, I got a little ahead of myself as I focused on cleaning out the pits. I moved on to filling the pits and scratches with CA glue before fully stripping the finish. After the glue cured, I sanded down the glue spots. Then I wiped the entire stummel down with high-proof alcohol followed by acetone to really remove the finish. Since I did my steps slightly out of order, the CA glue had softened in a couple of the fills. So, I picked it out and refilled it. I let the glue cure and then sanded the entire stummel. I had to be very careful over the stamping to preserve it. With the finish removed and the stummel sanded, I placed a wine cork in the bowl and coated it with dye.It’s hard to tell in the pictures, but the dye came out a little too dark, more similar to a Flame Grain. To keep it authentic with a Super Grain, I needed to lighten it back up a bit. I lightly sanded it with my sequence of micromesh pads which also brought the shine back. After the stummel was sanded, the color was nearly perfect. I then buffed it using Tripoli, followed by White Diamond, and finally Carnauba. Now that the outside was finished, I moved on to the inside. After really inspecting the fissures, some of them were deeper than I would like. If it was my pipe, I would have done a bowl coating and just kept an eye on them to address later, but since this pipe was for someone else, I wanted to address it now. This way they won’t have to deal with it down the road. I mixed up some JB Weld, which dries inert and can handle the heat. I carefully stuck it only into the fissures, using as little as possible so as not to coat the briar, since JB Weld won’t breathe like briar.After it cured, I sanded down the JB Weld to make the bowl smooth and flush, as well as to remove any that was not inside the fissures.Then I coated the bowl with activated charcoal in a great method I learned from Dad’s Pipes. (https://dadspipes.com/2015/08/12/a-simple-effective-bowl-coating/)After cleaning the charcoal off the rim, I noticed it had dulled a little bit. So, I threw the buffing wheel back on and gave it another coat of Carnauba. The pipe was now complete! I hope it will bring its new owner joy for many years!

Final Pictures:

Restemming and Restoring a Monte Verde Hand Made Freehand Bowl

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe I chose to work on was a Monte Verde bowl sans stem that was purchased from an online auction on 03/06/18 from Nampa, Idaho, USA. It has been sitting in my box of bowls since that time. Jeff cleaned it up and mailed it to me. I have been postponing restemming any of the pipes for a while now but after restemming that little gourd calabash a couple of days ago I was ready to do a few more. I pulled this one out of the box first and set aside to be the next pipe to work on. It has a very craggy rustication that is quite stunning and a square flared shank. Overall it is a pretty pipe. The bowl had thick cake in the bowl and the rim top had a coat of lava on the inner edge of the bowl and in the grooves of the rim top. The finish had a lot of dust and debris in the valleys of the rustication. The stamping on the smooth panel on the underside of the shank was clear and readable. It was stamped Monte Verdi [over] Made in Denmark [over] By Hand [over] Golden Tan in script. I knew that the Monte Verdi line was made by Preben Holm of Ben Wade and Preben Holm Freehand fame. Jeff took some photos of the bowl before he cleaned it up. The next two close up photos show the condition of the bowl and rim top. You can see the lava coat on the inner edge of the bowl and the debris in the rustication of the rim top. Jeff took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It read as noted above and is  clear and readable.I decided to confirm my thinking that the pipe was connected with Preben Holm/Ben Wade. I turned to Pipephil’s site to get a read on the brand (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-m6.html). Sure enough the Monte Verdi line was made by Preben Holm. The pipe in the photo had a very similar rustication to the Monte Verdi bowl I was working on. I did a screen capture of the section on Pipephil. I have included it below.  There were also photos that were included on Pipephil of what this particular pipe looked like when it had left Denmark. The rustication around the bowl and shank is very similar. The pipe I have does not have a shank extension but otherwise the finish is much the same.The pipe originally had a fancy turned vulcanite stem. The stem was long gone when Jeff picked it up so I had some decisions to make about the stem I would use to restem it.I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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. The pipe looked very clean when I received it. The rim top and shank end cleaned up really well as can be seen in the close up photos below.I took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It really is clear and readable.I went through my can of stems and found turned freehand style vulcanite stem that would work well with the bowl and shank. The bend in it was perfect. There were tooth marks in surface of the top and underside of the stem at the button that would need to be dealt with in the restoration. I took a photo of the stem and bowl together to give a sense of the look of the pipe and the proportion of the stem. I shortened the length of the tenon with my Dremel and sanding drum and smoothed out the tenon with 220 grit sandpaper and fit the stem in the shank and took pictures of the pipe and stem. I removed the stem and 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 15 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 “painted” the tooth marks on both sides of the stem with the flame of a lighter to lift them as much as possible. I filled in the tooth marks that remaining with clear super glue and set it aside to cure. Once it had cured I used a flat file to reshape the edge of the button and flatten the repairs on the stem surface. I blended the repairs into the surface of the vulcanite with 220 grit sandpaper. I started polishing the stem with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper. The stem was looking much 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. In speaking with Kenneth yesterday I remembered that I had used a product in the past called Meguiar’s Scratch X2.0 to polish the surface of the stem after all of the previous polishing I had done. I took photos of the stem after polishing with the compound and did give a rich shine.   This restemmed, rusticated Preben Holm Hand Made Monte Verdi Golden Tan Freehand is a beautiful looking pipe that combines a rusticated finish with a unique shaped. The brown stains on the bowl work well to highlight the finish. The polished turned fancy black vulcanite stem adds to the mix. I put the finished stem on the bowl and buffed it 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 pipe is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that like the other pipes I am working that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 7 inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¾ inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 63grams/2.22oz. It will soon be added to the Danish Pipe Makers section on the rebornpipes store. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. Remember we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.

Restemming and Restoring a Gepetto 303 Rusticated Bowl

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe I chose to work on came to us from an antique shop in Houston, Texas, USA that Jeff visited in 2018. It has been sitting in my box of bowls since that time. Jeff cleaned it up and mailed it to me. I have been postponing restemming any of the pipes for a while now but after restemming that little gourd calabash a couple of days ago I was ready to do a few more. I pulled this one out of the box first and set aside to be the next pipe to work on. It has a very craggy rustication that is quite stunning and it has a smooth rim cap and ring  that make me call it a Rhodesian. It also has a smooth band on the shank end. Overall it is a pretty pipe. The bowl had been reamed before Jeff purchased it and was pretty clean. The rim top had a coat of lava that covered the majority of the cap. The finish had a lot of dust and debris in the valleys of the rustication. The stamping on the smooth panel on the underside of the shank was clear and readable. It had a J in circle [over] the shape number 303. That is followed by Gepetto [arched over] Italy [over] Hand Made. The J stamp made me immediately think of a connection to Ser Jacopo but I would look into that later in the blog. The next two close up photos show the condition of the bowl and rim top. You can see the thick lava coat on the top and you can see the reamed bowl sides on the left rear. It would need to be cleaned up but it was surprisingly clean for the condition of the rim top. Jeff took a photo of the stamping on the underside of the shank. It read as noted above and is clear and readable.I decided to confirm my thinking that the pipe was connected with Ser Jacopo. I turned to Pipephil’s site to get a read on the brand (http://pipephil.eu/logos/en/logo-g2.html). Sure enough the Gepetto line is called a second of Ser Jacopo. I did a screen capture of the section on Pipephil on both the Gepetto line and the informative side bar from the Ser Jacopo section that also states that the line is a second. I have included them below.  There were also photos that were included on Pipephil of what this particular pipe looked like when it had left Italy. The rustication around the bowl and shank is very similar though the stain on this one is darker and the grain on the smooth rim cap much more prominent. The pipe originally had an acrylic saddle stem with a silver inlaid Pinnochio on the top of the stem. The stem was long gone when Jeff picked it up so I had some decisions to make about the stem I would use to restem it. I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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. The pipe looked very clean when I received it. The rim top looked better but still needed a lot of work. I went through my can of stems and found an acrylic one that had the right colour combination of browns and golds to work with the finish on the bowl. It was a little too bent but that would not be an issue. There were also tooth marks in the top and underside of the stem at the button that would need to be dealt with in the restoration. I fit the stem in the shank and took a picture of the pipe. The stem is a little larger in diameter than the shank. I will need to sand it down to match the shank. I will also need to straighten the stem. I took a close up photo of the rim top. You can see the cleanness of the bowl and rim. There is darkening around inner edge of the rim and crown top. You can also see the stem is a little larger in diameter than the shank in the photos below. You can also see the tooth marks in the second and third photos below.I straightened the stem over my heat gun. I put a pipe cleaner in the shank and heated it until the stem was flexible and I was able to straighten it to match the bend in the stem. I took photos of the pipe and stem after the straightening.I set the stem aside and worked on the rim edges and top with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper. I was able to remove the damage to the rim edges and top.I polished the rim top with micromesh sanding pads and wiped it down with a damp cloth to remove the sanding dust. The crown took on a rich shine. I stained the rim top with a Maple and Cherry stain pen to match the finish on the smooth portions on the bowl.With the repair completed 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 15 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.   In the process of rubbing the bowl down with Before & After Balm I noticed a hairline crack in the underside of shank that needed to be addressed. I don’t know if it was present or if it cracked when I fitted the new stem. Either way it needed to be repaired. I sanded the smooth area on the shank end down with 220 grit sandpaper in  preparation for the band I wanted to put on it. I found a nice brass band that was grooved to look like a double band. I heated the band and pressed it in place. The band looked very good on the shank. I filled in the tooth marks on the stem with clear super glue and set it aside to cure. Once it had cured I sanded it down with 220 grit sandpaper. I also sanded the diameter of the stem to match the diameter of the shank. I set the bowl aside and turned my attention to the stem. I polished the acrylic stem 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 restemmed, rusticated Gepetto 303 Rhodesian is a beautiful looking pipe that combines a smooth rim cap and rusticated bowl and shank. The brown stains on the bowl work well to highlight the grain. The polished variegated brown/gold half saddle acrylic stem adds to the mix. I put the finished stem 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 rusticated pipe is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that like the other pipes I am working that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 6 ½ inches, Height: 2 inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 2 inches, Chamber diameter: 7/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 57grams/2.05oz. It will soon be added to the Italian Pipe Makers section on the rebornpipes store. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. Remember we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.

 

 

Restemming a Dunhill Pipe – A Patent Era 1936 Dunhill Bruyere 35 Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

This Dunhill Billiard was one of five other Billiards that came to us in the same lot as the 1922 Dunhill Bruyere Reading Pipe, a cracked shank 1962 Dunhill Shell Briar Pot and the 1905 BBB Calabash Reading Pipe and 1911 BBB Glokar Poker. It was a great looking Bruyere Billiard that had a Yello-Bole stem instead of the original Dunhill stem. The pipe is stamped on the left side of the shank with the letter A next to the bowl and the was followed by DUNHILL [over] LONDON. On the right side of the shank it was stamped MADE IN ENGLAND [over] PAT. NO 41757416 that is followed by the shape number 35.

It was another filthy pipe with a thick cake in the bowl and a heavy lava overflow on the rim top. It looked like it had a shiny coat of varnish or shellac on the bowl that would need to be removed so I could work on the rim top and nicks in the bowl sides. The stem would need to be replaced so Jeff and I would look over what he had there in terms of stems we had set aside. Perhaps there would be one in the lot that would work. Jeff removed the Yello-Bole stem from the shank and took photos of the bowl before he did his clean up work.  He took photos of the bowl and rim to give a picture of the thickness of the cake and lava on the rim top. This must have been a favourite pipe to have gone through a Dunhill stem and then pressing a Yello-Bole stem into service. I would need to find a Dunhill stem for it but it had promise even under the thick cake in the bowl.  Jeff took photos of the stamping on the sides of the shank but they are quite blurry because of the refection of the shiny varnish/shellac coat. I am including them anyway here as the give a sense of where the stamp was on the shank sides.I turned to Pipedia’s section on Dunhill Root Briar Pipes to get a bit of background on the Dunhill finishes (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill#Root_Briar). I quote:

Bruyere

The original finish produced (usually made using Calabrian briar), and a big part of developing and marketing the brand. It was the only finish from 1910 until 1917. A dark reddish-brown stain. Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red.

There was a link on the above site to a section specifically written regarding the Bruyere finish (https://pipedia.org/wiki/Dunhill_Bruyere). I turned there and have included the information from that short article below.

Initially, made from over century-old briar burls, classified by a “B” (denoted highest quality pipe); “DR” (denoted straight-grained) and an “A” (denoted first quality), until early 1915. After that, they became a high-end subset to the Dunhill ‘Bruyere’. The DR and B pipes, a limited production, they should be distinguished as hand-cut in London from burls as opposed to the Bruyere line which was generally finished from French turned bowls until 1917, when the Calabrian briar started to be used, but not completely. Only in 1920 Dunhill took the final step in its pipe making operation and began sourcing and cutting all of its own bowls, proudly announcing thereafter that “no French briar was employed”.

Bruyere pipes were usually made using Calabrian briar, a very dense and hardy briar that has a modest grain but does very well with the deep red stain.

“Before the 1950s, there were three possible finishes for Dunhill pipes. The Bruyere was a smooth finish with a deep red stain, obtained through two coats, a brown understain followed by a deep red. The Shell finish was the original sandblast with a near-black stain (though the degree to which it is truly black has varied over the years). Lastly, the Root finish was smooth also but with a light brown finish. Early Dunhill used different briars with different stains, resulting in more distinct and identifiable creations… Over the years, to these traditional styles were added four new finishes: Cumberland, Dress, Chestnut and Amber Root, plus some now-defunct finishes, such as County, Russet and Red Bark.”

There was also a link to a catalogue page that gave examples and dates that the various finishes were introduced (https://pipedia.org/wiki/File:Dunnypipescatalog-1.png).I turned to Pipephil’s dating guide to show how I arrived at the date of manufacture for this pipe (http://www.pipephil.eu/logos/en/dunhill/cledat-en1.html). I am including two charts that are provided there for the dating a pipe. I have drawn a red box around the pertinent section in each chart. Since the pipe I am working on has a suffix 16 that is raised superscript it points to 1920+ 16 for a date of 1936 on the charts below. I now knew that I was working on a Bruyere that came out in 1936 because of the date stamp 16. The shape of the pipe was one of many Billiards that Dunhill put out and the #35 was a normal billiard shape with a taper stem. That helped me figure out the kind of stem I would need to restem the pipe.

I turned to work on the pipe itself. Jeff had carried out his usual thorough cleanup of the pipe. He had reamed it with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake and cleaned the reaming up 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 had included a stem that we thought could work with the pipe and had soaked it in Before & After Deoxidizer and once it had soaked rinsed it off with warm water to remove the residual solution. He dried it off and scrubbed it down with Soft Scrub All-Purpose cleaner to remove any oxidation that was still on the stem. The biggest issue with the stem was the large chunk of vulcanite missing on the button on the underside but I thought we could make it work. The stem was from the wrong era and the button was the wrong shape but it would work until the proper stem was located. The pipe looked very clean when I received it. I took a photo of the bowl and the stem I was planning on using. I sanded the tenon to slightly reduce the diameter and leave a snug fit in the shank. It did not take too much to get a nice fit. Note that the diameter of the stem is slightly larger than the shank and it is flattened on the bottom. Since it is larger the flatten portion will not be an issue and with a little work the stem will be a perfect fit.  The fourth photo of the underside of the stem shows the damage to the button that will need to be repaired. I took a photo of the rim top to show the condition. You can see the darkening, scratches and damage on the rim top. It is roughened and slightly out of round. The varnish/shellac coat is peeling on the top. The stem came out looking quite good. There are tooth marks and chatter on the top side near the button and a large chunk of the button missing on the underside. 

I took photos of the stamping on both sides of the shank to try to capture it better than the photos above. It is better and is readable it reads as noted above. Also not the variation in the diameter of the stem that will need to be addressed.It was time to work on the stem. I decided to tackle the repair to the missing part of the button on the underside of the stem first. I would also need to work on the diameter of the stem at the shank and the shape of the stem to match the year it was made. There was a lot of work to do on the stem.

I got the repair station set up. I use a piece of cardboard with two strips of packing tape to mix the putty. I used Loctite 380 rubberized Black CA glue and three capsules of charcoal powder. I made a cardboard wedge covered in packing tape to fit in the slot and keep me from filling the slot in with the mixture.  I put a pool of the glue on the middle of the cardboard base so I could mix the charcoal powder into it.I mixed the powder and the glue together with a dental spatula. I stirred it until I got a thick putty like paste. I used the spatula to place the mixture on the top of the stem and fill in the missing chunk. I always overfill the area as I can easily remove the excess with the Dremel and files. I sprayed the repair with accelerator to harden the surface so I could remove the cardboard wedge. I took out the wedge and took a photo of the stem at this point in the process.I let the repair cure overnight and in the morning I used a rasp and file to begin to shape the stem surface and flatten the repair. It was a good solid repair and with a lot of shaping and sanding it would work well.I continued to shape the stem surface with 220 grit sandpaper to the button and stem surface smooth. I also worked on the diameter of the stem and removed the flattened bottom. Lots more work to do but it is getting there.I knew that the 1936 stem would not have had the flared fishtail look but probably would have been more of a straight taper. I did a search on Google for a 1936 Dunhill Bruyere in a shape 35 to see if I could find one that would provide a pattern for the shaping of this replacement stem. I found one (https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/1936-dunhill-bruyere-grade-billiard-490781280). I copied several of the photos to get a pattern to work with.

You can see from the photos to the left that the stem was significantly different in shape than the fishtail stem that I was working with. The taper on the sides from the shank to the button was far more gentle and almost straight. The taper on the top and bottom the stem is very similar to what I have. The biggest difference was in the last half inch of the stem and button. I would need to remove the horns or fish tail edges from the button and smooth out the transition on the button end so that it is not flared.

It took some work but I used the Dremel to roughly shape the stem like the sides of the stem and the button edges. I took off a lot of vulcanite and when I was done it was very close. I think the rest of the work would be done with sandpaper.I continued shaping it with 220 grit sandpaper. It is looking very good at this point. I still have work to do on the repair to take care of air bubbles but I am happy with how it is coming out so far.I filled in the air bubbles on the stem and button surfaces with black super glue and set the stem aside for the repairs to cure.I turned my attention to the bowl. I decided to start the restoration on it by working on the damage on the inner edge of the bowl. It had darkening and some damage to the edge. There were burn and reaming damage marks on the edge. I worked it over with a folded piece of 220 grit sandpaper to give the edge a light bevel and remove and minimize the damage on the edge. When I finished with it, the bowl and the rim top looked much better.I wiped down the bowl with alcohol on a cotton pad to remove the shellac/varnish coat. It removed a lot of the shiny coat but the polishing with micromesh will remove the rest of it. I polished the rim top and bowl with micromesh sanding pads – dry sanding with 1500-12000 grit sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down with a damp cloth after each sanding pad. The briar began to take on a shine.    I paused the sanding with the micromesh to stain the rim top with a Mahogany Stain pen to match the colour around the bowl. Afterwards I picked up the micromesh pads 3200-12000 and completed the cycle to polish the bowl. I rubbed the briar down with Before & After Restoration Balm. I worked it into the briar with my fingertips. The product works to clean, enliven and preserve the briar. I let it sit for 15 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 was excited to be finishing this pipe. I still had work to do but thought I would take a look at the stem and pipe together. I put the stem in place and tried I tried to blow through it and only got read in the face. I tried to put a pipe cleaner through the button and it went into the area of the repair and stopped. I tried to push a wire through the blockage and it would not budge. My stem repair had sealed off the airway!!!!. I usually do a stem repair with a folded greased pipe cleaner in the airway. This time I tried the cardboard wedge that both Dal and Paresh have used many times with no issues, thinking this stem would be a great candidate for that. I made a wedge and fit it in place but it must have had a small opening at the end that allowed the repair material to go past it. The airway was sealed tight and hard as a rock! I set the stem aside and went to the Post Office to mail a package. While I waited for the clerk I had an idea. When I got home I tried it. I put the smallest drill bit I had in the chuck of my cordless drill and carefully drilled it through. I up the bit to the second smallest one and the airway was clear! Whew… but even more amazing is that with all the drilling and fussing at the button lip the repair did not chip or loosen. The repair was solid. That at least was very good news in the midst of this mess.I worked on the stem some more fine tuning the fit against the shank and the shape of the button and stem to get as close as possible to the pictures that I found and included above. I sanded and shaped and sanded and shaped… did I say sanded and shaped?? It seemed almost endless. 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 Dunhill A Bruyere 35 Patent Billiard from 1936 is a beautiful looking piece of briar that has a shape that follows grain. It is a great looking pipe that came out looking even better after the cleanup and restemming. The Bruyere is an early finish that Dunhill specialized in making. The finish on the pipe is in excellent condition. The red and brown stain on the bowl works well to highlight the grain. The polished black vulcanite taper stem that I repurposed to replace the Yello-Bole stem adds to the mix. It is not the 1936 stem but I reshaped it to a close approximation. It will work until I find the proper era stem. 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 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 Bruyere 35 Billiard is quite nice and feels great in the hand. Give the finished pipe a look in the photos below. I can only tell you that like the other pipes I am working that it is much prettier in person than the photos capture. The dimensions of the pipe are Length: 5 ½ inches, Height: 1 ¾ inches, Outside diameter of the bowl: 1 ¼ inches, Chamber diameter: 5/8 of an inch. The weight of the pipe is 31grams/1.06oz. Thanks for walking through the restoration with me as I worked over another beautiful pipe. Remember we are not pipe owners; we are pipemen and women who hold our pipes in trust until they pass on into the trust of the next generation.