"In any event, I don't care if he carves the pipe using the erect nipple of a virgin princess - I love the way his pipes look and feel".
LMAO! Priceless.
+1 :lol:
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Of all the things I most desire, one of these deep superblasts is at the top of my list.
This is an interesting conversation, but I don't agree with the "sandcarving" terminology as that word seems to point to some quality that'd be sculptural or rusticated. I think the deep blasts do in fact follow the natural grain, but to a degree we aren't really accustomed to seeing and perhaps aren't completely familiar with as of yet, I know I've never held one, much less smoked one, so all I'm going off are the pictures. I'm pretty sure that when Dunhill first starting blasting pipes that there were folks who were horrified at such an unnatural industrial process being applied to fine briar and indeed for a long time the sandblasted pipes were thought of as "seconds" and relegated to the lower throngs of collectability in most circles. I'm so glad to see the art of sandblasting elevated to its highest imaginable level and I'm also happy that this elevation was an American innovation.
Fred Hanna wrote on this topic a while back...
http://www.naspc.org/Archives/blast.html
Allow me to add an additional point. A well-known collector has stated in print in the last year that Jim Cooke's sandblasted pipes are actually "sand carved." Some have interpreted this as implying that Jim's method has deteriorated the sandblasting art into a form of rustication. I trust that this was not the collector's actual intention, but it might have been the result of his comment nevertheless. This is misleading and possibly denigrates and negates Jim's excellent work, which I believe is simply the best there is.
Actually, the remark is quite puzzling in many ways. When one thinks about it, all sandblasted pipes are "sand carved" to some degree. That is why the blasting is done! In making a single pipe, Jim spends from 12 to 15 hours on sandblasting alone, quite in addition to all the other steps that go into that pipe. Does this make his sandblasts somehow different than most others? Of course it does! He seems to consistently bring out more detail, depth, and definition, in my opinion, than anyone. That is why his pipes are so damned much in demand. Jim Cooke is the "Bo Nordh of the Blast." Jim does not create false graining patterns with his technique. In fact, he told me that his first pass is done specifically to expose the grain patterns, which he further exposes and details in his following steps. Jim does not do any sort of rustication using the blasting process, other than the blasting itself, which could be seen as the most true and pure form of rustication there is.
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Bruce Weaver has said
“I’ll do a cursory blast to get the block’s topography and find the rings. That will be my embarcation on the journey into how I’m going to attack the soft parts and highlight the rings,” said Bruce Weaver. “To do it right, you have to define what’s there. We don’t create the structure. We only enhance it.”
http://www.apassionforpipes.com/neills-blog/2010/9/23/what-a-blast.html
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...and J.T. Cooke has said this about wood, so clearly he seeks grain...
I was attempting to blast Grecian briar and I am sorry folks, that stuff, it makes beautiful smooth pipes, but if you want to go blast a piece of wood, go some place else. Because it has no real variation between the hard and soft areas. I stay as far from Grecian wood as I can. As far as the aging, I use Moroccan wood, and now I have started using some Italian wood. They are different and the Italian wood has to be treated a little differently. I like to get wood that is dry or semi-dry. I have my own curing process.
http://tobaccodays.com/interviews/j-t-cooke-in-a-class-all-his-own/
He also shared some info in a P&T interview, Vol 13 #1
The medium I use is part glass beads and part briar dust. The briar dust was a revelation...a happy accident...I started to see things I hadn't seen before...it helped define the soft and hard areas. Because it's briar blasting into briar, it tends to dig at the soft areas without necessarily taking much away from the hard areas...
3 different nozzles are used, the first stage is with the large nozzle, which displays grain evenly.
Then I go over it with the small nozzle, work around the bird's eyes and go around each of the individual rings and define the border between the hard and soft areas...each ring has got to be defined and that's with the small nozzle. Every millimeter of every ring is followed.
After that he uses the medium nozzle.
That's useful for rings that are twisting and going very deep. I try to follow the ring back as far as it will let me, and it can be frustrating because I'm seeing qualities in the wood that I can't get at yet...after that's done, after the third blasting, I again go over it with the large nozzle, and what that does is unify the texture. It brings all the wood fibers back so that they are individually apparent. Working with the small and medium nozzles, in a way I'm doing harm to the wood. In trying to follow each little wood fiber I kind of have to destroy it. The last blast has to be comparatively light, and it brings all the little fibers back into view. After it's been shot 3 times, you're not seeing too many fibers of wood. You're seeing where the rings are and where the bird's eyes are and where everything goes, but you're not seeing each of the individual fibers. They're there, I just have to bring that delicacy back. It's one fiber of wood next to another and the differences in their densities, so that's what the 4th blast does...
The result of this painstaking process is a sandblast with incredible delicacy and definition. So detailed is the texture that Cooke has often been accused of carving the pipes, or using a combination of carving and blasting.
This is sandblasting, pure and simple.
OGF FTW!
