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How do you get the stain to set on the pipe. I noticed that when smoking a pipe for the first few times stain is coming off on my hands. Not a good thing I would think. So I know my staining method lacks some thing? Any suggestions? I am using Fiebings Leather dye.

After you've stained, are you applying carnuba wax to the stummel? Sounds like you're not and that could be why you're getting pigment all on your paws whilst smoking.

I am but it maybe that I am not aplying enough. I'll try a little heavier next time.

How are you applying it? I've honestly never had this happen to me.

Strange problem!!! Usually buffing the stummel with tripoli will remove all the excess stain. Might try using 0000 steel wool before waxing next time and see if that helps.

David

bvartist wrote:Strange problem!!! Usually buffing the stummel with tripoli will remove all the excess stain. Might try using 0000 steel wool before waxing next time and see if that helps.

David

Yep.. forgot about this one. The steel wool is definitely a good way to go. Just don't put too much pressure on it or you'll take up more stain than you want to.

Some folks light the pipe on fire immediately after applying the stain. The alcohol burns off quickly and the stain sets well. As a side not, it seems like Red stain has a tendency to come off more than other colors.

How in the nae of ** are you getting stain on you hands? I have never had this happen - ever. What type of stain are you using? How are you finishing the pipe after staining?

Hmm ... not sure how to put this and not seem like a moron, but here goes:

Because of a private event I wanted to celebrate myself by buying a present that I really wanted. Since it was one of those happy concurrent situations, Bjarne Nielsen, the famous pipemaker was in town and showed his work at my tobacconist. I went there and immediately found a lot of his work appealing. I made a bargain and bought this wonderful semi-rusticated Golden Apple.

I couldn't wait to get home to sit in my chair and smoke it. When I finally did, it was a wonderful moment and the pipe fared well 2/3 down in to the bowl. Since the bowl was pre-carbed I packed it full from the start.

Suddenly, I felt a kind of stickiness on the lukewarm bowl, and when I looked closer at my hands they were all freckled with an orange stain! The joint between stem and bowl looked kinda shiny and when I put my thumb to it, the thumb turned orange-freckled too.

I was perplexed at this, but unsure if this was a common trait to new handmade Danish exclusive pipes (I haven't been using any other stains than natural ones, like Rum and Brown Flake simmered together, or red wine, on any of my own pipes), as opposed to the relatively more industrially made Stanwells, Chacoms, BigBens, Petersons etc I've been buying up til now, where this had never happened.

I wiped the bowl of with my blue pipe cloth which developed a darker streak where the shiny spot had been dried off, and then this didn't happen again during the last 1/3 of the bowl.

The week after I went down to refill some tobaccos and when my dealer asked me how the Bjarne pipe was, I related the above, but he just shrugged and seemed to think it normal. It hasn't happened again, and I didn't think anything more of it until I saw this thread.

SO, Miles, whatever you may be doing wrong, don't fear. Even Bjarne (or at least one of his "boys") seems to do it every once in a while...

I've NEVER heard of anything at all like this. If it happened to me with any pipe I owned, I'd want to know what it was.. and I would hope that if I made a pipe FOR someone and this happened that they'd let me know so I can try to work out the problem before it happens again. Just strange. Maybe you should contact him directly, if that's possible..

Hmm well, if everyone agrees that this is not something to be shrugged at, like my tobacconist seemed to think, then maybe I _should_ contact Bjarne.
I´d feel a fool asking for contact data from my tobacconist though... can´t seem to find an email on the web either. Maybe Bjarne is not the keenest of "cyberspace warriors"?

From a consumer's standpoint, I would want to know why it happened and if I put good money into the right item. Obviously there are things you simply cannot know about a pipe, but something like this is just weird and is something that a pipemaker has SOME control over.

from a maker's standpoint, see above. I really would want to know. What can it hurt to ask for contact information all things considered? The worst he can say is "no".

You're right Hazmat. I just didn't wanna be a fool and complain about something that perhaps was a "normal" trait in handmade pipes, just that I lacked the experience to judge it...

I'll ask him and see what turns out, I am on my way to copenhagen later this month anyway so I could just bring the pipe and ask Bjarne to have a look.

In the meantime for those who are interested the result looks like this:

BTW - anyone who could supply me with contact data /email to Bjarne? Maybe as a private message if you don't want to expose his email here?
Or you could send it to my olefattguy(at)hotmail.com email box.

Miles,

I think you may not be buffing enough of the stain off with tripoli. Either that or try using a spit coat of shellac to remove the excess stain.

John I think that is the case. I will do a better job of buffing next time and see how it turns out.

This is actually a quite common occurance with a lot of orange and red stains - they are much more prone to "bleed" than browns, and since (for whatever reason) Danish pipes tend to go more for oranges and reds than the English browns, it gets perceived as a "Danish pipe thing". I've had any number of pipes over the years which suffered from some initial bleed, and it isn't really avoidable. The maker can do some things to cut down on the occurance likelihood - buffing, alcohol wiping, and application of sanding sealers - but it isn't really possible to 100% guard against this phenomenon unless one applies a total surface seal of polymer or some other finish that forms an interlocked molecular chain across the surface. Which pretty much boils down to, "Yeah, it happens". I've experienced the same effect from some of the custom green stains I've mixed as well, and it seems to be a result of particular pigments that occur in these colors.

TreverT wrote:... it gets perceived as a "Danish pipe thing".

Ah. Thank you, Trever, for that tidbit of information. This convinces me that my tobacconist was right in shrugging, and also discourages me from contacting the pipemaker, at least in this particular matter

Yeah, it's no big deal. It should stop leaking stain after the first two or three smokes at max - If it continues beyond that and seems localized to just one spot, you may have a problem with an internal fissure or something, but probably not. I've gotten to where I sometimes make a point of wearing gloves if I'm smoking a new pipe of certain colors! I've seen this occur with a great many pipes, though it is worse in cases where the maker didn't apply any sort of sanding sealer (ie, waxed only) and didn't do a buff or alcohol rub before the wax stage.

Would seem Trever is right, someone has a bjarne doing the same.

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