1908 Calabash Gourd Restoration help (pics)

First off, WOW. Secondly, just saying, if it were me....I would look around for someone who has restored something similar and have it done professionally.
Rebornpipes fitted one with a meer bowl, I didn't read much, hopefully something is helpful there. There are a couple of others, but seems all meer bowls on his site.

Incredible buy! I'd go professional to get it smoking.

I'd go professional to get it smoking.

Click to expand...

More than that, actually. I am a professional, and can assure you that only an antique meer specialist will have the tools, know-how, and connections necessary to return that pipe to good condition.
PS -- I am categorically not a meer guy.

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I hope you get it fixed up, would love to see it restored! That Silver Rim is going to make it tricky.

I has some kind of bowl in there as a gourd is hollow. You may find meerschaum in there. Vulcanite stems can be heated and rebent. I myself have a 1908 Calabash but the stem has been replaced.

Here's mine:

As a starting point, try Briarville. They do work on meerschaum pipes, though I don't know if they have ever worked on a calabash of this type. To do this properly the sterling cap has to be removed to get at the meerschaum bowl and gasketing. From the picture of the bowl, it appears to have disintegrated at the base. There was a horribly disfigured Barling calabash up on eBay restored by a droolling idiot where the fix was done by cutting a hole - badly and completely incompetently by an idiot - through the silver cap. Looks like crap.

That's a beauty hawke!
Maybe contact the people from the link on reborn pipes I gave you http://www.jhlowe.com/ see if maybe the meer can work around the silver without having to remove it? I really want to see this fixed up!

I think i might shed some light on restoration... Might not be of much help, though.

First, stem... From what i see its ebonite, cleaning shouldn't be too tough. If the oxidation is too deep, and it seems it is, magic eraser might not help to remove it properly. If that is the case, just soak it in bleach, leave it over night, then use some veeeery gentle sand paper to remove it (i use 2000 and up, so i don't remove too much ebonite in process). That bit hole could be a problem though. It can be repaired, but that would be a pro job. Bending should be safe, if you are careful enough. Safest would be to dip it in boiling water before you remove oxi so it wouldn't crack if it's too dried out. Water should make it less fragile. Again, take care and do it very slowly.

Gourd is easy to clean, just use some isopropyl alco, clean it with dumped cloth and then polish it.

bowl.... Now, that is a hard one. Most of bashes of that age were made with non removable bowls, made from plaster and pressed meer. Its probably the later, since i see the bottom of the bowl has degraded, probably from moisture and decades of smoking. Best you can do there is to remove bowl and silver rim, clean the gourd insides and make another bowl from plaster. you can make a model from some soft wood of the bowl (part which would go inside) that can fit silver rim, make a mold of it and then pour hard plaster in it. after that fit cork to the gourd, fit silver rim to the plaster bowl and you have a new pipe with same, only removable bowl. A lot of work, but can be done.

The other way is send it to pro to restore it :D

Cheers and enjoy it, mate

Quick edit: Be aware that some pipes with non removable bowls of that age were made from asbestos. If that is the case, i would recommend you to replace bowl and think it through before you smoke it.

There was a series of posts around this subject about a year ago. You have to be so careful with these pipes as plaster and asbestos was extremely common in bowl manufacture right up to the 1920s. Normally the silver 'lid' is secured by fine brass pins which holds the cup on the cork gaskets inside the gourd. Proceed with extreme caution and at the first sign of any fine white fibers know that you are dealing with an asbestos bowl. Replacement cups are available on the market, it is simply a matter of finding one that will fit and form an air tight seal. Send it to Briarville to be on the safe side.