Here is how curved airways are drilled

[RadDavis]

That thing looks French to me, Random.

I wouldn't trust it.

Rad

[stdly]

I have seen a saw on the infomercial channels that has a flexible coated blade. Maybe carbide or diamond I don’t remember but it is flexible. It would be good to help on those hard angled full bent draft holes if the blade is avaliable alone. But to control the path of this type of cutter without a pilot hole is hard to grasp.

[stdly]

It's the tube shown in the diagram that controls the path of the cutter. The flexible shaft is only to drive the cutter.

Random,
Sorry about that I see it perfectly now. You could change the tube to different dia. to suit the purpose. Where can I buy one?

[pipemaker]

That thing will work as well as the Maginot Line.

Mike

[ToddJohnson]

Random,

You could definitely not call it the "shotgun airway" anymore. If you do it it'll be another trip to the patent office . . .

[Gatorade]

gone

[Nick]

There's actually some text that goes along with the diagram. I was digging a while back. I believe the document was written by Jaque..somthing or other of Genod pipes. I contacted Erwin van Hove and he forwarded it to me. A friend at work translated it. If i remember, I'll type it up and post it.

Additionally, the smallest flexibit I've seen is a 3/16th

[ToddJohnson]

There's no reason it shouldn't work... IF a guy can come up with the flex shaft and a way to attach it to a tiny cutter.

Random, I was just making a friendly joke about a "shotgun airway." It doesn't seem the term could apply to a curved airway. I know the above process works because I used to drill curved airways with a very similar setup. The problem is that you can't just "freehand" it. The curved tubing has to move in a perfect circle because you've got to continuously back the bit out and clear the airway, just as if you were drilling a straight airway. Here's how I used to do it:

First you need a tube bender so that there are no kinks in the tubing and you can bend on a perfectly continuous curve. For cutting, a flexshaft with a diamond burr soldered to the end works best. It must be slightly larger than the actual tubing. The tubing with the flexshaft in it should be attached to something that is variable speed (I used to chuck it in my drill press). Then you need to create a jig such that you've got another tube whose inside diameter is just slightly larger than the outside diameter of the smaller tube (the one with the actual flexshaft in it). This larger tube has to be mounted solidly to the jig such that it makes up almost 1/2 of a circle. The jig must include a vise which can hold a block of briar. It must also include something like an adjustable metal pointer off to the side that can be positioned right in the bottom of the tobacco chamber.

First you run the small tube through the larger one and align the pointer with the diamond burr at the end of your drilling "stroke". Then take your briar block, having already drilled the mortise and tobacco chamber, and put the metal pointer in the bottom center of the tobacco chamber. Without moving anything, clamp the block in the vise. Chuck the flexshaft in your drill press and slowly drill away, removing the tube and flexshaft every 1/4" or so and clearing out debris. Since the larger tube is guiding the smaller "cutting" tube, and the block is clamped in place, and you know that the smaller tube exits the larger tube and continues on a path to meet up exactly with the metal pointer (and thus the bottom of the tobacco chamber), all you've got to is go slowly and be patient. Eventually you'll exit in the bottom center of the tobacco chamber.

The amount of time and effort this process takes however is why I quit doing it. Not to mention that if you end up with a flaw where you can't have one, you've burned a couple of hours of valuable time. Of course, if you drill first and shape second anyway, there might not be as much at stake for you in terms of wasted time.

I know everybody else seems satisfied with having what amounts to a 45 degree "straight" bend at the mortise/tenon junction but I'm still trying to find a way to make that joint "straight" not have a corner in it.

Uuuhh . . . I have no idea what this means . . . though I'm pretty certain I disagree with it

Best of luck,

Todd

[Tyler]

I know everybody else seems satisfied with having what amounts to a 45 degree "straight" bend at the mortise/tenon junction but I'm still trying to find a way to make that joint "straight" not have a corner in it.

Uuuhh . . . I have no idea what this means . . . though I'm pretty certain I disagree with it

Best of luck,

Todd

OK, THAT was funny!



Tyler

P.S. Thanks for the description on curved drilling. VERY interesting.

[Nick]

Hehehe

[Tyler]

Glad you boys had a laugh.

You seem to be bothered by our laughter...it is not personal toward you. I think Todd was poking fun of himself as much as you with his comment. It was funny because we all know you guys tend not to agree with one another.

I think Boswell pretty much has the very-quick market tied up from the stories I've heard about the rate at which they're produced.

I'll disagree with this assertion. I don't buy that the very inexpensive hand-made pipe market is saturated. I think if you throw a reasonably well made $50-$100 pipe in the ring (retail price), it will sell. Wholesale them to stores for 50% of that, and I think you'll be behind the orders constantly. The trick is becoming efficient enough to make those pricess pay.

Pondering the nature of pipe collecting, I think that the average pipe collection is mostly built of briars in this $75 range and lower, even on the Internet discussion boards. Sure, many will have a highlight piece in their collection that they dropped $200+ for, but the bread and butter of their collection is inexpensive. Heck, I'm that way. The most I've ever paid for a pipe is $115. (It was a Heeschen )

I have said before, and I still think it is true, making a living a pipe making would be easiest in the low, low/mid grade region. The question is could you stand to do that? In my mind it would make pipe making into a factory production system that would drive me crazy. I don't think I could ever do the Boswell method. That said, I think the potential for earnings is higher with that system. (It's why very few things are still handmade...more money in the factory-type production methods.)

Tyler

[ToddJohnson]

Glad you boys had a laugh.

What I was referring to is the fact that any time you have an airway intersection made by two stgraight holes of the same diameter intersecting at an angle, your airway becomes slightly restricted at the inside corner of the intersection and it causes turbulance. Nobody seems to care about this, presumably because the turbulance is minor and if you use a large enough drill even though the airway is restricted it is still usable. I would prefer to avoid that issue entirely by using a curved airway.

Random, we're not building space shuttles here. I appreciate your supposed quest for absolute perfection (though I think it could be better used if applied to different issues), but you seem to be inventing problems and then claiming to have solved them. I can make a very bent pipe that smokes cool, dry, and effortlessly and so can many others. The turbulence you speak of is so infinitessimal as to be of absolutely no import. I know of no one whose pipe stems have melted in the sun, constantly stay green, or continually need to be replaced due to snapped tenons. Equally so, I know of no one whose pipes smoke wet or hot because the angle of the draft hole through the shank and the angle of the draft hole through the stem are not the same. You can't achieve "superiority" to all the other pipemakers in the world by claiming to have solved problems that simply don't exist.

The whole time issue leaves me scratching my head. The way to solve a time issue is to use a quicker method that doesn't produce as good a result? I don't know about anybody else but I am not trying to produce pipes as quickly as I can, I'm trying to make them the best that I can. I think Boswell pretty much has the very-quick market tied up from the stories I've heard about the rate at which they're produced.

Two things here. First, a curved draft hole is not a better method and does not produce a "better result." It's a worse method which produces an inferior result. The reason is because a curved draft hole *always* has "chatter" in it and it can't be removed (all you have to do is put your hands on some Ser Jacs to know that). A straight draft hole can be drilled such that its walls are smooth and polished. Second, you should be trying to produce pipes as quickly as you can, especially if you're starving and destitute as you intimate once every three posts. This doesn't mean you have to sacrifice quality of method, but it does mean you have to make some decisions about what is and what isn't important. I assure you, the "problem" of draft hole angles you've created isn't.

Each to his own, better that we help each other than poke fun.

I wasn't poking fun at you Random, more at our propensity to be diametrically opposed to one another. Your comments, though I didn't understand them at the time, sounded like another "Sure, if you wanna use briar and vulcanite to make pipes, be my guest" statement. I am in no way surprised that it was such a statement, nor am I surprised that, knowing what you meant now, I did and do disagree with it.

Happy carving,

Todd

[Nick]

Regarding the constriction Random, I find myself in agreement with you. I hadn't thought terribly much about that aspect, but i have been digging into fluid flow dynamics recently and how it relates to pipe smoking. Fun topic really. Sounds dry and boring, but its kinda neat once you get a grasp on the basics. Of course I'm kind of a geek anyway, so there's no accounting for taste.

It probably is the case that the turbulence created is not terribly significant. Or even more that the friction generated by the wall roughness is larger amount of turbulence from the angle. But this could be overcome by polishing the airway. I heard Kurt talking - posting- a while back about polishing the airway of clear lucite stems with buffing compound and a thick pipe cleaner. I bet the same thing could work in the stummel. Of course if there is really big dings in the passage, made by a clattering bit, well that little pipe cleaner wouldn't do much good.

One last note, a recent article in Pipe Collector talked about a dealer's trip to Denmark. I wish I could find the article, but I threw it out. I think it was the second to last one put out. (June/July?) Well, in the article the dealer was talking over dinner to a pipe maker. (Really hate the fact that I can remember neither the dealer nor the maker - I hate posts like these: "Why I knew a real high grader who uses spam and goat semen for his bowl coating and says its the best! So thats must be right") Well the maker said somthing like he would not make full bents because he felt that the ovid shape of the draugh hole as it meets the bowl produces a less that satisfactory smoke.

Well, now that I've written all that out, it doesn't seem as on point as I originally thought it would. Less so because I can't remember the names. Bllleecch. Oh well. Gone to this much trouble typing it. Might as well post it.

So do I get a smoke and a last request before I'm torched?

[JHowell]

Well the maker said somthing like he would not make full bents because he felt that the ovid shape of the draugh hole as it meets the bowl produces a less that satisfactory smoke.

Constriction in the airflow? Make the airway a bit bigger. A pipe gurgles in part because the airway is small enough that the surface tension of the condensation inside allows the condensation to occlude the airway. A pipe smokes hot in part because the airway is small enough that velocity must be increased (sucking harder) in order to get enough oxygen through the tobacco to keep it lit. Just my opinion, of course, but eliminating the angle at the stem/stummel junction won't solve anything.

It is often said that straight pipes smoke cooler and drier than bents, which is, I think, a useless myth in this context. It may be true of bent pipes that allow air to pass through the "angle" by drilling the airway through the wall of the mortise and leaving a 1/4" gap between the end of the stem and the bottom of the mortise, but we aren't talking about those kinds of pipes. Bent pipes with proper massaging of the airway smoke as well as straights, even without the curved airway (which fascinates me, too). I'd like to be able to do curved airways simply to make shapes possible that are currently impossible, but Todd makes an important point about the surface of the resulting hole. I imagined that the curved airways on Ser Jacs were big enough to drag a cat through just because that's as small as they could get the mechanism. Perhaps that's the size needed to make up for the poor surface.

Regarding the entry of the airway, on deeply bent pipes it is possible to drill the airway just fractionally short of the bowl, then join it to the bowl with a Dremel applied from inside the bowl so that the entry is at a flatter angle.