Strange and Quirky Pipe Inventions

I have been kicking around the idea of making a tiny steam powered engine to set on top of the bowl, that runs off of the heat of the burning tobacco. ...maybe to power a small LED light, or to just spin and whistle as I smoke. As a metalsmith, I like tinkering with tiny novel stuff like that. But, then again, I hope my work doesn't slow down to the point where I have time to actually make something like that, ha ha.

Haven't smoked this yet, but the airway is "interesting."

I've seen some odd items on the outside of pipes, usually in the form of a wind cap of some sort. But I find most quirky pipe features are on the inside, like different types of stingers, filters etc. The most puzzling to me is the one on this old Italian pipe I recently bought. It has a spiral black plastic part that screws into the shank, that has one hole in the side of it. The stem, which is made from horn with an aluminum tenon pushes into the black part. The pipe is a straight pipe with an oval bowl, and seems to have a small reservoir drilled in under the draw hole. I guess it's some kind of system pipe meant to keep moisture from coming up the stem. It smokes fine, but the draw is a little constricted by the odd components of the system.

I'm sure there's other weird stuff out there, but like you say it's all interesting, and welcome to the forums, an interesting place to spend too much time! :roll:

Whoa Pitch! That is a Peterson system on crack!

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Took the words right out of my mouth. LOL

Ken pipes are quirky, though not as strange as some of the pipes others have shared here. http://pipedia.org/wiki/KEN