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I gotta say, you've completely stumped me on that one. I've never heard of "water based linseed oil". I didn't know such a thing was even possible.

davy51 wrote:Im thinking the oil based wouldnt be safe because of base chemicals but water based

Linseed oil does not have oil additives, it is itself a natural oil extracted from the seeds of the Flax plant: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linseed_oil

I can't imagine that adding water to anything is going to make an oil, boiling or not. What you might come up with is a cake of flaxseed extract, but if you can make actual oil with that (aside from little drops of oil floating on top of a slurry of flaxseed), I'll eat my favorite pipe.

I'm not saying it can't be done - I've been around to long to make that claim. What I can say is that it's one of those things that's, in my mind, roughly equivalent to dividing by zero. Thinking about it actually causes me to suffer a mild brain-buss reset.

The fact that it was seen in a feed store makes me suspect that it is not intended as a wood finish. I would not expect any health risks from an application of linseed oil to the exterior of a pipe, though if you simply want a satin oil finish that brings out the contrast of the grain and have reservations about linseed, why not use a food oil? The oil section of an upscale grocer or natural food store has many choices.

davy51 wrote:it was a new one on me

I thought linseed oil was only oil based

Well, it IS an oil, after all...

The stuff from Tried and True is the only actual boiled linseed oil you can get anymore. The hardware store stuff is just raw oil filtered and dosed with various toxic heavy metal drying agents, like lead carbonate in the old days, now they use cobalt.

Olive oil is the oil of Dunhill fame, but I've used boiled walnut oil with decent results on non-pipe food-contact wooden stuff. No reason it wouldn't work on a pipe if you want an oil finish, it just takes a few days to dry, or more accurately to polymerize. Heat helps, so go for it.