pipemakersforum.com

That's just it, I mean, there's at least a dozen different ways to finish a pipe. I know a guy who uses polymerized tung oil as a base coat. This strikes me as totally horrible - like, it's one of the only finishes in the woodworking world that is a vapor-sealer and not just a water sealer. And yet....

A lathe won't help a bit. Removing excess stock quickly from odd shapes is what we are talking about, and you need a power sanding setup for that, and a band saw is hugely helpful too. Most makers run some kind of "French disc" setup, a spinning disc mounted on an arbour/motor setup. Many ...

I will say, I was fuckin around with pure tung oil last year, and don't do that. Shit don't dry if the humidity is above about 10%.

I mean, shellac has a shelf life, so first things first, mix up new shellac. And if you are using a can of zinsser or something, just go fucking die and quit wasting my time. And honestly this block would literally have to be outgassing small aliphatic hydocarbons to make shellac "not harden&qu...

Some vendors just don't care about customer service anymore.

"In El Paso I got me two hundred and fifty dollars for it"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMI1uQBHUpA





The best pipes sell, they always sell. The best pipes, the very best pipes any maker makes, never hit the market.

The first full size LC:





The third:




I was WAY more aggressive on the taper, just outrageously aggressive, or so it felt, but visually... gotta do it.

It's really hard. I've made a couple hundred bent pipes and worked the shit out of some of them, tried different angles at the shank.... and there's only a few where I feel like I really nailed it. Anyone who thinks this shit, these long curve idea is no trouble, make a hawkbill and try to carry the...

So, genuine criticisms apply: the bottom of the shank indicates a curve, the top doesn't. This is actually made worse by the curved shank mount, which is curved up near the top of the shank, leading the eye to perceive a slight "downward angle" on the stem. Which is to say, the perceived c...

Assuming you have a drill press, then basically one equation gets solved by using delrin tenons. There's a stickied thread in the stem making category about this. So that solves the problem of how do you keep the pipe stem in the stummel. After that, the lathe is really not used that much. Shaping, ...

There isn't a "right answer" to this because there isn't agreement about what "good smoker" is. There is no single set of variables that every user agrees on, no single "correct" setup. That said, there are obviously pipes that are BAD smokers, pipes that gurgle, pipes ...

Artemesius, you are getting slightly facetious answers here because the question is too broad. There's an old saying here: How do you catch a sparrow? Easy, just shake a little salt on their tail. If you know how, you can, and if you don't know how, being told how isn't going to help a lot. We don't...

TYLER SIGHTING

It's gorgeous stuff when it's "on". https://i.imgur.com/sikYPcI.jpg This is a piece from years and years ago, came with a bunch of stuff I bought from another pipe maker. Typically soft and weirdly waxy to work with, it clogs sandpaper more than other briar, finishes differently. But that ...

Psst, George.... your Micoli is showing.

I stumbled across a really excellent looking pipe on eBay of all places, stole the sellers pics, hope pipes-estate doesn't mind the free hits. https://i.imgur.com/yPQKPA4.jpg https://i.imgur.com/qFpV8qY.jpg https://i.imgur.com/KetxnQt.jpg This is a lovely pipe. Tightly carved, the gleam lines are al...

Are you..... feeling okay?

Cute little pipe, but not terribly "English" with teh rolled edge on the rim and the slightly Dublin'ed presentation. I have offered a set of lines here showing that if the back of the bowl presents a certain slow curve, the front of the bowl should mimic it, and what you wind up with is a...

Nice to meet you - you're coming into making pipes carrying something that a lot of guys don't, which is the necessary shop skills, and I don't mean this lightly. Lots of guys are dying to make pipes and throw all kinds of time and money at it and they've never so much as carved a smaller stick of w...

In the shop, you can draw through a pipe and see if it feels smooth (opposite condition is whistling, literally caused by cavitation), but otherwise, with a straight pipe, you can shine a flashlight in the bowl and look into the stem, and it will show you every little scratch from drilling, filing, ...