Tag Archives: waxing

A Dr. Grabow Special Rhodesian/Bulldog – A Makeover

The last of the pipes from the Ebay lot below was the one in the bottom left corner of the photo. It was stamped Dr. Grabow over Special over Imported Bruyere on the left side of the shank. The finish was a varnish or polyurethane coat over the briar. It was bubbling and crackling. There was water damage on the edges of the rim. The briar itself was in good shape with no dents or roughening on the rim. The rim was slightly darkened but no dents or dings. The bowl was slightly out of round from poor reaming but very workable. The stem was a mess with chew marks on the top and the bottom for about an inch up the stem from the button. The stem was made of nylon and not vulcanite. The tenon was a push style and not a screw in stem. There was a shovel like stinger in the end of the tenon. The stem was loose in the shank and there was significant debris and buildup in the shank and in the stem. The second photo below shows the pipe as it was in the pictures from the seller.

I took it to my worktable this evening and went to work on it. I took the stem out and began to sand on the bite marks on the top and bottom of it. The next series of five photos show the progress of smoothing out the stem by sanding. I began with 220 grit sandpaper and worked up to a medium grit sanding sponge. By the fourth and fifth photo the bite marks are gone and some sanding scratches remain that will need to be worked out with micromesh sanding pads. I recut the edge of the button on the top and bottom with a needle file to clean up the angles. That is also visible in the last two photos. I also removed the stinger and cleaned it with 0000 steel wool and then polished it with micromesh sanding pads.

While I worked on the stem the bowl had been soaking in an alcohol bath to help loosen the varnish or urethane finish. My plan was to remove the finish totally and sand and restain the pipe once it was cleaned and sanded.

The alcohol bath softened the finish so when I dried it off the finish was cloudy. I have found that with this kind of finish I can use acetone on a cotton pad afterward to further remove the softened finish. The next two photos show the bowl with the finish removed. There is some nice looking birdseye grain coming through. Once the briar was clean I reglued the metal decorative band back on the shank and let it dry.

I sanded the bowl with the medium grit sanding sponge and then with 1500-2400 micromesh sanding pads. The next series of four photos are a little out of focus but the cleaned surface of the briar is visible and the grain that was underneath the finish is quite nice. I was also able to remove the water marks/damage that was along the outer edge of the rim and down the side of the bowl in the process of the sanding. I also cleaned out the shank with cotton swabs and Everclear. I did the stem as well and cleaned until the cleaners and swabs came out clean and white.

While the glue dried I worked on the nylon stem. I was able to remove all of the tooth damage. I wet sanded it with 1500-2400 micromesh sanding pads and removed the majority of the scratches left behind by the sanding sponge. I continued to rework the stem with these sanding pads until all of the scratches were gone and the stem began to take on a shine. (Photos 1-2 below show a top and bottom view of the stem).

I dry sanded with the remaining grits of micromesh sanding pads from 3200-12,000 grit. The stem took on its original shine. The next series of four photos show the stem as it moves through each level of polishing.

I wiped the bowl down a final time with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the sanding dust and grit. I dried it carefully and then it was ready to stain. I decided to use a linseed oil and medium walnut stain on this pipe. I felt it would make the grain show well and give the bowl a good protective coat. I applied the stain and wiped it off, reapplied and wiped it until I got the coverage I wanted on the bowl. The next series of four photos show the stained bowl.

I buffed the bowl and shank on the buffing wheel lightly with Tripoli and then with White Diamond to give it a shine. I then buffed it with carnauba wax and gave it several coats to protect the wood. I did not buff the stem on the wheel as the nylon heats too quickly on the buffing wheel and melts. I have made a mess out of more than one nylon stem. It does not seem to matter how light a touch I use the wheel and the nylon stems do not work well together. I gave the stem a coating of Obsidian Oil and rubbed it into the stem. I then hand applied several coats of carnauba wax and hand buffed the stem with a shoe brush and a soft cotton cloth. The finished pipe is pictured below. All in all it is not a bad looking old Grabow. It is clean and should smoke very well.

A Canadian Pipe Maker I had never heard of: Leonard Payne Pipes

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Blog by Steve Laug

On a Saturday not too long ago I went on a pipe hunt in Vancouver. I began at the Vancouver Flea Market and worked my way back toward my home. I stopped a quite a few antique shops and “malls” in my hunt for old pipes. I found a few at the flea market and several old timers at the shops that I left behind. However, one pipe caught my eye. It was not a brand that I had seen before or heard of.It was a nicely shaped thick shanked apple that needed very little work. It had a bit of tarry build up on the rim, some tooth chatter on the stem and minor oxidation. It grabbed my attention. The stamping was Leonard Payne on the left side of the shank and Made in Canada on the right side. The stem bears a green dot in the centre of a white circle on the left side of the stem. I decided to do a bit of research on the web and found the following advertisement that highlighted the pipes.

Further digging with Google came up with this short note from alt.smokers.pipes forum. It was written by Mike Glukler of Briar Blues. I quote it below in full. (https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.smokers.pipes/RrICLiVgE2o) “Leonard Payne was based in B.C. for many years. He came to Canada from England. He had shops in Surrey, B.C. and Kelowna, B.C.Interesting fellow. Gruff as the day is long. When you bought a pipe it was handed to you in a paper bag. No sock, no box. Most of his pipes carried a “carburetor” system at the shank / stem junction.Another Payne idea was his shanks. Almost all his pipes were two pieces. He’d turn the bowl and shank, then cut off the shank and reattach with glue (not always with the same piece of briar, so many did not match grains). His thinking was that the shank being the weakest link, if cut and glued would never break and thus “correcting”the weakest link.You may find his pipes on E-Bay on occasion listed as a Len Cayne. The P in his stamping looks more like a fancy upper case C.”

That is the extent of information that I could find on the pipe. It was a Canadian made pipe carved by an eccentric BC pipe carver. The one example I purchase was a single piece of briar without the broken and reglued shank that Mike mentions above. It is a light weight piece of briar and the fit of the stem and shank is very well done. The gap between the end of the tenon and the end of the mortise is very small – just enough to allow for expansion. The finish was very good and the stain well done.

My clean up on the pipe was very simple. I sanded out the tooth chatter on the stem near the button and polished the stem with micromesh sanding pads from 1500-12,000 grit. I then took it to the buffer and used red Tripoli and White Diamond on the buffing wheels to further polish the stem. I reamed the bowl and cleaned the tars off the rim and polished it as well with White Diamond. I am careful when buffing the shank area where the stamping is so that I do not harm the stamping. Once I was finished with the polishing I gave the bowl and the stem several coats of carnauba wax. I polished the pipe with a soft flannel buffing pad. The finished pipe is pictured below.

Fast forward several months to a conversation had with a friend in Ontario via email. She had come across several Leonard Payne pipes and done the same research I did. She found the same information I did and sent me photos of the three pipes she found. We talked for a while and I offered to restem a pipe of hers. She sent me the pipe for work and then also the nice little Leonard Payne Zulu/Dublin pictured below.

She said that it needed some TLC but it was really in quite good shape. The finish was clean, though somewhat spotty. There were very few scratches or dings. There was a scuff mark on the bottom of the shank next to the stem and the stem was slightly scuffed in the same area. The rim was also clean. The bowl was already reamed and relatively clean. The bowl and shank smelled of Latakia but the pipe really seemed to be hardly smoked and certainly not broken in to the bottom of the bowl. The stem had some ripples in the surface near the button and in those were the remnants of tooth marks. The shoulders of the stem at the stem/shank junction were slightly rounded from sanding or buffing with the stem off the pipe. There were two small spots of oxidation around the logo.

I sanded the stems and shank with a fine grit sanding sponge and used a sanding block to reduce the rounding to the shoulders of the stem. I then sanded the stem with micromesh sanding pads from 1500-12,000 grit to polish the vulcanite. I rubbed stem down with Obsidian Oil and let it soak into the surface. Once it was dry I buffed it with White Diamond and then carnauba wax. The ripples in the stem are gone and the oxidation around the logo is also gone. My Black and Tan Cocker Spaniel decided to sit and “help” me this morning. He has learned that I generally have some dog chews at the work table but he gives me the illusion that he is really interested in what I am doing!

I set the stem aside and worked on the bowl. I found that though the finish was clean it was faded and spotty in places. I decided to give it a coat of medium walnut aniline stain mixed with linseed oil to even out the finish and give it a shine. I applied the stain with a cotton pad and then buffed it by hand with a cotton cloth when it was dry.

I reinserted the stem and gave the entire pipe a buff with White Diamond and then gave it several coats of carnauba wax. I finished by buffing the entirety with multiple coats of carnauba wax. The finished pipe is pictured below. This nice little pipe is cleaned, restored and ready to smoke. It joins the other Leonard Payne pipe in my collection.

Restoring An Interesting Piece of Pipe History – An Art Deco C.B. Weber Streamliner

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Blog by Steve Laug

In a recent EBay purchase I picked up a unique pipe that has a flowing look to it. I was intrigued to figure out the history and any information I could find regarding it so I went on a hunt on the web. One of the first articles I came across is found in the link below. http://streamlinesdeluxe.wordpress.com/2012/06/01/weber-streamliner-pipe-2/ The author of the blog makes a brief reference the pipe I found and even has a picture of it. He speaks of the stem being made of something other than vulcanite. Other references I found in online pipe forums spoke of the fact that the bowl was not made of briar but of some composite material. Others said that the bowls were made of American hardwoods. Interestingly no one spoke of what hardwoods were used. I have hunted high and low on the web and can find nothing definitive on the pipe’s manufacture or composition.

I broadened my search to information on finned pipes. I did not want information on Porsche design pipes or metal finned pipes but was looking for anything on wooden finned pipes. I came across the following information on a patent taken by a carver/designer named Wayne Leser. His diagrams and patent application is included below and it can be seen that it is actually very close to CB Weber’s Streamliner. His patent was applied for through the US Patent Office in January of 1941. I assume the patent was granted as it is on the Patent website. Weber’s design seems to be elongated a bit more than the Leser design but the tear drop shape of the outer bowl and the similarly tear drop shape of the drilling match quite well.

I can find no further information on Wayne Leser so I have no idea if he sold his concept to Weber, or worked for Weber. If anyone has further information on that connection it would be great to learn about it. Please post a response below.

The pipe I picked up is pictured below in photos from the EBay seller. The photos were not very clear so I could not see the condition of the pipe very well but I was intrigued by it nonetheless. It looked like the bowl was in good condition. The stem however, appeared to be a replacement stem and the fit was poorly done. In the second photo below it is evident that the junction of the stem and shank does not meet.

When the package arrived from the seller I took the pipe to my worktable and photographed the condition of the pipe. The pipe was in fairly decent condition. The left side of the bowl was clean. It is stamped Streamliner in script over C.B. Weber & Co.

There were two small divots in the shank just below the stamping. I thought at first these might be dents but they are actually spots where the wood is missing. The right side of the bowl is also in good shape. The fins are intact all the way around the bowl with no chips or breakage. The rim was tarred and had a small burn spot on the point at the front of the bowl. The stem was definitely a replacement stem. In my reading I had found copies of the logo that was originally on the stem and also the fact that the stem had a stinger apparatus as part of the fitments. This stem had neither and the fit was wrong. The diameter of the stem was bigger; the tenon was off center therefore the fit was out of line with the left side being too large and the right side too small. The length of the stem was also too long and did not match the dimensions that I had found online regarding the overall length of the pipe. The bowl was in pretty decent shape though there was some kind of bowl coating on it that had broken free of the walls. It is a tear drop shaped bowl with a downward angle on the front portion so reaming it would be tricky. The wood on this one was definitely not briar. The bottom of the bowl has a foot that makes it a sitter and there is a rusticated pattern on the bottom of the bowl.

I carefully reamed the bowl to remove the bowl coating and the slight cake that was there. I used two different cutting heads on the PipNet reamer. The first head was the same diameter as the main portion of the bowl. For the angle teardrop end I used the smallest cutting head. Between the two of them I was able to clean up the bowl and remove all of the coating.

Removing the tars from the rim was a bit of a challenge and combined with burn mark on the point I decided to sand off the rim with a medium grit sanding sponge. I would then have to restain the bowl. I sanded it with the medium grit sponge and then with a fine grit sanding block to work on the burn mark and the darkening of the rim.

I finished the sanding by wiping down the bowl with acetone on a cotton pad. I was able to even out the finish on the bowl and rim so matching stain would be much easier to do. I was also able to lighten the burn spot with the same process to the point that a good coat of oxblood stain would make it fade into the surface of the rim.

I then set the bowl aside and went to work on fitting a new stem to the bowl and shank. In the first photo below I have the new stem blank fit to the shank. It still needs work to make the diameters match. The stem is about an inch shorter and brings the pipe back to the original length as noted from my online work. I also think that proportionally it works better with the elongated bowl and shank than the one that came with it.

In order to get the fit good and tight I used a sanding block to make sure that the transition between the bowl and shank was smooth. This entailed sanding the shank slightly in the process. In the next series of four photos below the fit is finished. The transition is smooth and the fit is good and tight.

I wiped the pipe down with acetone once again to even out the finish on the shank. The grain in the original wood is quite visible in these photos and it is not briar.

The flow of the taper on the stem was still too chunky in my opinion to match the Streamline concept of the pipe. I used 220 grit sandpaper and files to change the slope of the stem. When I had it the way I envisioned I sanded it with 220 grit sandpaper, a medium grit sanding sponge and also a fine grit sanding block. The angle was right and the profile looked much more “streamlined”.

I sanded the stem, bowl and shank with micromesh sanding pads. I wet sanded them with 1500-2400 grit sanding pads and dry sanded with 3200-12,000 grit pads.

I decided to try to match the original stain using a Danish Oil (linseed oil with a cherry stain). I applied the stain with a cotton pad and wiped it down. When it had dried I was not happy with the coverage and appearance so I removed the stain with acetone to try a different stain.

Once I had the finish removed I restained it with an oxblood aniline stain. I had to apply it and flame it several times to the top of the bowl and shank to get the stain to set deeply and match the rest of the bowl. This was a hard one to get a good stain on. I decided to not apply the stain in the grooves of the fins but just on the surface of the bowl. It worked quite well with the original stain in the fins matching the surface colour really well.

I did some further polishing on the stem with the higher grits of micromesh from 3600-12,000. Once I had finished the sanding I polished the stem with Maguiar’s Scratch X2.0 to deepen the shine. I coated the stem with Obsidian Oil and then buffed it with carnauba wax to seal it and protect it. The final buff on the stem was done with a soft flannel pad.

I reinserted the stem and gave the pipe a final buff with carnauba wax and a soft flannel buffing pad. The finished pipe clearly shows some of the grain pattern of the alternative wood on the shank and the top and bottom of the bowl. The stem came out fitting nicely and giving the overall pipe a new “streamlined” appearance more accurately approximating the original stem. The bowl feels great in the hand and is uniquely attractive as a piece of pipe history. Time will tell if I smoke this one or just keep it around for display purposes. Below are photos of the finished pipe.

A National Bent Apple Diamond Shank Restored

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A National Bent Apple Diamond Shank Restored
It is stamped NATIONAL in italics over Washington D.C. on the bottom right side of the diamond shank.

That portion of the shank is smooth. The remainder of the pipe has a deep, craggy sandblast that is quite nice. The stem has no logo or identifying marks other than being stamped PARA on the top right side of the saddle stem.

The two photos above and the series of ten photos below were included in the listing on Ebay. The pipe looked to be in excellent condition. I am uncertain as to the brand of the pipe. The book, Who Made That Pipe identifies the brand as being made by Comoy’s and stamped England. However, this pipe is clearly stamped Washington D.C. The book identifies a brand that is stamped National Mazda as made by LH Stern in the US. The pipe may have been made by LH Stern or possibly it was made for a pipe shop in Washington D.C. and made by Comoy’s. There is also a company called National Briar Pipe Company in Jersey City, New Jersey that could possibly have made the pipe as well. There is something about the stamping that reminds me of the Bertram pipes that also came from Washington D.C. This pipe is a bit of a mystery but I like the diamond shank apple shape and the nice blast on the bowl.

Whoever made the pipe, it has a great looking sandblast as can be seen in the photos below.

The bowl was lightly caked with carbon and was quite clean in the shank and stem. It appeared to have been barely broken in.

The stem seemed to have light tooth chatter on the top and the bottom near the button. There appeared to be light oxidation on the vulcanite.

When the pipe arrived, I unpacked it and took it to the worktable. I removed the carefully stem out of the shank because it was very tight and was hard to turn. I was just about ready to put it in the freezer for a few moments to let the contraction and expansion loosen the stem when it turned. I was able to remove it from the shank without damaging either shank or stem. Looking at the tenon I could see a slight buildup of grime that was on the last ¼ inch and looking into the shank the same band of grit was present. Interestingly to me, the shank was dirty but there was not a lot of tar or oils built up inside. There was bare briar clearly visible in the shank other than the band of grit that had held the stem tightly in place. I cleaned out the shank with cotton swabs dipped in Everclear and the inside of the stem with pipe cleaners and the same. It did not take too much work before they both came out clean and white.

I reamed the bowl of the pipe with a PipNet pipe reamer to remove the slight cake and the tobacco debris that had built up on the walls. It was quite soft and came easily away from the wall of the pipe.

I buffed the bowl with White Diamond and then gave it a coating of Halcyon II wax to give the surface a shine. The finish was actually in excellent shape and after hand buffing the Halcyon II the pipe bowl looked as good as new. I set the bowl aside and worked on the stem. I sanded the stem with a medium grit sanding sponge to remove the surface oxidation and the slight tooth chatter at the button. There was also some calcification around the button that I sanded off as well. After the stem was clean of oxidation and debris I sanded it with micromesh sanding pads. I wet sanded with 1500-2400 grit micromesh and the dry sanded with 3200-12,000 grit pads.

Just after wet sanding with the 1500-2400 micromesh pads I used a white out/correction pen to whiten the stamping on the stem. I applied the white out with the tip of the pen and when it dried sanded off the excess with the 1500-2400 grit pads.

Once the stem was polished with the final grit of micromesh I rubbed the stem down with Obsidian Oil and when it was absorbed I buffed the stem with White Diamond on the wheel. I gave the bowl a light buff with White Diamond as well. I finished by buffing the stem with carnauba wax, giving it several coats and then buffing the entire pipe with a soft flannel buff to raise a shine. The finished pipe is pictured in the last four photos below.

An Ultrasonic Stem Cleaning Experiment – AJ Verstraten (aka Bananabox-Ninja)

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What follows is another article by AJ on his use of the ultrasonic cleaning machine. He has written it in response to the many who asked to hear more about it after his first article here on rebornpipes. I wish to thank AJ for his contributions to the blog and to encourage him to continue to write for us. It is a pleasure to post his next contribution. Thank you AJ.

Greetings, when using a new technique I can’t help but experiment like a mad scientist. So when I heard of the ultra sonic cleaning from my fellow cleaner on the PRF (The Dutch Flemish pipe smoking forum) named ‘Meindert’ I dove into it, because science! One of the first try-outs was posted in my first article and I was carefully optimistic about the end result. During the course of this clean-up I learned why I was not completely happy about it.

When I read the comments on my first article, Mark Domingues mentioned the Oxyclean method. To be honest I never heard of Oxyclean but it triggered a mention done by another fellow PRF-er named ‘annie69’. Who once told me he used hand warm water and Oxi-Action to remove the heavy oxidation on a stem. I tried this method a few months ago, but was not very happy with the end results as it left the stems slippery and gooey, which in my eyes prevented the rest of the oxy-water reaching the stem.

As an ultrasonic vibrates the water I thought: “What if the water is in motion, would it remove the goo from the stem during the soak and so give a deeper penetration?” followed by: “What if I combine the oxy-method with the ultrasonic?” So I set up a test with two almost similar oxidized stems which are from my ‘bit-box’ of pipe heads and stems that are missing their counterpart.

Oh, I should mention I work for a company that supplies laboratory equipment and some of the tools are old stock that was distributed to personnel, hence the use of a magnetic stirrer.

First the stems: The one on the left for the ultrasonic, the one on the right for the stirrer.

The stirrer setup: A glass on a magnetic stirrer, hand warm water, stirrer, amount of Oxi-Action and the stem.

To keep the stem in the liquid I used a bent electric wire and hung it in the glass.

So I poured the hand warm water, the Oxi-Action, and the stirrer in the glass, hung the stem in the mixture and set the timer for 20 minutes.

What happens is that a rotating magnetic field lets the stir bar rotate in the liquid, creating a whirlpool inside the glass. Thus the water is in motion and hopefully rinses off the goo that is formed on the stem by the Oxi-Action.

When I retrieved the stem and it was as I expected, greenish brown from the Oxi-Action. But not as gooey as before, so it worked to some degree.

Then I put the stem to the grind wheel and it came out as normal.

The light brown patches are hard to reach for the wheel and I normally do those by hand.
To be honest, I was not really happy with the end result and did not finish all the way through with polishing and buffing the stem. In all it only saved me a little time and was a headache to set up right.

While I worked the previous stem on the grind wheel I let the ultrasonic do its thing. Again the setup: Warm water, ultrasonic with Oxi-Action and the stem.

The ultrasonic in action.

The stem just removed from the bath.

When I retrieved the stem I was blown away by the result, the stem came out cleaner than with the normal soak method and less gooey as with the stirring method. (However the photo did not show this, so I had to lighten it to make it clearer.) Also when I put the stem to the grind wheel I found that the liquid was a deeper brown colour instead of the golden light-brown colour I usually get when grinding.

The result after grinding.

Was I on to something or was it a fluke with this particular stem? I decided to leave the stems as is, find another stem in my ‘bit-box’ and try the ultrasonic again to see if I could duplicate the result. I found a stem without its tenon and dunked it in the ultrasonic.

While this was going on I Googled about ultrasonic cleaning and I stumbled on a very well written site: http://www.tmasc.com/qa%20process.htm by an unknown author. In it I found a certain line that made me stop the ultrasonic and reconfigure it, namely this:

‘Parts should be racked in a basket or work holder designed to handle your specific part. This is very important in high-end cleaning systems where you want the cleanest part possible. You should always use a stainless steel basket, as softer materials will absorb the ultrasonic energy. Never use plastic or other soft materials. If your part is easily damaged or scratched, stainless steel racks with Nylobond or Teflon coatings are available.’

Now if you look in the previous pictures you will notice I left the basket out of the cleaner thinking it was not needed for my purposes. Boy was I wrong. Having the stems in contact with the bottom meant that the sonic vibrations were interrupted and as such the cleaning was not optimum. Whoops. So I put the basket that came with the cleaner, put the stem in and let it go for 8 minutes. The end result really surprised me.

When I used the grind wheel on it the liquid was almost black. Here are the stems next to each other.

You can clearly see that the middle one has had more oxidation removed than the other two and in the case of the upper stem I blame my inexperience with the ultrasonic. Still the end result for me was quite exciting and I wanted to try it in a complete cleaning process. So I rummaged through my pipe- and bit-boxes to find almost equally oxidized stems. I found a ‘Belmont Grain London Style’ pipe and a loose stem.

First I cleaned the inside using 96% alcohol and pipe cleaners, they came out pretty clean indicating that the stems were not heavily used.

Then I set up the ultrasonic again with the Oxi-Action solution, warm water and the basket in place. The stems were placed in the basket and I let her go for 8 minutes.

When I retrieved the stems, the first thing I noticed was that they were not as gooey as I was used to and the water smelled rather…..well….like oxidation but more moist. There is no good way to describe it.

I put the stems to the grind wheel and the oxidation came off way faster than if I would not have soaked them. Also the liquid that came off the wheel and stems was way darker as I mentioned before. At this time I also sanded the hard to get edges with 600 grit paper wrapped around a modelling file.

Then I proceeded to empty the ultrasonic and put in the 50-50 alcohol and water mixture with a dash of disinfectant.

One of the positive things of the ultrasonic is that it goes on a timer and you have your hand free to do another thing until it is done, so I proceeded to clear the top of the bowl of its soot using a sock, salvia and the abrasive pads. Using the sock I got most of the soot build-up off the bowl and used the 1800 grit to get the thicker and harder pieces off.

Then it was time to retrieve the stems. They came out nice and clean and when dried were a little dull. I pulled pipe cleaners through them and as you can see they were only a little brown at the beginning (right side).

Replacing the stem on the pipe I used the muslin buff wheels and polishing wheels to buff the stems to get a nice shine on them.

And the final pictures of the tools used in the experiment and the cleaning.

So far I am optimistic and happy with the end results using the ultrasonic cleaner with the Oxi-Action cleaning solution. The oxidation gets off rather well using the grinding wheel and it saves me roughly 30 minutes of work. This means a relief for my tennis elbow I have in both arms. So for me it is quite a pleasant addition in the cleaning process.

The negative aspect so far encountered was that this particular model ultrasonic bath is not very drain friendly, in this I mean that getting the liquid out is rather a messy business. Also I have no idea what will happen in the long run with the stem if you use it for a prolonged time. As I read that some items can turn brittle when used too much in an ultrasonic cleaner. But so far I have not found any evidence this is happening with the stems. And there is of course the fact that Vulcanite tends to bend back to its original form when heated too hot, so far this has not happened but I can imagine that if using water that is too hot in combination with the ultrasonic vibrations that add extra heat it can happen.

All-in-all an experiment that opened my eyes to two cleaning methods and I hope it was as informative for you to read as it was for me to do.

Repairing Deep Tooth Marks and Bite Throughs on Vulcanite Stems – AJ Verstraten

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Blog by AJ Verstraten

It is with pleasure that I post AJ’s second post on rebornpipes. AJ is known to the online community as Bananabox-Ninja.

Greetings, today a small post about the use of black super glue on a few pipes I had previously cleaned and refurbished; before I found Rebornpipes. This did give me a small problem as I did not extensively take pictures of the process as I had no reason to share the process at that moment and as such I am missing a few ‘before’ pictures.

The pipes I revisited for this project were:
– 11 Wahl Filtro
– Lorenzo Elba
– Machiavelli Como
– BBB Medina
– Spitfire by Lorenzo Riviera
All of them had bite marks on the mouthpiece and the Riviera had even been bitten clean through.

Lorenzo is a good Italian brand that is quite popular in Germany. The BBB Medina is an old English made pipe that has a good reputation here in the Dutchlands. The Wahl and the Machiavelli pipes are a mystery to me. I can find some eBay listings for them but I cannot pinpoint their true origin.

First up the pictures I did have of the before process.

BBB Medina

Lorenzo Elba

11 Wahl

As these pipes had already been waxed I first removed the wax layer using my motor, water and grinding wheel. This only took a few moments, after which I used a cotton swab and some alcohol to really clean the surface of the mouthpiece.

The following steps I repeated a few times as I found I was a little impatient in the drying process, I advise to let the glue set for a night just to be sure it is dry to the core.

Using a piece of cardboard dipped in Vaseline (sorry no pictures) I closed the hole in the Riviera mouthpiece and with cotton swabs and toothpicks applied the glue to the bite marks on all the other mouthpieces.

When the glue had dried I used 600 and 1000 grit sanding paper wrapped around a model file to sand off the excess glue and smooth the mouthpiece.

I checked the smoothness using my mouth and tongue and although in all cases it felt smooth I noticed that in taking the pictures of the finished product the glue spots are visible. This bothered me, like when I sand a round shoulder or edge on the stem. A casual observer will not notice this, but I know it is there and it will bother me. However I decided against re-sanding them in the hopes of getting them perfect. Because in the end it is my lips and tongue that are handling the mouthpiece the most, not my eyes 

To finalize this short post here are the finished mouthpieces, pipes and the tools I used for this project.

11 Wahl Filtro

Lorenzo Elba

Machiavelli Como

BBB Medina

Spitfire by Lorenzo Riviera

Tools used during this project

Dorset “Genuine Briar” Rhodesian

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By Al Jones (aka “Upshallfan”)

I found this unknown to me pipe on Ebay. It looked to be in decent condition and it is a shape that I love (tapered stem Rhodesian). The pipe had a dark red finish, with a few fills but they were covered up nicely. The stem fitment was excellent and also in overall very good condition. I was hoping that this would be a relatively easy restoration.

I reamed the light cake from the bowl and soaked it for several hours with isopropyl alcohol and sea salt. The bowl only required a light buff with white diamond to bring back the shine, after which I applied several coats of carnuba wax. The bowl had some scuff marks but they came out nicely. The beading around the bowl was in excellent condition.

The stem was badly oxidized, but in great shape. I soaked it in a mild oxyclean solution, then used first 800 then 1500 and 2000 grit wet sandpaper to remove the oxidation. After which I sanded it with 8000 and 12000 grade micromesh paper. The stem was inserted back onto the bowl for work around the shank end and I was careful not to damage the “D” stem stamp. I then buffed the stem with white diamond and red rouge, followed by a buff using automotive plastic polish. The stem came back quite nicely. Here is the stem before moving to the buffing wheel.

Overall, I was very pleased with the finish of the pipe. It was delivered to the new owner this weekend, and they were also pleased with the appearance and how it smoked.

A Handmade Denmark Dublin Reborn

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Blog by Greg Wolford

A week or so ago I went into a local antique shop that houses a variety of vendors. In the past I have found a few decent pipes here so I always have high hopes when I go there. This trip yielded a nice little haul of four pipes which I plan to restore over the next few weeks as i have time. The first two have already been started one: one completed and one still in the process. This post will mainly focus on a Dublin shape that is stamped on the shank Handmade over Denmark, with no other information on the pipe or stem. This is the pipe as it looked when I got it home:

As you can see, it was heavily caked and had what I thought were some deep scratches on it, the rim was charred and damaged from knocking out the dottle, the finish was gone, and the stem was oxidized but had little chatter on it. I decided to start with reaming the back the cake. This bowl is a tapered one, as many Dublins are, and required the use of all four of the bits on my Castleford reamer. After reaming the cake back considerably, to an even, thin layer, I decided to sanitize it with my retort. And since one of the other of the lot I picked up needed very little work other than cleaning (or so I thought at the time) I decided to go ahead and retort it (no reaming needed on this one) while I had the equipment out and also do both stems at this time, too. The Dublin took several “runs” with the retort to produce a clean tube of alcohol at the end; the cherrywood that I was also doing only took two tubes, but I knew it hadn’t been used much and wouldn’t be very dirty.

After I finished the work with the retort I dropped the stems in a OxyClean bath and left them to soak while I cleaned the shanks out. The retort had done a nice job of taking out most of the gunk in the shank of the Dublin; it took comparatively fewer pipe cleaners and cotton swabs than most restorations. I expected the shank from the cherrywood to be all but clean with one or two passes and it sort of was; instead of tar I found the alcohol had “raised” a mahogany-like stain inside the shank – and a lot of it. I then noticed that there was some of this same color on the outside, bottom edge of the shank. The pipe itself wasn’t a reddish color but a more maple, orange-ish one and I hadn’t planned on refinishing it since the color was nice and I didn’t really see a need – until now. Once I noticed the red color it had to come off the outside and out of the shank. Now the entire finish was going to have to be removed so both pipes got wiped down several time with acetone and then put into the alcohol bath overnight.

Several hours later I removed the stems from their soak to begin to make them look new again. I was disappointed to see that the thin layer of petroleum jelly I’d put over the logo on the cherrywood’s stem had washed away and the “white” which had been there was now gone; the stem logo had only been about 60% colored and I’d have had to apply more white anyway so I suppose it wasn’t that big of a deal. I washed the stem well with dish soap and then sprayed them with some liquid Bar Keeper’s Friend, a new product to me (I’ve tried the powdered form before but not the spray). I scrubbed them off with a Miracle Eraser hoping for the good results I had gotten last time I used the eraser but they weren’t as good, though a lot of the oxidation had softened and been removed.

I now moved onto using the micro mesh pads, wet sanding them with 1500 & 1800 grit. At this point I noticed there was some oxidation that hadn’t come out well so I took some 400 grit wet/dry paper to the stems, then “painted” them with a Bic lighter, and then back to the 400 grit paper until the oxidation spots were gone. I then went back to wet sanding with the micro mesh 1500-3200 grits. After the 3200 grit I polished the stems with plastic polish and then dry sanded with the remaining grits through 12,000. Here are a few photos of the shine progression:

I now set the stems aside until the next day when the stummels would come out of their bath.

After removing the stummels from the alcohol bath I wiped them down and them dry a bit. Then I began cleaning the shanks again to make sure all the tar, gunk, and stain were gone. I also cleaned as much gunk off the rims as I could so I could see what their condition really was; fair on the cherrywood and poor on the Dublin. I decided to top the bowl of the Dublin and set the cherrywood aside to finish later. This what the Dublin looked like at this point:

You can see much better the condition of the rim here. You can also see that the “scratches” I referred to earlier are in reality fills that have fallen out; I scraped them with my dental pick to be 100% certain. These would have to be dealt with after I topped the bowl.

I used 400 girt wet.dry paper to top the bowl, checking it often to see how it progressed. The char marks wouldn’t come out completely but were reduced substantially. And the dings in the rim were nearly sanded out, in good enough shape that I was happy with them; the one on the outside edge would require me to sand at least another 1/16″ off the entire bowl and I didn’t want to remove anymore material than I already had.

Now I turned my attention back to the fills. Taking the dental pick, I picked out the remaining fill material. I recently picked up a new product that I wanted to try on fills made by DAP and I thought this would be a good opportunity.

These sticks are a wax-like substance that softens with heat/friction. I chose the darkest of the four sticks and rubbed it into the two largest fill areas. The sticks worked easily into the areas that needed filled:

I buffed the excess off lightly with an old cotton rag, getting it into the fill well and just below the surface. I then put a bit of super glue over the new fills and let it dry. After it dried I sanded the fills back down to flush. There were also some areas that needed small scratches/marks sanded out on the bottom of the stummel so I did that at this time, too.

I avoided sanding around the nomenclature and the shank in general. As you can see, the spot sanding left some obvious differences in the finish. But I didn’t want to sand any more than I needed to and knew that as it was I’d have to blend the stain. I decided to use the new-to-me wood stain markers for this job as well as the bowl’s rim. I applied the stain from the marker in small sections and blended it immediately with my finger after I put it on; I did this with all of the fills, spot sanding and the rim. The stain from the markers is very easy to apply in just the area you want it and blending by “finger” was very smooth and didn’t take long at all. I think that the pens did a great job and they have earned a permanent place in my restoration arsenal!

I know took the entire pipe to the buffer and buffed the stummel with Tripoli and then the pipe with white diamond and carnauba wax, finishing with a few passes on a clean soft buff. This is the finished pipe:

The DAP fill sticks did a pretty good job I think. In retrospect, I should have, perhaps, used a lighter color; the fills were so near the grain I thought darker would be better. I do think that they are something that I will explore using further and believe they have potential for some good results.

I had no idea Douwe Egberts made pipes

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Blog by Steve Laug

When I posted the find of this pipe on Twitter, I received an email from Al Jones (upshallfan) that pretty well summarized my thinking. I post a bit of that email here: Douwe Egberts pipe??? We used them for our restaurant coffee program for many years (they provide the on-demand brewers used by Burger Kings as well). They are now owned by Sara-Lee. Who knew they made pipes! I’ll look forward to that restore and history lesson… If I had thought a bit more about it I would have remembered that Amphora tobacco was once made by Douwe Egberts but I did not remember that.

The one I picked up is a nice rusticated briar billiard. It is stamped Douwe Egberts X-tra 819. The stem also has a logo – an upward pointing white arrow-head. The bowl had a thick cake and the rim had a buildup of cake and tars. The bowl had what appears to be a combination of sandblasted and rusticated finish. The shank is sandblasted and it appears that the bowl was rusticated first and then sandblasted afterwards. The rustication has a rough edge appearance to it like it was blasted after the patterns were cut. The finish was dirty and worn and the stem had hints of oxidation under the grit and grime. There was minor tooth chatter on the top and bottom of the stem near the button. In the photo below, taken on my iPhone the pipe I am speaking about is the second one down from the top of the photo. (I apologize for the blurriness of the photo.)

Wikipedia states that Douwe Egberts (often abbreviated as DE) is a Dutch corporation that processes and trades coffee, tea, and other groceries. Its full name is Douwe Egberts Koninklijke Tabaksfabriek-Koffiebranderijen-Theehandel NV, which translates as “Douwe Egberts Royal Tobacco Factory – Coffee Roasters – Tea Traders, Plc.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douwe_Egberts

The late Bob Runowski (Morelysson) had this to say about the brand: Douwe Egbert was a conglomerate which used to manufacture Amphora. I don’t recall if the conglomerate ever owned pipe manufacturing. DE offered pipes as a premium for coupons in Amphora Pipe Tobacco, I think in the ’60s. Strange to me, though, because their Amphora pipes were always stamped “Amphora”. I did smoke a fair amount of Amphora Brown in my time. It was quite common for most tobacco firms to offer some inducement for the smoker to continue to buy their products. One of the better known was the Reynolds offerings for PA and CH users. H&H used to include a pipe tool (tamper/knife).

As Bob spoke of above, I have seen DE offering pipes with Amphora coupons. But those pipes were consistently stamped Amphora –and sometimes X-tra as the DE one I have is stamped. Generally they also bore the Made in Holland stamp as well. This pipe is not stamped with any other than the Douwe Egberts stamp.

I reamed the bowl with a PipNet reamer to remove the cake, taking it back to bare wood. This pipe had a heavy aromatic smell so I decided to go back to the beginning and clean it out. Once I had reamed it I dropped it in an alcohol bath to soak for several hours.

I dropped the stem in a Oxyclean bath while the bowl was soaking. The Oxyclean softens the oxidation and makes it much easier to remove.

After a two hour soak, I took the bowl and the stem out of their respective baths and dried them off. In the first photo below you can see the oxidation has all risen to the surface of the DE stem. It is the third stem from the top in the photo.

I pushed the stem back into the shank once the shank had dried out and took some pictures to show the state of the pipe after the soaks.

I scrubbed the exterior bowl and shank down with a soft bristle tooth brush and Murphy’s Oil Soap to remove the grime and build up in the grooves of the finish. I also scrubbed top of the rim with the tooth brush and used a dental pick to remove the buildup from the grooves of the finish. Once I had scrubbed the bowl I rinsed it with warm water under the tap. I scrubbed it with the warm water to remove the soap and then dried it with a soft cloth.

I wiped the bowl down with acetone on cotton pads to clean off the remainder of the finish on the pipe. I worked on the rim until it was clean and free of the buildup that was deep in the grooves.

I restained the bowl and shank with a dark brown aniline stain, flamed it and then gave it a coat of Linseed oil with a light cherry stain.

This time around in the cleaning process I had gotten ahead of myself and stained the pipe before I had thoroughly cleaned out the interior of the pipe. IT WAS AN ERROR. Normally I clean and scrub the interior the same time I do the outside. It makes the cleaning with Everclear much easier and if the alcohol drips on the surface no harm is done. Doing it after the staining made the cleaner process fussy and I had to be careful not to harm the finish of the newly stained bowl and shank.

Once the interior was cleaned I set the bowl aside and worked on the stem. I sanded the stem with a fine grit sanding sponge to remove the surface oxidation. The Oxyclean had done a great job in bringing it all to the surface.

I put the stem back in the shank and did some work on the tooth marks on the top and bottom of the stem. I flamed them with a Bic lighter to lift them as much as possible. On the top side the marks disappeared altogether between the light sanding and the flame of the lighter. On the underside one deeper bite mark remained. I continued to flame it and sand until I had minimized its appearance on the stem.

I dry sanded the stem with micromesh sanding pads from 1500-12,000 grit. Each successive grit removed more of the scratches on the vulcanite and brought a deeper shine to the stem.

I rubbed down the stem with Obsidian Oil and set it aside to dry and soak into the stem and buffed it by hand.

I took it to the buffer and buffed it with White Diamond and then with carnauba wax. I gave it multiple coats of wax and then buffed the pipe with a soft flannel buffing pad to give it a shine. The finished pipe is pictured below.

Reworking an Old Pal Pencil Shank Pot

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I just finished cleaning up another of the old pipes I found on my trip. It is a petite pot shaped pipe with a pencil shank. The overall length is barely over 5 inches and the weight is negligible. It is stamped on the left side of the shank in arc – Old Pal, over an Eagle with spread wings and then underneath Made in France.

On the right side of the shank it is stamped 5 which I assume is the shape number. The stem is also stamped with the words OLD PAL on the left side of the saddle portion. On this particular pipe it is faint. In checking on the background information on “Who Made That Pipe” I found that it had two French makers for Old Pal listed. The first of those is Marechal Ruchon and Cie. (Incidentally it is the company that owned the GBD brand). The second maker listed is Rubinovich & Haskell Ltd. The bird emblem is probably the key, but I can find no reference to it. My own thinking is that the brand was made by Marechal Ruchon & Cie. I was able to dig up this brief summary of the MR&C brand. Ganeval, Bondier and Donninger began making pipes in 1850 and rapidly gained prominence in briar pipe making. Of the three, Bondier survived the others by 30 years, but new partners took their places. The name of the company changed to Bondier Ulrich & Cie, then Bine Marechal & Cie and finally to A Marechal, Ruchon & Cie. August Marechal and Ferdinand Ruchon saw the firm into the 20th century, their names being used for the company for well over 50 years.

Prior to 1899, Marechal, Ruchon & Co. became A. Oppenhiemer’s sole agent for cigarette papers but still remained in the pipe making business. Then in 1902, Marechal, Ruchon & Co.. owners of GBD and referred to as French pipe makers, merged with A. Oppenhiemer. In the 1915 London Directory of briar pipe makers one will find: “”Marechal, Ruchon & Co. – 38 Finsbury Sq. E.C.; London works, 15 & 16 Featherstone St. E.C. and Oppenhiemer, A. & Co. – 38 Finsbury Sq. E.C. listed separately.

With that background information I worked on this old pipe to clean it up and restore it. When I picked it up the bowl was badly caked and packed full. The rim was dirty and tarred with what appeared to be a fill on the top of the rim right side. The entire right side of the pipe was full of fills of various sizes and shaped. There was one fill on the left side as well. The grain on the bowl was mixed and the finish was pretty beat up. The fills were shrunken and they left small pits in the surface of the pipe. The stem was oxidized and had tooth chatter on both sides near the button. The shank and airway were dirty and tarry. When the stem was removed there was an interesting flared tube that extended into the shank from the end of the tenon. The end looked like the bell of a horn. This was badly tarred and the inside of the tube was packed with debris.

I separated the stem and the bowl. The bowl was reamed with a PipNet pipe reamer back to a thin cake. Then I dropped the bowl in an alcohol bath to soak away the grime and to soften the fills. I drop the stem in an Oxyclean bath to raise the oxidation and soften it. I scrubbed both while in their respective baths to loosen the grime and buildup on the surfaces. I removed the bowl from the alcohol bath after two hours of soaking. I cleaned out the inside of the shank and the bowl as well as the inside of the stem. The trumpet like tube came out of the tenon and I cleaned it inside and out and reset it in the tenon. It is an interesting contraption as it is flared and the flared end rests against the end of the mortise directing the smoke directly into the mouthpiece. I have not seen that design before (see the photo below after the stem cleanup paragraph).

I used a dental pick to dig out the fills that had softened in the bowl. My objective was to remove them altogether and replace them with a briar dust and superglue fill that turns black and gives a different look than the red putty fills.

After removing the fills I wiped down the bowl with acetone on a cotton pad to remove the finish from the bowl and to remove extraneous dust from the holes where the fills used to be. I repeated this process until the bowl was clean. Once finished I used a drop of superglue in each pit and then pressed briar dust into the holes using a dental pick. I repeated the process until the fills were repaired. I then sanded the bowl to remove the excess briar and superglue fill material with 220 grit sandpaper, medium grit sanding sponges and a fine grit sanding block.

The black marks on the right side of the bowl highlight the fills in the bowl. I have often used a permanent black marker to blend in the fills to the grain. I decided to try that with this pipe as well.

I gave the bowl several coats of dark brown aniline stain mixed 1:1 with alcohol. I applied the stain, flamed the bowl, reapplied and reflamed until the colour was even over the entire surface. I then took it to the buffer and buffed the bowl with red Tripoli and White Diamond to polish the stain. I also wanted to see how well the fill material was working. I have found that as it dries it can still shrink.

I brought it back to the work table and gave it a coat of linseed oil.

The fills had shrunk and left divots in several spots so I reapplied the superglue and briar dust (less this time around). I sanded the bowl with a sanding sponge and a fine grit sanding block to smooth out the surface. I reapplied the stain and the linseed oil and then buffed the bowl.

I took the stem out of the bath and wiped it down. The majority of the oxidation wiped off with a damp cloth and then I polished it with Meguiar’s Scratch X2.0 and wiped it off the stem. I wiped the stem down with a polishing cloth and buffed it with White Diamond.

I applied a coat of Obsidian Oil and when dry rubbed it off. I reinserted the stem and buffed the stem with multiple coats of carnauba wax. I took the pipe to the buffer and buffed the entirety with carnauba wax and a soft flannel buff to a shine. The following pictures show the finished pipe.

In the bright flash of the camera the fills on the right side of the bowl appear to stand out more than they do in the natural light. They tend to look dark spots in the birdseye of the grain. They do not stick out as badly as they appear in the photo below.

The final picture I have included is one of the Old Pal pipe with a package of Old Pal Pipe Cleaners that I picked up at an antique shop in Edmonton. The two form a nice complement to one another.

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