Tag Archives: topping a bowl

Breathing New Life into a mystery pipe and in the process finding out that it is a GBD

Blog by Steve Laug

I picked up this bowl in a purchase of bowls on EBay recently. All of them had a broken tenon in the shank and this one was no different. All of the bowls had stamping that was pretty unreadable or not present at all. This one had very faint stamping. When I first looked at it I put it aside and was in no rush to restem another bowl. Yesterday I took it out of the box and had a look at it through a lens with a bright light. I was pretty surprised to see that there was a faint GBD in an oval and underneath that it was stamped PREMIER and under that London Made. The shape number on the other side of the shank and any other stamping was gone. In the next three photos below it is circled in red – in the first it is the second bowl down in the left hand column. In the second it is the second one down and in the third it is at the top of the photo in the middle.

It was in pretty rough shape but underneath the grime there was a classic shaped billiard that was just waiting to be reborn. The finish on the bowl was worn, tired and water spotted. The rim was very rough from tapping out and was rounded on the edges. The bowl was caked but it also had about a half bowl of unsmoked tobacco. It also had the tenon broken off in the shank of the pipe. It almost looked as if the owner had dropped it mid smoke and the stem broke off and he just laid it aside. There were some serious deep gouges in the bottom right side of the bowl. It looked as if it was part of the fallout when the pipe was dropped. The photos below show what the pipe looked like when I received it. You can also see why I missed the stamping on the side of the shank.

When it arrived I used my usual process and pulled the broken tenons from all of the shanks. I used a screwdriver, pliers and a drywall screw. I thread the screw into the airway on the broken tenon and then use the pliers to wiggle it free. You can see how it works in the photos below. I removed five broken tenons in a matter of moments.

At this point I put all five bowls away and did not look at them for almost a month. The past two days I have been through them and already restemmed the tiny apple. This one came out next from the box. I wet the stem and looked at it through a lens with a bright light. That is when I discovered that the mystery pipe was a GBD. There was no shape number but it was a petite billiard. I had a stem in my stem can that was nearly perfect for the pipe. It did not have a GBD logo but it fit really well. I only needed to shorten the length of the tenon and the left side of the stem to get a perfect fit.

I wiped down the bowl with acetone to see what I was working with under the grime. I took a few photos of the bowl to show what it looked like.

I shortened the tenon and the fit was great against the shank. Now all that remained was to sand and clean the stem. I used a dental pick to remove the dottle from the bowl. You can see the amount of unburned tobacco that remained in the bowl. I think my theory of being dropped mid smoke was pretty accurate. I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer and took the cake back to bare briar. The bowl was between the smallest sized cutting head and the second one so I could only do a part of the job with the reamer. The round bowl made it not feasible to work with the KLEENREEM reamer. I cleaned up what remained with a pen knife to smooth out the walls of the pipe.

In the photo above shows the damage to rim top and the inner and outer edge of the rim. I decided to top the bowl to clean up as much as possible of the rim damage.

I repaired the deep gouges on the right side of the bowl with superglue and briar dust. I would have tried to steam them out but they had sharp edges on all of the marks and steaming would not have raised them. I sanded the dried repairs with 220 grit sandpaper to blend them into the surface of the briar. You will see in later picture what that looked like. I started to clean out the shank and stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol and soon began to realize that it was far dirtier than I initially expected.

I put the stem on the shank and set up the pipe retort. I boiled three test tubes of alcohol through the bowl and stem until it finally came out clear. The second photo is a cool picture of the boiling alcohol. I had to include it!

I ran pipe cleaners, a shank brush, cotton swabs and alcohol through the stem and shank to remove what was left behind by the retort and was pleased to see how clean it was. One surprise to me was the red stain that came out of the shank. Evidently the pipe had originally been stained with a oxblood stain. You would never have guessed that looking at what I started with. Now that the internals were clean I took a series of photos of the pipe to show where it stood at this point. In these photos you can see the repairs on the right side of the bowl.

Now it was time to polish the stem and work on the finish of the pipe. I worked on the stem with 220 grit sandpaper and a medium and fine grit sanding sponge to remove the grime and the oxidation on the stem. I don’t know what was on this stem but it was tacky, gummed up the sandpaper and was hard to clean. I wiped it down with alcohol and then repeated the sanding. I was able to remove the oxidation and the tooth chatter at the button. I sanded the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and then giving the stem a coat of Obsidian Oil. I dry sanded with 3200-4000 grit pads and gave it another coat of oil. I finished with 6000-12000 grit pads and gave it a final coat of the oil. I let that dry.

I sanded the bowl with 1500-4000 grit micromesh to smooth out the sanding marks. I wiped the bowl down with a tack cloth and then gave it a coat of Cherry stain mixed with Danish Oil. I buffed it by hand and gave it a second coat. I set it aside to dry. Once it was dry I buffed it by hand with a soft microfibre cloth.

I put the stem on the pipe and then buffed the stem and bowl with Blue Diamond on the wheel and then gave the bowl and stem several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean flannel buff to raise the shine. I hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth to give a deeper shine to the pipe. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below.The cherry stain brings out the grain and at the same time hides the repairs. While the pipe will never win any contests for beauty or perfection that must have once accompanied the PREMIER it is nonetheless fully functional and should deliver the next pipe man who owns a decent smoke at a decent price. Thanks for looking.

A Tiny Apple Reborn – new stem and new finish

Reshaping and Restemming a no name Oval Opera Pipe

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Blog by Steve Laug

I bought a group of pipe bowls on Ebay a while ago and one of them was an oval bowl Opera pipe. The stamping was non-existent, whether worn off by over buffing or never present it was no longer on the shank on either side. It is shown in the photo below marked with a red oval. It is an interesting shape and this one was a normal sized pipe. There was nothing of the typical small size of the pipes like this that I have worked on in the past. The stem was long gone and the broken tenon was stuck in the shank. The finish was rough and had deep dents and nicks all over the bowl. The cake in the bowl was thick and the rim was damaged on the inner edge and had burn marks on the front top and left side. There were two large fills on the bowl; one on the left side shank near the bowl junction and the other on the underside mid-shank. I pulled the broken tenon by my usual method. I use a drywall screw and insert it in the airway. I use a screwdriver to turn it into the airway just enough to be tight in the tenon. You need to be careful to not turn it in to far as it will expand the tenon and crack the shank. Once it is in place I use needle nose pliers to wiggle it free of the shank. It usually comes free with little effort. That was true in the case of this tenon.
I took the next set of photos to show the state of the pipe when I started this project. Note the damaged rim top and inner edge.

I went through my can of stems for a donor stem and found a bent saddle stem that I could straighten and fit to this pipe. I turned the tenon with the PIMO tenon turning tool to a close fit and hand sanded it to get a snug fit. The shank was slightly oval and the stem round so I would need to work on the shank to get a good fit.
I used 220 grit sandpaper to clean up the finish on the bowl and shank. I did preliminary shaping of the rim to clean up the damage at the top. I used a PipNet reamer to ream the bowl. I use the smallest head and work it in the centre of the oval first and then move it to the front and back of the oval to ream those areas. I cleaned up the reamed bowl with a pen knife to get rid of the cake. I needed to take the cake back to bare briar so that I could reshape the inner edge. I sanded the bowl with 220 grit sandpaper to remove as much of the damage to sides of the bowl as possible. You can see from the photo below the dip in the top edge of the bowl about middle. That is where the burn damage is on that side. I wiped the bowl down with acetone on cotton pads to remove any remaining finish and to see where I stood in terms of removing damage to the bowl.
The next photo shows the extent of the damage to the top and inner edge of the rim. You can see the rough cut marks on the inner edge from a previous owners attempt to ream the bowl. You can also see the burn marks on the left and right top and sides of the rim.
To remove the dips where the burn marks were in the rim top and to remove the damaged briar I decided to top the bowl. I would need to reshape the rim to match the original but I would deal with that later. I used a Dremel and sanding drum to shape the outside edge of the rim and bowl.
I put the stem in place in the shank, aligned it correctly and sanded the shank to clean up the fit. I wanted the shank to be more round and consistently shaped as it originally was not completely oval – it was only that shape on the left bottom side. The rest of the shank was round. I sanded until I had the shank rounded and matching the stem.
I continued to shape and sand the rim and flow into the bowl. I worked on the slight bulge in the stem at the saddle to get the alignment and flow right. Since I had a clean slate to work with on this old briar I figured to get it as close as I could to a clean flowing look. I wanted it to look better than before not just cleaned up. It would take a lot of sanding and shaping before I was finished with it.

The fill on the bottom of the shank was solid except for one small spot in the centre of the repair so I sanded it, wiped it clean and filled in the spot with clear super glue. Once it dried I sanded it smooth to match the rest of the shank. The small rough spot was gone and the fill was smooth and dark. I cleaned out the shank and airway with the KLEENREEM drill bit to remove the buildup in that area. The draw on the shank was constricted so this was necessary to open it and give an easy draw to the pipe.
I cleaned out the shank and the airway in both the bowl and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners until it was clean. I sanded the edges of the stem and the scratches in the saddle portion with 220 grit sandpaper to shape and define the edge and fit of the stem. I left a slight bend downward in the stem when I had straightened it and like the look of it.

I put a cork in the bowl of the pipe and prepared to stain it with the black undercoat. I wanted to highlight the interesting grain and the black would bring that out. It would also serve to mask the repair on the shank and the fill next to the bowl. I applied and flamed the black stain and repeated the process to get good coverage on the bowl. I wiped the bowl down with alcohol soaked cotton pads to remove the stain that did not settle into the grain.

I sanded the bowl and shank with a medium and fine grit sanding block to further remove the black stain. The contrast is beginning to show and the grain stand out.

I sanded the bowl and shank with 1500-1800 grit micromesh sanding pads to remove the scratches on the briar.
I wiped it down with alcohol on a cotton pad and then set it up for the top coat of stain. I chose to use a Cherry Danish Oil on the top coat. I applied it with a cotton pad and set the bowl aside to dry.
While the bowl dried I worked on the stem. I wet sanded with 1500-2400 micromesh sanding pads to further fine tune the shape of the stem. I worked to remove the remnants of scratching left behind by the initial shaping done with the lower grits of sand paper. I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil and then dry sanded it with 3200-4000 grit pads. I gave it another coat of oil and finished sanding it with 6000-12000 grit pads. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and let it dry.

The bowl was dry by the time I finished with the stem so I buffed the bowl and stem with Blue Diamond on the wheel and then gave both several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the pipe with a clean flannel buffing pad and then hand buffed it with the microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. I really like the way the contrast stain came out and the way it hid the fills on the shank. The pipe really has some stunning and interesting grain all the way. Not one side looks the same. There is birdseye, cross grain and swirled grain. I think the finished pipe is a great improvement from when I started it. Thanks for looking.

A Rescue Dog – Restoring a Chadwick “Supreme” Rhodesian

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Blog by Steve Laug

The third pipe my brother Jeff picked up in the lot from the Montana was one of my favourite shapes. In the photo below of the pipes at the seller’s antique shop it is the pipe on the far right of the picture. Looking at it in the photos I wondered if it was a Peterson 999 or a GBD 9438 two of my all time favourite pipe shapes. I was pretty excited to see what it was once he got the pipes. Everything about that pipe shape made me think that my guess was not far off. When the pipes arrived in Idaho my brother called and read me the stamping. The pipe was stamped on the left side of the shank Chadwick over “Supreme”. On the right side it was stamped Imported Briar. At that point I was scratching my head. It still looked like an English-made pipe to me but I had not heard of the Chadwick brand. When the pipe arrived in Canada I looked it over and was still convinced it looked English-made. I looked in Who Made that Pipe and it was listed there as made by Wally Frank in the US and England. The next photos show what the pipe looked like when it arrived here. There is a lot of promise underneath all the grime. There was a thick cake in the bowl and the rim was covered with the overflow of tars and oils down the sides to the double ring. The finish was dirty and almost gone. I am not sure if the pipe had a natural finish or was stained but it was no longer clear what the original had been like. The double ring had a large chunk missing on the front of the bowl. There were two fills on the bowl front that were shrunken and looked like dents. The shank was dirty. The stem was chewed and gnawed on to the point that the button was virtually gone on the top side. There was a chunk missing from it on the top middle of the button. There were deep tooth marks on the top and bottom of the stem near the button. The stem was oxidized and scratched and had a build-up of calcification about an inch up the stem toward the shank. Inside the stem and shank was very dirty. The airway to the bowl was clogged and I was not able to blow air through it. It looked to me that there had originally been a stinger in the tenon but it was no longer present.

I took some close up photos of the stamping and the condition of the bowl, rim and stem before I went to work on restoring it. You can clearly see the stamping on the left side of the shank – Chadwick Supreme. The rim is in nasty condition. I am not sure how the last pipe man had ever fit much tobacco in the bowl. All I know is that it must have smoked really well because it looked as if he had never laid it down. The stem condition is also clearly shown with tooth marks and gnawing on the button top and bottom.

Before I started cleaning it up I wanted to learn a bit more about the brand. I have cleaned and used quite a few Wally Frank pipes over the years and knew that other companies in Europe often made their pipes for them. It was highly likely that this was a British made pipe. I checked on Chris Keene’s Pipe Pages and found the Chadwick name in the Wally Frank Catalogue for 1939. None of the other catalogues would open but at least I had the information that I needed. The first photo below is of the whole page. The second is of the right top corner where the Chadwick line is mentioned. The third is of a Chadwick Display Cabinet that was provided to tobacconists and stores that sold the line.

Now I knew that the Chadwick line was indeed made in England. My guess was correct and I would go one step further and guess that they were made by Comoy’s or GBD. The advertisement says that the pipe was “custom-made in London with the deliberate precision of English master pipemakers. The Chadwick is our sincere effort to present a fine quality London made pipe from sweet smoking Algerian Briar Root at a modest price.”

What interested me was that the pipe came in three different finishes – Rough-Rugged, Natural and Dark. I am pretty sure that the one I had was originally dark finished as the dark finish would hide the fills on the bowl and they would be blended into the briar. That gave me the direction that I would go in restaining the pipe once I got to that point in the restoration process.

I love reading these old catalogues and seeing the life time warrantee on the pipes and the fact that the pipe originally cost $2.50 with postage paid from the Wally Frank factory.

Armed with that confirmation of British origin for this old pipe I went to work to restore it to its former glory. I worked on the bowl first. I wanted to ream back the cake to bare wood to see what I was dealing with in the bowl. I set up the PipNet reamer with the smallest head first and found that the cake was incredibly hard. The cutting head barely made a dent in the cake. I took the largest sized cutting head – same diameter as the bowl and work on it and with a lot of force was able to begin to make a dent on the cake. It was just too hard to go too deep with the tool. I used a pen knife to try to cut back the lower portion of the cake but could not even cut into it because it was so hard.

I decided to soak the bowl and soften the cake in an alcohol bath. I dropped the bowl into the bath and left it overnight to soak and soften the cake. In the morning I took it out of the bath and dried it off with a coarse cotton towel. The soak also had the effect of softening the lava on the rim and cap so that when I dried the bowl most of it came off in the process. I was able to ream it back to bare wood with the use of a PipNet reamer and a KLEENREEM reamer. I used the drill bit part of the KLEENREEM tool to open the airway into the bowl and remove the clog. With that gone I could freely blow air through the bowl. The final photo in this set shows the conical bowl on the reamed pipe.

I wiped the bowl down with acetone on a cotton pad to clean off the remaining finish and the grime left behind after the soak and the reaming process. The damaged rings on the front of the bowl are visible in the photos as is the damage to the rim top.

I lightly topped the bowl on a topping board using 220 grit sandpaper to flatten the rim top and to remove some of the rounding to the outer edge of the bowl. I used a dental pick to remove the fills that had shrunk on the bottom front of the bowl in preparation for replacing them. I packed briar dust into the holes and then dripped super glue onto the packed briar dust. I packed briar dust into the missing section of the double rings on the front of the bowl. I put super glue on top of the briar dust fill to build up the repair. I added more briar dust on top of the fills on the bowl front and on the repair to the rings. I sanded the patches on the bowl front with 220 grit sandpaper and smooth it out to match the surrounding briar. I sanded the patch on the ring repair with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth it out. There were still some low spots on that repair so I refilled the area with some more super glue.

I set the bowl aside to let the repair on the rings cure before I cut the new rings into the bowl front. While it was sitting I sanded the stem with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the oxidation and the calcification. I wanted to clean up the stem before I worked on repairing the tooth marks and gnawed button. I cleaned the stem with alcohol and pipe cleaners.

I scrubbed out the tooth marks on the stem and the button with a cotton swab and alcohol in preparation for the repair I would do there. I mixed the patching material using finely crushed charcoal capsules and black super glue. I mixed the two to blend the materials. I use super glue that gives me 45 seconds of time before it hardens so I have to work quickly.

When I had the paste mixed well I applied it to the tooth marks and built up the button with a dental pick and dental spatula. The repair is anything but beautiful at this point but the mixture adds strength to the repair that the glue by itself does not give with tooth marks and damage of this magnitude.

I set the stem aside to cure and went back to the bowl. I used a Buck Knife, a pen knife and a sharp-edged needle file to cut the lines in the patch on the bowl front. I wanted the new lines to connect seamlessly to the lines on either side of the repair. These three blades always have worked for me to get a good straight line match. When I had finished cleaning up the lines on the bowl the stem repair had cured enough to begin to shape the button and clean up the tooth repairs. I sanded them with 220 grit sandpaper to begin to shape and smooth out the repairs.

When I had the basic shape of the button set up the surface was quite porous on the button surface and in one spot on the tooth repair on top of the stem so I gave them a top coat of clear super glue to fill in the pores left behind by the super glue/charcoal mixture. I set that aside to dry.

I cleaned the bowl and shank with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. It was one dirty shank. It took a lot of scrubbing to clean out the grime. I scrubbed until the cleaners came out clean and white. I wiped the bowl down with alcohol to remove any last dust or grime in preparation for staining the briar.

I decided to stain the bowl with a dark brown aniline stain that I had thinned by half to give it a medium brown colour. I wanted to aim for the dark stain that was noted in the Wally Frank Catalogue above. I figured it would give me good coverage on the fills and the repair to the rings. I applied the stain with a cotton swab and then flamed it with a lighter to set the colour in the grain. I wiped down the freshly stained bowl with alcohol on cotton pads to even out the stain and to give it more transparency so that the grain shows through. When I was through I was happy with the colour and with the way it hid the fills on the bowl and the repair to the ring on the front of the bowl.

By that time the stem repair had dried and I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the stem patch and do more shaping on the button.

I filed the slot in the stem to smooth it out and shape it. I also sanded the stem with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge to further shape the button. I wet sanded the stem and button with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads and rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil. I dry sanded with 3200-4000 grit micromesh pads and gave it another coat of oil. I finished by sanding it with 6000-12000 grit pads and gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil. I set it aside for the oil to dry.

I sanded the bowl with the micromesh sanding pads – 1500-12000 grit to polish the briar – bowl, shank and rim, to bring out the grain. When the grain began to pop I buffed the bowl and the stem with Blue Diamond on the wheel and then gave both multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean flannel buff and then with a microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It is a far cry better looking than when I started. This one is a keeper. Thanks for looking.

Restoring An Eagle Cool-Dry Billiard

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Blog by Steve Laug

The pipe was another gift pipe sent to me by Pam. It is in decent shape. The stem is oxidized and has some tooth marks on the top and bottom side of the stem near the button. The tooth mark is like a vertical slit on the top and bottom side about ½ inch up the stem from the button. There is also a small tooth dent near the button. The metal part of the stem and tenon were integrated into the stem rather than in the shank of the pipe. The finish on the pipe was shiny and showed that the lacquer or varnish that had been used was peeling in spots on the front of the bowl. The stamping was deep and readable. There were quite a few fills on the bottom of the bowl. The largest was on the bottom front edge of the bowl. It had shrunken and was a large pit that ran across the front of the bowl. The bowl was heavily caked and the buildup on the beveled rim was hard and chipped looking. There were some nicks on the outer edges of the rim from when the bowl had been tapped out. The shank was not too dirty and the mortise appeared to be lined with a white tube of some sort. The Eagle Cool-Dry has some unique plumbing in terms of system pipes. It is different from any of the other pipes like this in my collection. The rest of the ones that externally look like this one, the Keyser Hygienic and the Millard Perfect Pipe are actually very different in terms of design. They have a metal insert at the end of the shank that acts as a condenser area with a tube extending from the airway into the condensation chamber. The stem also has a metal tube insert and no tenon but is a military mount stem that inserts into the chamber. The two tubes either meet in the chamber or sit in the chamber. The Eagle is very different in terms of design from the other two mentioned above. The shank is lined with either clay or meerschaum – hard to tell by just looking. My tendency is to assume it is clay. The porous tube is inserted into the shank forming the mortise of the pipe and extending to the end of the shank (see photo below). The metal tenon integrated into the vulcanite stem sits snuggly into the lined mortise. Once I clean it up I may be more certain what the material that makes up the mortise lining. As I worked on cleaning up the pipe I took a little time to see if I could ferret out any information on the brand and the manufacturer of the pipe. I looked for Cool-Dry pipes and found a metal Falcon like pipe that uses the same threaded bowls as Dr. Grabow Vikings. I looked for Eagle Pipes and found a clay pipe manufacturer in Montreal, Quebec in the late 1890s but nothing on a briar pipe maker of that name. I searched for patent information on the internals of the pipe under both the Eagle and the Cool-Dry name and found nothing specific on the system in this pipe. The one thing I did find was that the pipe was made by the Hudson Universal Pipe Co. who also made the brands Excelsior, Harrington Park, and Hilex. This information came out through some notes I found while Googling the brand.

Having that information in hand I looked for the pipe on the Pipephil Stampings and Logos website and interestingly found the following picture and short information. The brief notes under the picture confirm that Hudson Universal Pipe Co. was one of the makers of the pipe. The pipe I received has the same stamping as the one pictured below. The one I have does not have the stem logo but rather is stamped ITALIA on the underside of the stem next to the metal portion of the stem.

When I brought the pipe to my work table I took the following photos to give an idea of the condition it was in when I started. I have spoken of the finish and the general worn condition of the bowl. The rim and cake issues have also been mentioned. The photos show the oxidized stem and aluminum. The bowl has an attractive shape and there is something about the old pipe that drew me to it.

The next two photos are close up shots. The first shows the large shrunken fill on the bottom front part of the bowl. The second shows the thickness of the build up on the rim and the cake in the bowl.

I took the pipe apart to show the nature of the tenon and stem apparatus. I sanded the stem with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the oxidation on the stem and to prepare it for the repairs that needed to be done to the tooth marks on both sides of the stem. I sanded it and removed much of the oxidation and minimized the tooth chatter. I then scrubbed the stem with alcohol to remove the dust and debris in the tooth marks. I filled them with a bubble of clear super glue – both the two spots next to the button (1 on top and 1 on the underside) and the two vertical cuts or marks (one on each side). I set the stem aside to let the glue cure.

While the glue dried I worked on the bowl. I sanded the top of the rim with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the cake that had built up on that surface. I would need to continue to reshape the rim. I reamed it back to bare wood with a PipNet reamer.

I continued to sand the rim and also sanded the inside edge of the rim with the 220 grit sandpaper. I scrubbed the bowl with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the varnish coat and the grime that collected on the briar through the years.

The next photo shows the clay/meerschaum insert in the shank that lined the mortise on the pipe. I cleaned it with cotton swabs, pipe cleaners and alcohol. I picked out the large fill on the front of the bowl with a dental pick until the sandpit was clear of the white putty. I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on a cotton swab to clean out any remaining debris. I used the dental pick to press briar dust into the sandpit and packed it in. I dripped a couple of drops of glue into the dust. Unfortunately the glue ran down the face of the bowl. I am using a new kind of glue and it is very thin and dries slowly. I sanded the surface of the bowl to remove the heavy overdone patch until it was smooth with the surface of the bowl. I then added a little more briar dust to the patch and used the tip of the pick to put some more glue on the repair.

When the glue dried I sanded the patch until it was smooth. I sanded the entire bowl with a medium and fine grit sanding sponge to remove the scratches. I wet sanded the bowl with 400 grit wet dry sandpaper and then with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads. I wiped the bowl down with alcohol and cotton pads to remove the sanding dust in preparation for restaining the pipe.

I gave the bowl a coat of dark brown aniline stain and flamed it with a lighter. I gave the pipe several more coats of stain and flamed each one. When the stain had dried I hand buffed it with a cloth and then gave it a light buff on the wheel with White Diamond. The first two side view photos of the bowl show it with a red tint that really is not as prevalent as it appears. The photo of the bottom of the bowl is more accurate in terms of the colour of the pipe.

I sanded the repaired stem with 220 grit sandpaper to blend the repair into the surface of the stem. I sanded it with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge to remove the scratches in the surface of the stem.

The stem was quite clean on the inside so it took only one pipe cleaner to take out the sanding dust that had collected inside. I wet sanded the stem with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads and then rubbed it down with Obsidian Oil. I dry sanded with 3200-4000 grit pads and then gave it another coat of oil. I finished sanding it with 6000-12000 grit pads. I gave it a final coat of Obsidian Oil and let it dry.

I buffed the pipe and stem on the wheel with Blue Diamond. I gave the aluminum a light buff so as not to darken the buffing pad and carry the metallic colour onto the vulcanite or the briar. I gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax and then buffed the pipe with a clean flannel buff. I finished by buffing it by hand with a microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. The glow of the briar and the vulcanite are really set off by the burnished aluminum portion of the stem. It is truly a beautiful pipe. Thanks for the pipe Pam it is a keeper. Thanks also to each of you who are reading this blog.

A Pair of Millard Perfect Pipes – A Sandblast Apple and Dublin

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Blog by Steve Laug

When I came across the Millard – the Perfect Pipe coupon in the two boxes of Kentucky Club that I found I was fascinated with the look of the pipe. It reminded me of the Keyser Hygienic pipes that I had restored over the years. The stem that fit into the metal mortise shank insert and the tubes on the inside of the stem and the shank were similar. While the Keyser tubing in the shank looked identical the one in the stem was different. Keyser was directed downward while the Millard was two straight tubes that met in the mortise. They did not touch but the metal chamber became a condensing chamber, or as they call it an Action Trap, for the smoke and collected the moisture before it continued through the tube in the stem. I looked up the brand online and found the following advertisement postcard that shows the way the system works. I found that the stems were interchangeable between the shapes that the pipe came in. The straight stems could be easily transferred from pipe to pipe. In fact the pipe originally came with an extra or replacement stem. The pipe came in a sandblast and a smooth finish in six shapes – apple, Dublin, billiard, pear, pot and bent. It came in two sizes: medium or large. In the advertisement below you can see that the pipe cost $3. I also found that Mastercraft supplied the pipes through the coupon sales. Knowing a bit of history about the company I know that they did not make pips so they were sourced from the original manufacturer.I mentioned in the Kentucky Club Blog that I would love to get my hands on one of these. I received a comment from one of the readers, Pam who offered to send me one. She had picked one up in a lot of pipes she was working on restoring. I could have it. I thanked her and she sent me the following photos of the pipe. It is a little (or what Kentucky Club called Medium in the advertisement above). It was a sandblast apple. It was in decent shape and would clean up quite nicely. The finish was spotty and the stain was lightened and missing in some spots. The rim had some buildup of tars. The cake was quite thick. The inner rim edge was out of round. The stem was oxidized and had some calcification in front of the button.

While I awaited the arrival of Pam’s gift I took a look on eBay and found that the pipe that I had pictured in the Kentucky Club Blog was for sale. The seller wanted $12 for the pipe. It was a Dublin shaped pipe with a smooth finish. It looked to be a Medium sized Millard as well. On a whim I put a bid on it and won. The seller said that it was restored but my past experience with these kinds of sales made me pretty certain that all that it meant was that it was polished. Now I went from no Millard pipes to two in a matter of days. The photos that follow were from the seller. The pipe looked sound. The finish was pretty decent though there were ripples and dents on the bowl sides. The beveled rim was not clean and there were still spots where the tars had been left and polished. The inside of the Action Trap was dirty with tars and oils. The stem had some tooth chatter and dents. Once the pipe arrived I would have a better idea of what I had to work with on this one.

Pam’s gift pipe arrived first. It was a beautiful smaller sized apple (even though the advertising from Millard called it a Medium). The length was 6 inches. My original assessment from the photos proved to be pretty accurate. The finish was worn but the sandblast was quite nice – shallow but still tactile. The light spots on the top of the shank were spots where the finish was gone but the blast was still present. The cake was thicker than I thought it would be, particularly in the bottom of the bowl. The bowl was more out of round than I had guessed and had a burn spot on the back middle inner edge that contributed to the misshapen inner edge. The tar build up was deep and there appeared to be a burn spot on the top of the rim at the front right side. The inside of the shank, the Action Trap, was dirty and had tar, oil and tobacco shellac. The airway was tight and constricted when I blew air through it. The stem was oxidized and under the calcification there were some deep tooth marks and cuts that would need to be addressed. The inside of the stem has a chamber with the tube in the middle and that area was dirty with tars and oils. The airway was constricted even more than the one in the shank. I was pretty sure that something was clogging it and causing the constriction. The slot had been reduced by half with the buildup of grime.

The second pipe arrived at my home a short time after Pam’s. It too proved my original conjecture about the concept that some people have of what “restored” means. This pipe had been given a light polish on the briar and the stem. The polish had merely wiped over the dents, dings and scratches on the briar. There were ripples along the top of the shank. The rim still had spots of tarry buildup that had been polished and there were scratches from what looked like a quick scrub with a coarse scrubber. The bowl had a slight ridge around the inside just below the rim from an incomplete reaming. The inside of the Action Trap was dirty and the oils and tars had hardened. The airway was constricted and dirty and the opening in the bowl bottom was plugged with grit. The aluminum mortise insert was oxidized and dull. The stem was oxidized and there were ripples in the surface from where someone had either buffed hard or tried to remove tooth chatter or tooth marks. The inside of the stem chamber was dirty with tars and oils and the inside of the stem looked as if it had never seen a pipe cleaner. So much for the term “restored”.

I decided to work on both pipes at the same time so that I could compare the internals and the briar on them. It would be a fun project to do them both together and watch the truly restored pipes emerge from the tired pipes that had arrived at my work table. The next four photos show the pair together.

I took some close up photos of the two bowls to show what I would be working on. The first photo shows the bowl of the apple shaped pipe. You can see the cake and the damage to the top of the rim. The bowl is out of round. The second photo shows the rim of the Dublin and you can see the scratches and the incomplete cleaning of the rim tars. The next photo shows the stems removed from the shanks. The stems are interchangeable so as I had expected from the advertisement shown above one stem size and shape could be used interchangeably on any of the straight pipes. I took a photo of the internals of the mortise insert to show the tube inset in the middle of the aluminum chamber. This is the Action Trap that the adverts spoke of. The “restored” Dublin was just as dirty inside as the untouched apple sent by Pam. While both look the same the tube in the Dublin extends further into the Trap than the one in the apple. The second photo shows the end view of the two stems. You can see the tube inset in the middle of the stem. Again the tube in the Dublin stem is shorter than the one in the apple. I am not sure the reason for this as when both are interchangeably inserted in the bowl the draw and fit is identical so it may well be just inconsistency in the manufacture. I cleaned up the inside of the Dublin bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the ridge along the top portion of the bowl just below the beveled rim. I scrubbed the rim with saliva and cotton pads to work on the tars left behind. I found that they were hard so I used a 1500 grit micromesh pad to sand and work on the deposits until they were gone and the rim was smooth. It also worked to remove the scratching on the rim that had been left behind by the previous “restoration”. I reamed the bowl on the apple with the PipNet reamer and took the cake back to bare briar. The second photo shows the large amount of carbon that I removed from the bowl.

With the bowl reamed you can see the damage to the inner edge that left the bowl out of round. There was a burned area on the rim at that point that did not go too deeply into the bowl but it was present. I scrubbed the rim with a brass bristle tire brush to remove the overflow of cake on the rim.

I scrubbed both bowls with a tooth brush and Murphy’s Oil Soap to remove the spotty finish on the apple and the grime on both bowls. I also removed the polish that had been applied to the Dublin so I could work on the scratches and dings. After scrubbing them I rinsed them under warm water in the sink to remove the soap and the grime that had been loosened.

I scrubbed both bowls with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the remaining finish and clean up the briar. The finish on the Dublin was pretty clean. The one on the apple came off with the scrubbing and the remaining finish was removed.

With the bowls and finish cleaned up it was time to address the internals. I used pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol to clean out the debris in the shank and the mortise of both pipes. I used a folded pipe cleaner and a cotton swab that I thinned the cotton on to get inside of the mortise to clear out the build up there. To address the damaged rim on the apple I decided to top the bowl. I set up the topping board and a piece of 220 grit sandpaper and worked on the rim to flatten it and remove the damaged areas. In doing this I found another burned spot on the front right top of the rim. I worked on the inner edge of the rim with a folded piece of sandpaper to correct the out of round condition. When I was finished the rim looked far better. Now I needed to work on rusticating the rim to match the sandblast on the finish of the pipe.

To rusticate the rim I used a dental burr in my Dremel and carefully worked it over the surface of the bowl rim. It had to be deep enough to show, tight enough to look like a sandblast and somehow blend into the bowl finish. I carefully worked the Dremel over the surface being careful to keep it on the flat rim and not damage the edges of the inside or outside of the bowl. The next two photos show both the burr and the work done on the rim. Though it is a little hard to see the rustication came out really well. It will become clear in later photos. I stained the bowl and rim with a dark brown aniline stain. I applied the stain and flamed it. I reapplied it and reflamed it.

The next photo shows the rustication very clearly. I touched it up with a dark brown stain pen and then waxed the bowl and rim with a microcrystalline Conservators Wax. The bowl was looking far better.

With the basic work done on the bowls and rims I turned my attention to the stems. I cleaned both stems with pipe cleaners, alcohol and cotton swabs until they were clean. I picked out the slots on both stems with a dental pick to make sure they were wide open. The stem on the Dublin had a very tight draw. I ran a straightened paper clip through the stem and a large chunk of tar and cotton from pipe cleaners dropped out of the end. The draw was unconstricted and the airflow was clear in both stems. I sanded both stems with 220 grit sandpaper to remove the oxidation and also clean up the tooth marks and ripples in the surface of the vulcanite. I sanded them with a medium and fine grit sanding sponge to remove the scratches left behind by the sandpaper. I repaired the tooth damage and the cuts in the surface of the stem for the apple with black super glue. After the repair had dried I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper and the sanding sponges once again. I wet sanded the stems with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads. I rubbed the stems down with Obisidian Oil and then dry sanded with 3200-4000 grit pads. I gave the stems another coat of oil and dry sanded with 6000-12000 grit pads. I buffed the stems with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel and then gave them several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed them with a clean flannel buffing pad and then a microfibre cloth.

I polished the aluminum ferrule/mortise inserts on the shanks with the last three grits of micromesh sanding pads and then rubbed them down with a jeweler’s cloth. I lightly buffed the stems and bowls with Blue Diamond and then gave the entire smooth pipe several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed the two pipes with a clean flannel buff and then with a microfibre cloth to raise the shine. The inside of the Active Trap is stained but it is clean. These are a couple of great looking pipes now. The rusticated rim worked really well with the finish on the bowl and gives the apple a clean look. The clean beveled rim on the Dublin has a rich shine that shows the grain off very well. The finished pipes are shown in the photos below. Thanks for looking.

Repairing Cracks in a Large WDC Wellington Bent

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Blog by Steve Laug

Through Facebook I connected with a new friend Warren. He wrote me about how to repair a crack in a pipe that he was reworking for a friend of his. As I described the process he asked if he could send it to me to work on. At that point my refurbishing box was getting low as I had repaired and moved out a lot of the pipes that had been there. So I agreed. Last week it arrived here. A funny side note is that I have a stem for the same pipe and have been looking for a bowl for the stem for a while now. Now I get the opportunity to work on a pipe with the same stem. It is stamped WDC in a triangle on the stem with Wellington arced below the triangle. It is also stamped on the left side of the shank with the WDC triangle and Wellington in script to the right of the triangle. Underneath the script it reads Imported Briar. There is no other stamping on the pipe. It is a large pipe with a length of over 10 inches and a bowl height of 2 inches. The diameter of the bowl is 7/8 inches. The third picture below shows a comparison of a 5 ½ inch long pipe and average bowl so you can see how big this pipe truly is.

The briar had some attractive grain in it but there were some issues as well. It had a lot of fills on the front left, front right and bowl front. There was some damage to the surface of the rim that looked as if the pipe had been dropped on concrete. The outer edge of the rim on the front had some damage and was rounded over and the inner back edge of the rim had burn damage that made that portion out of round. Fortunately it was not a deep burn and would be relatively easy to address. There was also a ¾ inch crack on the underside of the shank that had one ¼ inch branch going toward the left side of the shank.

I took a series of close up photos to show the damaged areas of the pipe. The first shows the damage to the rim surface and edges. The second shows the crack in the shank. The third photo shows the missing fills and divots in the bowl sides.

I decided to address the crack in the bottom of the shank first. I used a micro drill bit on my Dremel to drill some small holes at the end of the crack and the branches of the crack to stop the damage from spreading further. The bit is very tiny as can be seen from the holes that are left behind after drilling. I drill two holes on each end because after the first hole I examined it with a lens and could see that extended slightly beyond my first hole. I picked out the damaged putty fills with a dental pick and wiped the bowl down so that I could repair the crack and the fills. I used a clear super glue and fine briar dust to replace the fills and to fill in the drill holes on the shank bottom. In each case I over filled the holes so that as the glue and dust were sanded I would not need to repeat the process due to shrinkage.

My intention was to restain the entire bowl so I sanded the bowl and the repairs with 220 grit sandpaper to smooth out the repairs. I followed that by sanding the bowl and repairs with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge.

I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer starting with the head that would fit and working up a head that took the cake back to bare briar. In looking at the back side of the bowl I could see a small hairline crack and I wanted to know if it went all the way through.

I topped the bowl with the topping board and took off all of the damage to the inside and outside rim as well as the rim surface. I sanded it with the medium and fine grit sanding sponge as well to smooth out the scratches.

After sanding and topping the bowl I could see that indeed there was a hairline crack that went across the rim at 5 o’clock and went down the back side of the bowl about ¾ of an inch. It was small and did not separate. It looked like it went all the way through to the inside of the bowl but upon examination appeared to only extend about 1/16th of an inch into the bowl. I topped it a little bit more to take care of the internal crack. I drilled the back side of the bowl at the bottom of the crack to stop it from going further down the bowl. I wiped down the bowl side and then picked out the crack with a dental pick. I filled it with super glue and briar dust and sanded it down with 220 grit sandpaper and the medium and fine grit sanding sponges until it blended into the surface of the bowl. I picked out the rim crack as well and filled it with the same mix. I sanded it with the topping board once again and then with the medium and fine grit sanding sponge.

I scrubbed the bowl with acetone on cotton pads to remove the remaining finish on the briar and to clean up the dust from all of the sanding of the fills. There was some beautiful grain that was showing through. The patches and fills actually looked much better.

I cleaned out the shank, bowl and airway in the shank and stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners.

I sanded the stem with 220 grit sandpaper and a medium and fine grit sanding sponge being careful not to damage the stamping. I went over that area with a 1500 grit micromesh pad. I then use an antique gold oil based product called Rub and Buff to fill in the stamping. The next photo shows the finished rework of the gold in the stem stamp. I put the stem in place on the bowl to get an idea of the improvement that the repairs, fills and stem work had done. I wanted to see what the pipe would look like as I finished.

I wiped the bowl down with a final wash of isopropyl alcohol and then heated it so that I could give it a stain coat. I stained it with a dark brown aniline stain thinned by 50% with isopropyl alcohol. I applied it and flamed it. I reapplied the stain and flamed it again and then set it aside to dry.

When it had dried I gave it a light buff with a microfibre cloth to see what the colour looked like. It was still a bit dark to my liking but the coverage was good. The repairs and fills while visible looked far better than when I started.

I wiped the bowl down with alcohol on a cotton pad to make it a bit more transparent and make the grain shine through. It did not take much to coax the grain to the surface and highlight the beauty of the pipe.

I worked on the long stem. To clean it thoroughly I had to wrap pipe cleaners together to extend the length of the stem. I wet sanded it with 1500-2400 grit micromesh sanding pads to clean up the oxidation and scratches in the stem. I rubbed it down with Obsidian Oil afterwards and then dry sanded with 3200-4000 grit micromesh pads. I gave it another coat of oil and then finished sanding it with 6000-12000 grit pads. I gave it a final coat of the wax and set aside to dry.

At this point I laid the pipe on top of the current issue of the Pipe Collector and took a series of photos to show it before I buffed it.

I polished the nickel ferrule with a silver polishing cloth and gave it and the bowl several coats of carnauba wax. A light touch is imperative on the nickel as it will darken the buffing pad and then transfer to the bowl. I hand buffed the bowl and ferrule with a microfibre cloth. I buffed the stem with Blue Diamond polish on the wheel and then gave it several coats of carnauba as well. I buffed the stem with a clean flannel buff and then with the cloth as well. The finished pipe is shown below. It is repaired and serviceable for many years to come. Thanks for looking. Thanks for the challenge Warren.

What a Mess – A Vanguard Reg’d. Lumberman with a Bit of History

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Blog by Steve Laug

I recently came across an EBay lot of bowls without stems and broken tenons still in the shanks. In the lot was one that intrigued me. It was the only one with a stem. The stem was short and tapered. It was very narrow and the button and slot made me think that it was old. The lot had the look of older English pipes but there was no information on the stamping. When the lot arrived in Vancouver, the stemmed pipe was stamped Vanguard over Reg’d on the left side of the shank. All other stamping, if there had been any, was lost. The bowls finish was gone. The colour was almost grey and there were spots all over this bowl and the others as can be seen in the photo below. From the third and fourth photo provided by the seller I could see that the shank was cracked and would need to be addressed. The rim appeared to be very thickly covered with lava and the outer edge had been damaged and rounded. The next photo shows the large crack that was present in the shank of the pipe. It had started to open and the edge of the shank where it met the stem had some nicks. When the box arrived the pipe was actually in worse shape than the photos had shown. The bowl rim was not all that was caked with tars. The bowl itself was almost 1/3 full of half burned tobacco, dottle that was rock hard and filled the bottom of the bowl. The cake on the rest of the bowl was not thick but was very hard. The finish was not only grey and spotty but was dented and rough to the touch. I could feel the ridge where the sides of the crack in the shank had separated. The rim edges were not only damaged and rounded but were also rough from banging out the burnt tobacco against something hard. The stem had tooth marks and chatter on both sides of the stem at the button. The button and slot were intact. The stem appeared to be as old as or older than I first thought. This was going to be a challenge to bring back to life but the age of it made it something I could not wait to tackle.

I took some close up photos of the state of the rim and cracked shank once the pipe arrived. It was a mess that is for sure. The rim and bowl were in bad shape and smelled awful. The shank crack was worse than I had imagined. The first photo of the cracked shank is from the top and the second photo is from the side.

I looked up the Vanguard name in Who Made That Pipe and found that there were two makers. There was a French maker and an English maker. The French pipe was made by Marchal, Rouchon 1907 and the English one was made by A. Oppenheimer/Bernhardt & Meyers. Given that I cannot be definitive as to which maker crafted this pipe. But the interesting thing is that the Marchal & Rouchon Cie which later became GBD France came under control of Oppenheimer in Great Britain. So you can see that though I may not know which one ultimately made the pipe the fact is that the two brands came together in 1902 when Marchal & Rouchon Cie sold out to Oppenheimer. I now have in my collection a pipe which may well have bridged the union of the two companies. The Vanguard thus could easily bear both the French and the English stamping. The lack of a “Made in…” stamp may well signify the years that the companies joined. That in itself made cleaning up and restoring this old-timer interesting for me.

I decided to start the clean up by reaming back the cake and cleaning out the dottle from the bowl. I used a PipNet reamer and started with the smallest head and worked up to the one that fit the bowl. I took the cake back to bare wood to check for damage to the inside walls of the bowl. With a pipe this worn I find that this is extremely necessary. I do not want any surprises after I have cleaned it up.

To repair the damaged shank I opened the crack as much as possible without making it worse and used a dental pick to push super glue into the crack. I pressed it together until it dried. I then used the sanding drum on the Dremel to take down the shank slightly so that a band would fit snugly on the shank and hold the crack tightly together. I pressed the band onto the end of the shank and took the picture below before I heated the band and pressed it into place. I heated the band with a heat gun and then pressed it against a flat surface until the band was in place on the shank. I pressed it onto the shank and then used a folded piece of sandpaper to clean up the edge of the band and shank. I left about 1/8th of an inch of the band extending past the shank to deal with the chipped and damage shank end. The stem would not have had a clean fit against the shank because of the damage. When the stem was in place it fit inside of the band against he shank and looked great.

With the band in place the shank was repaired and the tenon would no longer fit in the mortise. The contraction of the briar by the band cleaned up the crack and tightened up the loose fitting stem. I lightly sanded the tenon with a sanding drum on the Dremel and then by hand to get a snug fit in the shank.

I scrubbed the surface of the briar with acetone and cotton pads to remove the grime, spotting and remaining finish. There was some interesting grain under the grime.

The damaged rim surface and outer edge required that the bowl be topped. I used the topping board and 220 grit sandpaper to remove the damaged surface and sharpen the edge of the bowl.

I scrubbed the surface of the bowl down again with acetone and cotton pads to remove the dust and grime from topping.

I cleaned the inside of the shank and the stem with alcohol, cotton swabs and pipe cleaners. I used the drill bit from the Kleen Reem pipe reamer to clean out the airway from the mortise to the bowl. When I was finished I swabbed out the bowl with cotton swabs and alcohol and was pleased to find that the rank smell was gone. I sanded the bowl and stem with 220 grit sandpaper and a medium and fine grit sanding sponge to remove the tooth marks on the stem and scratches in the briar. I steamed the dents in the briar with a knife blade and wet cloth.

I sanded the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and dry sanding with 3200-12000 grit pads. I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil between each grit and then continued sanding until I had worked through the lot of pads.

I wiped the bowl down with a light coat of olive oil and then sanded it with 1500-2400 grit micromesh pads and then continued through the rest of the grits of pads. I continued to polish the bowl with the remaining grits of micromesh.

I buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond polish on the wheel and then gave it several coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean flannel buff and then hand buffed it with a microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It came out well for a pipe that potentially was made 108 years ago. Thanks for looking.

Restoring a White Cloud Imported Briar Pot

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Blog by Steve Laug

The next pipe up for refurbishing is a small pot shaped pipe. It is stamped on the left side of the shank with the words White Cloud over Imported Briar. There are no other stampings on the right side and underside of the shank. I have looked for the brand in WMTP and found the name but that it is an unknown maker from the US. I also on PipePhil’s site and found no additional information. I also did some searching on the web for information and found absolutely no information on the brand. Do any of you know anything about it? Any information would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

The pipe was in good shape underneath the thick coat of varnish. The stem was oxidized and dirty. The varnish on the rim was peeling and bubbling. There was damage to the rim in terms of darkening and potential burn. The bowl had some cake but it was bare wood at the bottom third of the bowl. The stamping was very clean and readable. There were some dings and fills on the bowl sides but nothing huge. They would clean up adequately. The metal tenon and stinger were a very interesting looking piece of plumbing. They were dirty and tarred. The inside of the shank and stem also had a lot of grime. The stinger was stuck in the tenon so it would need to be heated to be able to clean the airway in the stem thoroughly.

I took the close up photo of the rim and bowl to show the damage to the rim surface and the cake that was present. The next photo shows the stinger apparatus. It is a unique set up that is different from the collection of other stingers that I have here. The stem was slightly underclocked so I heated the tenon with a lighter and corrected the fit of the stem in the shank. I removed the stem and dropped the bowl in an alcohol bath to soak overnight. I wanted to loosen the varnish on the bowl and knew that while the alcohol would not remove it, it would soften it and make it easier to sand off. In the morning I removed the bowl from the bath and dried it off. The shiny coat of varnish was unscathed by the alcohol but I knew that it would be easier to remove. You can see the interesting grain on the bowl sides in the photos that follow. You can also see the nicks and fills that would need to be dealt with in the restoration.

I sanded the rim and the bowl with a medium grit sanding sponge to begin the process of removing the varnish. It worked well to break the seal on the varnish coat. Once that is done it comes off quite easily with acetone.

I needed to lightly top the rim to remove the burn mark and rounding on the front outer edge of the rim. It did not take much to clean up the rounded edge and give the rim a crisp profile.

I wiped the bowl down with acetone on a cotton pad and was able to completely remove the varnish coat. The alcohol had softened it and it came off very easily.

I heated the stinger in the tenon until I was able to wiggle it free of the airway. One side of the two prongs that held in place in the tenon was cracked so I repaired it and set it aside to dry. I cleaned out the shank and the stem with pipe cleaners, cotton swabs and alcohol. I sanded the stem with 220 grit sandpaper to remove some of the wavy marks from previous repairs to tooth damage. I sanded until the stem was smooth and then sanded it with a medium and a fine grit sanding sponge. I also sanded the bowl with the same sanding papers and sponges to minimize the dents and scratches in the finish.

I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake on the upper portion of the bowl.

I sanded the bowl and rim with micromesh sanding pads- wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads. I wiped the bowl down with a light coat of olive oil before proceeding to sand with 3200-4000 grit pads. I rubbed it down a second time and then sanded it with 6000-12000 grit pads. I buffed it by hand to see what the finish looked like at this point.

I sanded the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and then rubbed it down with Obsidian Oil. I dry sanded with 3200-4000 grit pads and gave it another coat of the oil. I checked the stinger and for some reason there was some dark grime that appeared in the slot in the stinger. I cleaned it again with pipe cleaners before sanding some more with 6000-12000 grit pads. I gave the stem a final coat of Obsidian Oil and set the pipe aside to dry.

I buffed the pipe with Blue Diamond on the buffing wheel and then gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it to a shine with a clean flannel buffing wheel. When I finished buffing it on the wheel I took it back to the work table and buffed it by hand with a microfibre cloth. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It should deliver a good smoke to whoever adds it to their rack. The briar is certainly interesting to look at now that the finish has been stripped and the bowl polished. Thanks for looking. cloud41 cloud42 cloud43 cloud44

Bringing a Dr. Grabow De Luxe 9704 Bent Billiard Back to Life

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Blog by Steve Laug

I just finished cleaning up the last of the pipe I picked up from the antique malls while I was in Idaho Falls. It is a little Dr. Grabow bent billiard. It is stamped on the left side of the shank Dr. Grabow over De Luxe over Imported Briar. On the right side near the stem shank union it is stamped with the shape number 9704. From what I can find on the Grabow shape charts the 04 shape is the bent billiard. This one was in rough shape. The finish was basically worn off and the bowl had spots of sticky grime on the sides and shank. There were also spots of paint on the shank and bowl. There were scratches all over the bowl. There were a lot of small fills on the right side of the bowl and the top of the shank as well as a large one on the lower part of the front of the bowl. Because of the missing finish these stood out. The top of the rim had a buildup of tars that looked flaky and hard. The bowl had a thick cake that made it impossible to see if the inside of the rim was in decent shape. I would need to ream it back to be sure. The stem was oxidized and the dirty with light tooth chatter on the underside near the button.

I took a close up photo of the top of the rim to show what I had to work with in cleaning up the bowl and rim. When I took the stem off the pipe it had the usual Dr. Grabow shovel stinger apparatus. This was a little unique in that it was not inserted into the metal tenon but was an integral part of the tenon. The two were cast together which made removing it impossible. It was covered in tars and in a tobacco coloured lacquer that was rock hard. The next two photos show the stamping on both sides of the shank. The right side shows the clear shape number stamp and the left side the Dr. Grabow stamping. The Imported Briar stamping is weak but visible.

I reamed the bowl back to bare wood with a PipNet reamer. I started with the smallest cutting head and worked my way up to one that was the same diameter as the inside of the bowl. Once the cake was cleaned out I used a pen knife to clean up the small ridge that shows up in the second photo below.

I used a sanding sponge to lightly top the bowl. The tars and lava on the top were hard and this was the way I chose to remove it without damaging the finish to the rim. I worked on it until the rim was clean and smooth. It would still need to be scrubbed to remove the darkening.

I scrubbed the rim and the bowl with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the grime and oils left in the finish. I scrubbed until the rim and bowl were clean. I scrubbed the shovel stinger with 0000 steel wool to remove the buildup on the aluminum and polish it at the same time.

I cleaned out the shank with alcohol, pipe cleaners and cotton swabs until it was spotless. I then worked on the stem. It was made a bit more difficult with the built in stinger but I was able to get it clean with a bit of effort. With the inside clean I sanded the bowl and rim with 220 grit sandpaper and a medium and fine grit sanding sponge to clean up the finish. I was able to remove the darkening on the rim and also the dark spots on the sides of the bowl.

I screwed the stem back on the shank and then sanded the stem with the same sandpapers as I had sanded the bowl. I removed tooth chatter and the calcification on the first inch of the stem. I worked on the slight tooth marks on the button itself and cleaned them up. The pipe was beginning to take shape. Much more sanding would need to be done to the bowl to remove all of the scratches left behind by the sandpaper and a lot of polishing would need to be done on the stem before the pipe was finished.

I rubbed the bowl down with olive oil so that I could wet sand the finish and work out the scratches.

I sanded the bowl with micromesh sanding pads and the olive oil until I was able to remove the scratches. I started with 1500-2400 grit pads and sanded until the scratches were minimized and then rubbed it down with olive oil once again before sanding with 3200-4000 grit pads. Each successive micromesh pad brought more of a shine to the briar. The fills became smooth and blended into the briar better and began to disappear into the briar as the scratches around the edges were smoothed out.

I gave it a final rub down with oil and then finished sanding it with the last three grits of micromesh – 6000-12000. The bowl was smooth to the touch and had a shine to it that once was buffed and waxed would glow.

I sanded the stem with micromesh sanding pads – wet sanding with 1500-2400 grit pads and then rubbing it down with Obsidian Oil. I continued to dry sand with 3200-4000 grit pads and gave it another coat of the oil. I finished by sanding it with 6000-12000 grit pads and then gave it a final coat of oil and let it dry.

I buffed the pipe on the wheel with Blue Diamond polish and then gave the bowl and stem multiple coats of carnauba wax. I buffed it with a clean flannel wheel to give it a shine and finished by buffing it with a microfibre cloth to deepen the shine. The finished pipe is shown in the photos below. It is a beautiful old Grabow that has a lot of life left in it. Whether I keep it or pass it on to someone else it should last much longer than I will. It should continue to give companionship to whoever’s rack it graces. Thanks for looking.

ADDENDUM: I received the following message on FaceBook from Christopher Chopin. It adds much to the information on this pipe so I add it here:

A favorite shape. Nice job as always Steve. And yes, 04 is the shape code, 97 was the finish code for deluxe. Also 92 and 98, there was more than one De Luxe, and 97 was the natural variegated finish. Dating on that if I’m not mistaken is between 1944 and 1953, at which point the spade was rotated so that the tip pointed to the bowl instead of the mouthpiece, after the company was purchased by HL&T. That is a true Linkman’s grabow, they just discontinued the Linkman’s stamp in ’44. I suspect it’ll find a place in your regular rotation.

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rebornpipes

reclaiming old and worn estate pipes

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