First, no soaking. 10-30 seconds flush. Second, I don't have a new meer upon which to demo. But I can't believe that smoking a meer alters the basic properties of meerschaum.John, on this one, you're gonna have to demonstrate that water won't harm a new block meerschaum pipe. I seem to recall that crude meerschaum is soaked in water to soften it for carving -- not something I would want to do to a finished pipe.