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This be my first post on here, so many apologies if I've placed this in the wrong location, or if there was already a thread going I missed using the search option. I'm a novice, so this all might be obvious...
I recently acquired a couple of estate pipes and set to restoring them, with varying degrees of success. The Dunhill was in good shape and so didn't require much beyond a clean and a polish, but the second pipe, a Karl Erik freehand, was in rougher shape. I cleaned the devil out of it, and used the salt and alcohol treatment on the bowl. Along the way, I noticed that the lower interior of the bowl, specifically the heel and just above the draw hole, were irregular to the point that over-reaming seems to be the only possibility--the heel is a bit ridgy, and the wall of the bowl has a shallow but obvious indentation/recess above the draw hole.
Obviously the peril with picking up estate pipes is that one never knows the condition you'll find them in, especially at the base of the bowl's interior. I know an over-reamed bowl will burn through eventually, but as its a rather thick freehand pipe I don't anticipate that happening anytime soon, and so I've set to breaking it back in. I've smoked it over half a dozen times, however, and each time the bowl turns funky on me about half way down.
I'm assuming this funkening of the bowl takes places as the burning tobacco meets the over reamed briar, but if that's the case won't the over reamed area eventually fill in with cake the same as the smoother portions of the bowl, albeit unevenly? I must say, the taste seems sour, rather than that of new briar being broken in.
And am I correct that the likely culprit for this unevenness is over reaming? Freehand pipes, while possessing a great deal of character on the outside, have standard, smooth-walled interiors, yes?
Or is it possible that I'm just not used to smoking a bowl this large, and the bitter, funky taste that occurs halfway down is user error? It's a couple of inches deep and over a thumb's width all the way down, and with that volume of tobacco being packed is it maybe akin to the way a cigar will get tarry and acrid toward the end, with the last inch or four being discarded rather than smoked? I can't imagine this is the case, given the amount of much larger pipes I see on the market, but as I said, I'm an utter novice, especially where big bowls are concerned...
Right, I'd post pictures, but the uneven portion of the bowl is at the bottom, and even with the flash my camera failed to really give a good impression. Sorry for the vagueness of the query, and would very much appreciate the counsel of my betters--does the culprit sound like the over reaming, as I suspect, or simply user error where large freehands are concerned? And if I soldier on and build a cake will the taste diminish, or is it a doomed briar? Cheers!
I recently acquired a couple of estate pipes and set to restoring them, with varying degrees of success. The Dunhill was in good shape and so didn't require much beyond a clean and a polish, but the second pipe, a Karl Erik freehand, was in rougher shape. I cleaned the devil out of it, and used the salt and alcohol treatment on the bowl. Along the way, I noticed that the lower interior of the bowl, specifically the heel and just above the draw hole, were irregular to the point that over-reaming seems to be the only possibility--the heel is a bit ridgy, and the wall of the bowl has a shallow but obvious indentation/recess above the draw hole.
Obviously the peril with picking up estate pipes is that one never knows the condition you'll find them in, especially at the base of the bowl's interior. I know an over-reamed bowl will burn through eventually, but as its a rather thick freehand pipe I don't anticipate that happening anytime soon, and so I've set to breaking it back in. I've smoked it over half a dozen times, however, and each time the bowl turns funky on me about half way down.
I'm assuming this funkening of the bowl takes places as the burning tobacco meets the over reamed briar, but if that's the case won't the over reamed area eventually fill in with cake the same as the smoother portions of the bowl, albeit unevenly? I must say, the taste seems sour, rather than that of new briar being broken in.
And am I correct that the likely culprit for this unevenness is over reaming? Freehand pipes, while possessing a great deal of character on the outside, have standard, smooth-walled interiors, yes?
Or is it possible that I'm just not used to smoking a bowl this large, and the bitter, funky taste that occurs halfway down is user error? It's a couple of inches deep and over a thumb's width all the way down, and with that volume of tobacco being packed is it maybe akin to the way a cigar will get tarry and acrid toward the end, with the last inch or four being discarded rather than smoked? I can't imagine this is the case, given the amount of much larger pipes I see on the market, but as I said, I'm an utter novice, especially where big bowls are concerned...
Right, I'd post pictures, but the uneven portion of the bowl is at the bottom, and even with the flash my camera failed to really give a good impression. Sorry for the vagueness of the query, and would very much appreciate the counsel of my betters--does the culprit sound like the over reaming, as I suspect, or simply user error where large freehands are concerned? And if I soldier on and build a cake will the taste diminish, or is it a doomed briar? Cheers!
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