A Smoke of Pipes
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Kevin Godbee - Mar 2, 2009
- 5 min read
Ok so you’ve made up your mind that you’d like to try smoking a pipe. You’ve heard that it’s relaxing and a great way to spend time just sitting back and watching the world go by and maybe even a great way to contemplate where you want your life or business to go in the future.
Now you’re about to head down to your nearest pipe store to buy that pipe but, unless you’ve spent some time looking around the Net you could be in for a bit of a shock. You see, you just can’t walk into a store and ask for a pipe … well you could but the store clerk may look at you a bit strangely and he’s certainly going to have some questions for you for the term ‘pipe’ covers a huge range of shapes, sizes, and types.
There are decorative pipes, plain pipes, long pipes, short pipes and even mini pipes. There are pipes made out of briar … and pipes made out of other materials. There are pipes with straight shanks, pipes with bent shanks, there are pipes with small bowls and pipes with large bowls. So walking into a pipe shop or tobacconist and asking for a pipe is a bit like walking into a hardware store and asking for a couple of screws … you’re either going to need to give the clerk more information or ask for his recommendations.
Hopefully after reading this you’ll be a little more informed about pipes and have some better idea about what sort of pipe you’re looking for.
Quality
A lot of smokers who want to try a pipe are going to head down to the store with the idea that they’re not going to spend a lot of money. So they go looking for something cheap … something that’s not going to break the bank … and something they won’t feel that they’ve wasted their money on if they find that pipe smoking isn’t for them.
And straight away, they’re making a fundamental mistake. Sure you can pick up a pipe for a couple of bucks in a bargain bin somewhere but the price you pay for a pipe is in direct proportion to the quality you’re going to get and those cheap pipes are not going to give you the smoking experience you want … especially when you’re just starting out.
So if you want to give pipe smoking a real test then be prepared to spend some dollars and maybe think of buying something around the $50.00 mark for your first pipe. Also be prepared to buy the pipe from a specialty store. Yes you can find them in a few other places but the specialty stores are the places to go to get the right advice so don’t waste time going elsewhere.
So what makes a good pipe?
There are three main parts to every pipe. There’s the bowl that holds the tobacco while you smoke it. The bowl is attached to the shank which is designed to keep the bowl away from your face and allow the smoke to cool before it enters your mouth and the shank is attached to the stem … the part that actually goes into your mouth.
The most noticeable difference in some pipes is the shape of the shank; some are straight and some are curved. The shape of the shank is more about what’s comfortable for the smoker than anything else. Some people like the way a pipe with a curved shank feels when it’s in their mouth or when they hold it and some prefer a pipe with a straight shank.
The most important factor in what makes a good pipe is the material that it’s made out of and a briar pipe is what you should be aiming for. Briar is a type of wood that comes from the roots of a bush found around the Mediterranean Sea. The briar wood is very tough and very heat resistant and it’s the perfect material for pipes.
Briar’s ability to resist heat isn’t the only reason that it’s ideal for pipes. Briar is actually somewhat porous and so the moisture and heat in the tobacco can escape and cool air can enter the bowl and that allows the tobacco to burn more evenly. So definitely aim for a briar pipe … even just to test the waters.
Does it look cool?
The outward appearance of a pipe really isn’t very important when it comes to smoking it. Back in our grandfathers’ days … or even earlier … the way a pipe looked on the outside was probably of very little importance and I’m sure that some pipe smokers really had absolutely no choice when it came to that outward appearance. However these days we do have a choice and we’re all creatures of fashion so the outward appearance of a pipe can be quite important to the user.
There are basically three different exteriors on a pipe. There’s the smooth polished pipe that’s gentle to the touch and some people might think that it gives of an air of refinement and adds that refinement to the smoker’s image.
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| Briar Pipe with Smooth Surface | Briar Pipe with Rough Sandblasted Surface |
There’s also the roughened exterior … something that’s created by sandblasting the exterior of the bowl. Some roughened exteriors go beyond a light sandblasting and have a very pitted exterior and, while you think that may be a little too rugged a look for you, there are some advantages in a roughened surface. You see, the rougher the surface the greater the surface area and if it’s a good briar pipe that means a larger surface area to be air-cooled and that leads to a cooler smoke.
But beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the choice of exteriors really does come down to a personal preference.
Exotic pipes
Before I close this piece on pipes I really should briefly mention carved meerschaum pipes. These pipes are beautiful works of art but their beauty grows with their age and use. You won’t find these in a close-out bin at your tobacconist or pipe store and you won’t pick one of these beauties up for $50.00 either but they certainly are something to aspire to further into your pipe-smoking experience.
So there you have a brief introduction to pipes. I really have only briefly touched on the topic and there is so much more to learn about those pipes that can deliver so much pleasure.
Written by Kevin Godbee
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There’s a pipe in my collection that I cannot bring myself to smoke, though I’ve had it for more years than I care to recall. It’s old, or shall I say, well experienced; that experience, that oldness came to it long before it was in my possession. The pipe is an old Comoy’s Grand Slam from the 1940s. The shape (#93), a slightly canted, stack billiard (sometimes referred to as a Belgian) is right up my alley, and it’s a beautiful example of it. It came to me with some wear and tear; nothing unusual for an old pipe, but more the signs of one that has been well loved, smoked a lot, treated as a favorite tool, cherished, in a sense, by frequent use. It’s the pipe equivalent of a vintage car that’s been driven a lot, enjoyed fully and maintained adequately, rather than one kept in a spotless garage, dusted and detailed weekly, brought out only for leisurely Sunday drives, or to be ogled behind the ropes at the next Concours d’Elegance. When it arrived, those uncounted years ago, it wanted a little restoration. Nothing dramatic needed to be done to it, but the stem was oxidized, the finish a little dingy. The cake was even and fairly thin, and the airway was relatively clean, both signs that its previous owner cared for it, but the bowl’s surface was a little drab and dull. It took little effort to reveal its beauty, to show the lovely contrasted stain and interesting grain beneath the old wax. I often think I should do before and after photos of pipes that I work on, but those thoughts always come after the work’s been done. This one would have been a great illustration of how years of handling that can sometimes make a pipe more beautiful, can other times make it just look grungy. Once I’d cleaned up the externals, it was time to address the inside bits. I approach this a little bassackwards, I realize. It would be more sensible to take care of the inside before addressing the outside, but it’s how I roll. If an old pipe isn’t pretty to look at, it’s unlikely that I’ll care much about it, and cleaning is usually the hardest part, or at least the most boring part of any restoration for me. Alcohol and pipe cleaners. Lots of pipe cleaners. That’s why I leave it for last. Sometimes, I’ll even give a pipe a test smoke before a deep cleaning, just for a point of reference. I gave it a sniff to get an idea of what I was up against, and it stopped me cold. There in that bowl was an aroma that I had not smelled in decades. My head was instantly filled with memories of being in the back room of a fabled Berkeley tobacconist’s shop where I stumbled upon a few jars of long discontinued blends. One of them, a blend called Forty and Eight, had the most engaging and unusual scent of any tobacco I’d stuck my schnoz into. It was sweet, but not in a candy store way. There were none of the usual vanilla, cherry, berry or anise notes of typical aromatics, nothing that could be compared to aftershave or deodorant soap, but something almost musky, a little earthy, something exotic. The shop’s owner couldn’t tell me what was in it, how, or where it had been produced. The old blend had been retired before he’d bought the place. The printed catalogue gave no clues, either, other than being overprinted with the word “DISCONTINUED” in bold, rubber-stamp type. (And, I don’t recall it as being “highly aromatic” as the description indicates.) There was still quite a bit in the jar. Being, at that point, an intrepid explorer of all kinds of tobaccos, whether I thought I’d like them or not, I had to give it a try. It was burly based, but also comprised a good measure of virginia leaf, and maybe some other varieties; I didn’t have enough experience at the time to really pick it apart. But, that aroma was unlike anything I’d experienced before or since. 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It revivified a long dormant memory that is mine, and mine alone, and that’s enough. I keep it in a drawer with other old English pipes. In some ways, it’s nothing special, just a nice old pipe. I don’t lavish it with any particular care that arguably befits the hidden treasure that it holds. It’s not in a special box, or displayed preciously in a glass cabinet. Every once in a while, I take it out, point my nose bowlwards, and every time, those memories return just as powerfully as they did the first time. I have no idea how long it’s been since its last owner smoked it, but in the years I’ve had it, there seems to have been very little degradation of the aroma, and that’s […]
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Soon now, supposedly, our neighborhoods will shift from grinning pumpkins, skeletons in various assortments, and zombies dashing about to pretty reindeer, angels, and flashing lights illuminating homes with sparkling stars and laughing, scurrying Santas. But, lest we forget, there is the turkey season, fancy pie aromas wafting from kitchens, and a national pardon of a big Tom Turkey. Remember, now, that only one of these holiday personalities is a pipe smoker. And that is the hefty, bearded fellow in a bright red suit sitting in a sleigh with a herd of deer hitched up and ready to streak across the globe, bringing tidings of joy and many presents. Ok, the scene is set for the next couple of months, right? So, before we get too far off the beaten path, let’s just take a deep breath of fresh autumn air, shall we? Ahh. That’s better, isn’t it? What’s got the Pundit in a snit is not all the Halloween spooks who came a-jostling for candy. 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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 633. Our featured guest tonight is Jon David Cole. JD is the Owner/Tobacconist at The Country Squire in Jackson, MS, and the accompanying online store. We’ll have JD and Brian talking about what’s new at the store and in the business in general. At the top of the show, Brian will discuss tobacco growing, what happens to the leaf, and provide updated information on where tobacco is being gown today. Tobacco production originated in the United States and we were once the #1 producer. It’s quite different now.
