Chacom Pipes General Impressions?

[madox07]

I don't own but two, and there is a reason for it... I never came across filtered estates chacom. But let me tell you, when I do smoke unfiltered, these two are my go to pipes .. dry briar, well drilled, good overall geometry. Go for it ..

 

[sardonicus87]

I have a Chacom Champs-Elysées (bent apple 871), not sure how long I've had it, maybe a year? Anyway, it's far and away my best briar pipe, but all my briars are in the under $200 range, the others are a Lorenzetti (worst pipe I own and also cheapest), Peterson Red Spigot and a Savinelli Roma Lucite prince.

The Chacom might have been the most expensive I bought, can't remember (though the Peterson might have been more), but it's a far better smoker and has a far better finish quality than any of the others in the same price range and definitely a better value per dollar than the others. For modern day pipes, I'd say their value is hard to beat from what I've seen when looking around.

 

[Lucashly]

They are priced well, smoke well and traditional looking. Not a pipe if looking for artisan shapes.

 

[rotate]

I have noticed that I've been spending some time looking at Chacom Pipes as of late. They seem to make pretty nice looking pipes at what seem like reasonable prices.

Do they smoke well compared to equivalent factories like Petes and Savinellis? Are they generally well drilled? How is their stem and button work?

I have three Chacom pipes from the Royale range, one an estate which was little smoked Is a smooth Lovat 212 and the other two which I purchased new are both smooth Rhodesians a small 283 and a larger 498, all three are excellent smokers of almost any tobacco I load them with and have been exceptionally well made with acrylic stems and buttons that are neither too small or too large, the drillings on all three to both briar and stem have been very well executed and easily pass the pipe cleaner test for alignment as have the airways at the mouth end of the stems so that they are pleasing to a critical centralist eye.

The finish to the faultless briars, no fills no sandpits was highly polished/buffed but not stained so that the new pipes arrived in the white which looks in photograph's to be a Matt finish which it’s not and with use and handling they have acquired an attractive patina of their own. Surprisingly to me at least the inside of the bowls were also highly polished which in part contributed to me not smoking the larger of the Rhodesians which has an almost perfect flame grain for some time as I was loathe to spoil something that looked so good but time and tide wait for no man and as I’m now 73% on my way to getting all of my money back from my earlier pension fund contributions I decided to spoil the large Rhodesian so that future eBay buyers don’t get quite the bargain they would have got when my family flog off all my worldly goods upon my entry to the Big Smoke Room in the sky.

In comparison to the Peterson pipes that I have, I don’t own a Savenelli which is my loss the Chacom‘s outclass the newer Petersons and are on fairly level pegging with the older Petersons that have developed a personality of their own. My interest in the Chacom Royale range was awoken after reading about the discovery and use in the Royale range Chacom made of the rough machined stumells in the Chapius Comoy warehouse where they’d lain for more than half a century unnoticed by anyone which means the briar was probably dug up in the early years of the twentieth century which is a continuity I find fascinating, they are not easy to find and are not by my standards cheap but if you are lucky you gets what you pays for and I think they were worth every penny I paid for them.

The numbering system of pipe types that Chacom use appears to me to be identical to that of Comoy which is not really a surprise as they were all one business/family until Comoy opened up a very successful pipe manufacturing business in Britain and were part of the peaceful business and artisan French invasion of Britain in the latter half of the nineteenth and early twentieth century which my French maternal great great grandfather took part in as a Master barrel maker to capitalise on the expanding customer base of the Empire, what was surprising to me was that Trident another French pipe maker based at Saint Claude in France also used the same pipe shape type numbering system, I have two of their excellent and now old 1/4 bent fat Rhodesians both shape numbered 1057 with not a briar fill between them.

A word of caution though none of my Chacom Royales are field strippable for cleaning in the summer months as the machining tolerances are so accurate that the Chacom interference fit of stem to shank is almost impossible to negotiate for fear of breakage and I use a freezer for both disassembly and reassembly. I could of course rub the stem spigot down sufficiently to enable an easier fit but where I live in the mountains at the outermost corner of the European Empire the long summer day time temperatures rarely falls much below 36’C/96’F + while the short but unforgiving winter temperatures barely rises above 5’C/41’F which may result in a useless floppy clearance fit between a reduced spigot diameter and a disappointed loose briar shank and no pipe smoker ever wants to experience that.

Purchasing from new, two Italian pipe vendors offered the greatest selection of Chacom pipes with prices well below that of French or anywhere else sellers, their courier delivery service cost €10 and the pipes were received by me two days later packaged amongst enormous plastic air bubbles which could have floated the pipes across the Mediterranean Sea to me with ease. Great Service and excellent pipes, good luck.

 

[woodsroad]

A box arrived from France today…

 

[OzPiper]

I have three Chacom pipes from the Royale range, one an estate which was little smoked Is a smooth Lovat 212 and the other two which I purchased new are both smooth Rhodesians a small 283 and a larger 498, all three are excellent smokers of almost any tobacco I load them with and have been exceptionally well made with acrylic stems and buttons that are neither too small or too large, the drillings on all three to both briar and stem have been very well executed and easily pass the pipe cleaner test for alignment as have the airways at the mouth end of the stems so that they are pleasing to a critical centralist eye.

The finish to the faultless briars, no fills no sandpits was highly polished/buffed but not stained so that the new pipes arrived in the white which looks in photograph's to be a Matt finish which it’s not and with use and handling they have acquired an attractive patina of their own. Surprisingly to me at least the inside of the bowls were also highly polished which in part contributed to me not smoking the larger of the Rhodesians which has an almost perfect flame grain for some time as I was loathe to spoil something that looked so good but time and tide wait for no man and as I’m now 73% on my way to getting all of my money back from my earlier pension fund contributions I decided to spoil the large Rhodesian so that future eBay buyers don’t get quite the bargain they would have got when my family flog off all my worldly goods upon my entry to the Big Smoke Room in the sky.

In comparison to the Peterson pipes that I have, I don’t own a Savenelli which is my loss the Chacom‘s outclass the newer Petersons and are on fairly level pegging with the older Petersons that have developed a personality of their own. My interest in the Chacom Royale range was awoken after reading about the discovery and use in the Royale range Chacom made of the rough machined stumells in the Chapius Comoy warehouse where they’d lain for more than half a century unnoticed by anyone which means the briar was probably dug up in the early years of the twentieth century which is a continuity I find fascinating, they are not easy to find and are not by my standards cheap but if you are lucky you gets what you pays for and I think they were worth every penny I paid for them.

The numbering system of pipe types that Chacom use appears to me to be identical to that of Comoy which is not really a surprise as they were all one business/family until Comoy opened up a very successful pipe manufacturing business in Britain and were part of the peaceful business and artisan French invasion of Britain in the latter half of the nineteenth and early twentieth century which my French maternal great great grandfather took part in as a Master barrel maker to capitalise on the expanding customer base of the Empire, what was surprising to me was that Trident another French pipe maker based at Saint Claude in France also used the same pipe shape type numbering system, I have two of their excellent and now old 1/4 bent fat Rhodesians both shape numbered 1057 with not a briar fill between them.

A word of caution though none of my Chacom Royales are field strippable for cleaning in the summer months as the machining tolerances are so accurate that the Chacom interference fit of stem to shank is almost impossible to negotiate for fear of breakage and I use a freezer for both disassembly and reassembly. I could of course rub the stem spigot down sufficiently to enable an easier fit but where I live in the mountains at the outermost corner of the European Empire the long summer day time temperatures rarely falls much below 36’C/96’F + while the short but unforgiving winter temperatures barely rises above 5’C/41’F which may result in a useless floppy clearance fit between a reduced spigot diameter and a disappointed loose briar shank and no pipe smoker ever wants to experience that.

Purchasing from new, two Italian pipe vendors offered the greatest selection of Chacom pipes with prices well below that of French or anywhere else sellers, their courier delivery service cost €10 and the pipes were received by me two days later packaged amongst enormous plastic air bubbles which could have floated the pipes across the Mediterranean Sea to me with ease. Great Service and excellent pipes, good luck.

Photos would be greatly appreciated
We all love eye candy

 

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I

Photos would be greatly appreciated
We all love eye candy

Understood and when my eight year old grandson returns from visiting his maternal grandparents in the UK I’ll get him to run me through what’s required to post pics here using my new fangled iPad

 

[crashthegrey]

I own one from the slow smoke in Chicago. We managed to get them to make them for the UPCA this year. Seems pretty great, to be honest.

 

[WhiteRaven]

So I am brand new to pipe smoking, I have always found an allure to the hobby but have never had the ability intill recently. Due to this thread I was able to answer questions that I had about Chacom and decided to by my first briar pipe! Chacom Club 851. Thank you all for your wisdom!