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We're visiting the in-laws in Lithuania and I wanted to keep myself busy while being here. Luckily my father-in-law is a carpenter and this is the machine that I've taken over for pipemaking.

It's a bit of a killer on the back, but who said pipemaking is easy?!

Ha great thinking!

A couple of years back there was the possibility of my partner having to move away for work. Because the move wouldn't be permanent there was no way I could move my entire shop, plus she would have been renting a flat. So I could spend time there and keep travel costs down (fuel is insane here) I started designing a portable pipe workshop that I could take with me. No major tooling or anything, I would drill and rough shape in my own workshop and then mostly do handwork like filing stems and finish sanding, bit of buffing and staining etc. I figured if I had a large enough stock of prepared stummels then I could always keep myself busy and productive.
In the end plans changed and I never had to build it but I do plan to build the portable workshop one day as and when I have the spare parts and time, never know when it might come in handy!

caskwith wrote:Ha great thinking!

A couple of years back there was the possibility of my partner having to move away for work. Because the move wouldn't be permanent there was no way I could move my entire shop, plus she would have been renting a flat. So I could spend time there and keep travel costs down (fuel is insane here) I started designing a portable pipe workshop that I could take with me. No major tooling or anything, I would drill and rough shape in my own workshop and then mostly do handwork like filing stems and finish sanding, bit of buffing and staining etc. I figured if I had a large enough stock of prepared stummels then I could always keep myself busy and productive.
In the end plans changed and I never had to build it but I do plan to build the portable workshop one day as and when I have the spare parts and time, never know when it might come in handy!

You could spend the week drilling and shaping then spend the weekends somewhere nice.

Charl wrote:We're visiting the in-laws in Lithuania and I wanted to keep myself busy while being here. Luckily my father-in-law is a carpenter and this is the machine that I've taken over for pipemaking.

It's a bit of a killer on the back, but who said pipemaking is easy?!

Nice! I firmly believe 75% of any undertaking consists of problem solving.

--K

I took along what I thought I would need (chamber bits, airway bits etc), but was actually way underprepared. I'll get to drilling a stummel and want to countersink the mortise, then realize that I forgot to bring it. With stemwork I'll get to wanting to make the slot and then realize that I forgot the Dremel bit. And so on and so on. I like to scrape my stems with a knife after rough shaping, but left the knife at home. Where do I get a good scraping knife now?
It's amazing how many little "tools of the trade" that works only for you, you accumulate through the years that helps you to make a pipe. Most people will see it as rubbish and throw it away, but for you it is indispensable!

What to take with me was always going to be the big problem. My plan to overcome it was to get a cheap tool box and put it beside me when I made a stem, every tool I used to make the stem would be put into the tool box as I was done with it instead of back on the rack etc.
Whether that would have worked in practice I don't know but it seemed a good idea at the time.

My plan was to do something similar, Chris. But then time got in the way and I ended up throwing bits and pieces together!