I was cruising through your blog and of course this pipe came out fantastic. However, I am absolutely stumped as to how in the heck you drilled this. To me I see the bottom of the mortise being drilled well below the airway and what looks to be an impossible line up. Hope it isn't a trade secret because I am really coming up with some crazy ideas.
KurtHuhn wrote:Looks like ebonite, but appears to have been cut from a thick plate of the stuff. How long have I been ignorant of the existence of this stuff?
Nyh in germany also used to make it..there is a guy 20 kilometers away from me sitting on a chunk of that big enough to make a dinner table...might rob him
As far as the drilling goes, you just have to mill a slot in the back edge of the mortise so that the draft hole hits the mortise floor as close to center as possible. It also involves a "trade secret," I guess you'd say, but this has to do with the tenon. This is a technique that can be used for all sharply bent pipes. And yes, that is plate Ebonite, a gift from Tokutomi. I don't use it a lot because I have some enormous diameter ebonite rod, but it is very useful for certain shapes.
Thanks Todd. Reminds me of the magician that won't reveal how a trick is done because once revealed the magic is gone and the person's amazement is replaced with disappointment. I like magic, being amazed and take solace in the fact that I am not crazy, well not much anyway.
after drilling the tenon, and having the draft hole hit it on the side, plugging the end of the tenon, then drilling/dremeling a small hole in the side of the tenon to meet the draft hole perfectly when the tenon is inserted, therefore the draft hole wouldn't need to be in the bottom center of the mortise.
