Restored a really really old pipe!

I'm rather happy with this project, it was a CPF Paris for $28 on Ebay, here's the before and after. I went with not applying a new stain since the old one looked great after sanding and waxing. The pipe almost looked black before I got to it and the stem was a uniform gray/green (I originally thought it was bakelite or something). I still got a little sanding to make the stem absolutely smooth. This is my first restoration on one of my own pipes, did two before that came out absolutely perfect, but this one well the company went out of business in 1920, so who knows how old this sucker is.
Its stem was treated with utter disrespect along with the rest of the pipe and allowed to oxidize for mabey a hundred years or so, which left the stem with deep pitting before I even got to restoring it, the pitting was not noticible until I sanded it and it got to a point where sanding didn't help it, but there were all these sharp bands of oxidization going across, turns out they were filled in pits of pure oxidization. One rather cool feature is the top of the cap, that nob that comes out is actually a spring loaded tamper that has been built into the windcap, I have a picture in here of it comming out, it almost goes all the way down to the bottom of the bowl, very handy for when your driving. The windcap and band were plated and with the windcap the plating is gone on the areas that got the most use, which is why the rim looks silver/golden, probabley copper comming through.
I used photobucket for this, just hit "view all" to see each album, the first one are the before photos and the second are the after photos.

Stem is vulcanite, but it does have some brown streaks that are not oxidization and looks like cumberland almost. You can see this on the tip of the stem, down the underside, and a spot on the front. This vulcanite is probabley one of the early ones, so it has deep pitting it in caused from oxidization. Stems today don't seem to do this even when they are so badly neglected.

Yeah, I have never seen a stem look like that before, I couldn't tell it was vulcanite until I sanded it way down and could feel the feel that only vulcanite has. The built in tamer gets really dirty during smoking from all the smoke going right into it, I gave up trying to keep that part shiny all the time. I try to use any tamper onhand (even my finger) before I use that one, the issue with it is it is really difficult to tell how hard I am pressing down...
I mostly use it when I am getting the pipe lit, and being able to have the tobacco self-contained is really nice for when I am on the go, I don't have to worry about it falling out of the pipe.

That would make a lot of sense as to why it has such deep pitting, parts of it do seem a little fiberous, but then it is also black and feels identical to any vulcanite stem I have ever seen. It's a screw-on type with a bone tennon.

Pretty sure it is vulcanite then, when I had it, it was heavily oxidized, cleaning the oxidization off of it took 4-6 hours (not really sure) sanding then bleach then 2 hours of sanding, it was really on there. I tried everything in my power to not use bleach but it really did not give me another choice as the pits were so deep that the sandpaper could not get in there.

The two cracks down the side and all the pitting was there before any treatments, they really didn't get any larger which was my main concern before any were done. The stem is fully restored and being well taken care of by obsidian oil, no more agressive cleaning is in store for it ever. It's nice and smooth now, yeah the vulcanite was rather primitive back then, but I enjoy it just fine and it feels good. I'm just glad that there is a very nice draw to it, it smokes ribbon cuts really really well but does not seem to like flakes very much.

Okay the pipemaker Alden weighed in and said this is 100% definatley a horn type material and that they can oxidize if they are very old, like mine is. That ends the stem material debate lol.