pipemakersforum.com

Doc Aitch (Walter) is a big "drill after" proponent. Really depends on what you are doing, how you are doing it. For me, my business model has nothing to do with chasing perfection on every pipe - I chase it where it exists and doesn't fight too much. For the hobbyist or newer carver, a gu...

And also yes, it's easy to get the block just not quite right and drill off center. Having really square stock to work with helps a lot, and leaving meat in the right places for chucking helps too.

I think I understand your question, and my answer is, the way most people do this, you face the shank, drill the mortise, possibly tap a pilot hole for the airway, THEN reposition the block and drill the airway. This in all but the most extreme cases will leave you with a perfectly ordinary looking ...

Well, maybe Shikano won't read this, but for anyone else reading, posting a pipe, and then stomping off 4 days later because no one has said much about it is pretty silly. Nobody owes anybody anything on this board. Come or don't, post or don't, have fun or don't. Make pipes or don't. https://i.imgu...

Yup, the "holding of the line" is what separates really good stuff from "oh, that was an interesting idea".

Yes, making a tiny pipe is hard in it's own funny ways, but making really big pipes, REALLY big pipes and not have them all fuckin wonky, it's a different hard.

So, v3.0, a smooth, came out gooder yet, and this is the thing, every shape, every everything, takes practice.

Bend the tip. A good P-lip is pretty tricky to make, but the process is something like this: make the stem as you ordinarily would, but leave the button both thicker and longer than you would, the p-lip is going to be some 5/16 or 3/8" long right? Get the end of this thick chunk hot and bend th...

PCs hold lots of juice which is good for stain. For smooth finishes, a little pad or rag is better for leaving less lines/ridges etc with shellac or oil. I like PCs on rustics and blasts for getting into little nooks.

I buy BJ longs, dunno about current production because I buy them literally years and years worth at a time, like I by 2500 or 10000 or something, I can't even remember. But if you can drop 90 bucks, it buys a fuckton of pipe cleaners, and it's well worth it to do so. I use about six on each pipe fo...

No sense of adventure some of you guys....

Those started the same shape?

And seriously, every fucking thumbnail..... LOL

LL's daily checklist:

Coffee
Take random shots at people.
Do a little work and brag about it on the internet.

Put it this way - if you took a slice out of the bowl, a pancake, horizontally, it would be round, yeah? And it should be round everywhere, all down the bowl - if the bowl "blobs out" toward the stem much at all, it's ugly/amateur. You need SOME relaxation there in that transition, it's no...

Yes.

Oh, just playing with briar and making something beautiful, it's a ton of fun, but it's even more fun when you know what you're doing and you can get the most out of the materials. And the only road is practicing all of it.

This is why these things teach so much. You make one little adjustment here, and something looks out of whack over there. They teach about the bottom of the bowl, how to carry a changing curve up the bowl, how to transition tightly and perfectly (yet not too tightly) onto the shank, basically everyt...

Stem looks really nice, I'd like to see a tiny bit of taper in the shank, and I think the bowl is belly-forward, both in that it's a little low-slung for "classic", a little brandyish, and I think it's a little accentuated by the lack of curve on the top half - it's angled, but not curved,...

Lots to like there, bowl shape is nice, simple design overall..... The biggest eye-jerk for me is the angle and position of the stem insertion vs the line and overall shape of the shank - it's drilled high, and the angle is too low, the curve indicated by the shank is not followed up on by the stem....