In my experience--and that's all this opinion is based on--there is a rapport that exists between the wood and the tobacco in a good pipe. There are times when you can taste it, and if it weren't there I would only smoke meerschaums. Or cobs, which have their own rapport with the tobacco. Bowl coatings seem to me to interfere with this, at best. At worst, they might be covering up something, like green wood. I have had cheap basket pipes that tasted pretty good for the first few bowls. Then the coating apparently burned away and the pipe is only good for hurling.
But the whole thing is moot. It's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. If coatings were really needed they would be put on cobs, I would think. I have quite often been right on the verge of buying a pipe and then backing out upon discovering the bowl has been coated with who knows what? That will continue.
P.S. I just remembered that Peterson's pricier offerings have no bowl coatings. Gee whiz, I wonder what's up with that? he said, slyly.
