Breaking In A New Pipe - With Water?

[snagstangl]

Peterson's 1905 catalog recommends running water through a new pipe before smoking it, or to put water in the bowl and let it sit an hour, then dump out and smoke the pipe for breaking in.

 

[shanez]

It's a little known fact that pipe smoking was invented to give people something to enjoy while underwater basket weaving.

 

[saltedplug]

I say! That's an idea! Perhaps a drop of gentian violet or mercurochrome to kill the germs too!

I don 't know about that. Could be true, could not be true. Maybe they contribute to the process, maybe not. Unrelated? Co-related? Related by dependent origination (like co-related but much more profound)? Causal?

In my youth Christian thinkers that taught me, confronted with a problem that they didn't understand, would stare vacantly into distance and say, whimsically, "It's a mystery." Even then I knew that was a dodge. But given that the results of total immersion are a mystery, we admit as much, whimsically.

We then issue a call-to-arms (we catch the ball, we do not dodge it). These methods would follow the formal guidelines for scientific truth, so that we might be more certain why we think that what we know is indeed fact. Establish standards for validity; devise experiments to manipulate the independent variable; replicate the results for reliability.

Don't you see? Objective data proven by the heat of scientific battle instead of opinions, repeated ad infinitum and that therefore have become true; that is, the subjective truths that rule the forums.

But pipe smoking is supposed to be fun and thus converts in this effort hard to find. The only certainty then, is that total immersion shall remain a mystery.

 

[mingc]

I don 't know about that. Could be true, could not be true. Maybe they contribute to the process, maybe not. Unrelated? Co-related? Related by dependent origination (like co-related but much more profound)? Causal?

In my youth Christian thinkers that taught me, confronted with a problem that they didn't understand, would stare vacantly into distance and say, whimsically, "It's a mystery." Even then I knew that was a dodge. But given that the results of total immersion are a mystery, we admit as much, whimsically.

We then issue a call-to-arms (we catch the ball, we do not dodge it). These methods would follow the formal guidelines for scientific truth, so that we might be more certain why we think that what we know is indeed fact. Establish standards for validity; devise experiments to manipulate the independent variable; replicate the results for reliability.

Don't you see? Objective data proven by the heat of scientific battle instead of opinions, repeated ad infinitum and that therefore have become true; that is, the subjective truths that rule the forums.

But pipe smoking is supposed to be fun and thus converts in this effort hard to find. The only certainty then, is that total immersion shall remain a mystery.

This is brilliant! I'm going to cut and paste it as a generic response to all unsolicited "expert" opinions sent to me by friends (and foes).

 

[Littlepipe]

The best advice I got on breaking a pipe in was just fill the bowl with Tabacco don't tamp it down and smoke all of it works for me

 

[Magpiety]

When not in use, I keep my pipes buried in large gallon jars of rock salt. Of course, it's crucial to tightened the lids lest moisture intrudes on the salt mixture. It does wonders keeping the pipes neutral tasting and vulcanite stems bright and shiny.

I'm also a committed advocate of rapping the pipe smartly on a hard surface, upside down, after smoking, to clear the bowl of any unsmoked dottle. Pipe cleaners are verboten; they ruin the wood and draft hole.

Agreed. I actually bought the carbon freezing chamber from Star Wars to keep my pipes in before, after, and during use. It gets a bit cold, but the alternative is complete and total destruction of my pipes by exposure.