Cleaning Out an Estate Kirsten Bowl

[rakovsky]

A friend gave me his Kirsten pipe that he used to smoke a lot of "1792 with Tonquin" or Coniston Plug. The pipe in the upper right below is my Grabow for comparison.

The Kirsten was clean except that the bowl had a strong "old tobacco" smell. When I piped the inside of the bowl with a pipe cleaner dipped in rum, the smell changed to a catstained carpet smel, and a lot of black soot stuck to the cleaner. It seemed that it had a thin layer of cake inside.

I scrubbed the bowl with 220 grit sandpaper wrapped around a golf pencil, rotated it in each of the 4 cardinal directions, and counted 400 sandpaper strokes total. My hands got sooted like a chimney sweep's hands. Then I filled the bowl with table salt and over 1 teaspoon of overproof white rum, and let it sit for about 24 hours.

It still smelled and my pipe cleaner still turned black, so I gave it 40 strokes with 60 grit sandpaper wrapped around the pencil, 40 strokes with 150 grit, and another 40 with 220 grit. Partway through the scrubbing, I rubbed the bowl with more rum and used spittle, hoping to loosen remaining cake.

Now it looks like this:

How does one tell the difference between hardened cake and the bowl's wood?

When I hold the bowl a few inches from my nose I can still smell the ghosting. When I scrub the inside of the bowl with sandpaper, a tiny pile of black powder forms that reminds me of soot. And when I put alcohol on the pipe cleaner, it still turns black.

I never tried to restore or clean a well used estate pipe before. I could be overly sensitive to the smell since it's not my own pipe's, like how other people's sweat smell worse to people than their own.

Kirsten sells reamers, but when I got the pipe, its cake seemed to me too thin for reaming, because I would worry that the reamer would cut into the pipe. Repairers consider 220 grind to be best, but I considered sanding it more with a coarser grind.

Some repairers online suggest filling your bowl with used coffee grinds from a drip machine. My father suggested filling it with coconut oil.

 

[The Benedictine]

Salt and water treatment.

 

[Bbailey324]

I've never used salt and water but have used salt and alcohol to good effect. Planning to try out the coffee grounds next time the need arises.

 

[rakovsky]

I've never used salt and water but have used salt and alcohol to good effect. Planning to try out the coffee grounds next time the need arises.

When people do a good job restoring pipes, do they get out all the cake and does the pipe bowl still smell of the ghosting?

 

[Briarcutter]

Not sure what you are trying to achieve. You took it down to the wood. It's a tobacco pipe, it's been smoked, it will smell. Time to just smoke it and enjoy.

 

[xrundog]

When people do a good job restoring pipes, do they get out all the cake and does the pipe bowl still smell of the ghosting?

Depends on what was smoked and how recently. Your bowl is clean. You did a nice job on it.
The fruity tobacco is usually the worst ghost. I am currently working on one. Ozone treatment seems to be having the best effect. It may still come back when smoked, but will hopefully fade away with successive smokes. Use a stronger tobacco.
To clarify, stripping out an old cake is normal. One can usually tell the difference between the cake layer and carbonized wood. It has a layered appearance once you get to the bottom of the cake.

 

[xrundog]

I will add that to get rid of a ghost, every nook and cranny of every piece of your pipe needs to be spic and span.

 

[rakovsky]

One can usually tell the difference between the cake layer and carbonized wood. It has a layered appearance once you get to the bottom of the cake.

Xrundog,
I've seen photos of pipe bowls where the bowls' sides look like the age stripes on canyon walls, like in this canyon photo:

But in my case I didn't really notice layers. The cake filled up to within a couple millimeters of the rim. Underneath the cake the wood had shallow long cracks. After sanding the cake out and swabbing the sooty bowl with rum on a pipe cleaner, those cracks turned black. You can see them a bit in my bottom right photo in the OP.

 

[rakovsky]

Planning to try out the coffee grounds next time the need arises.

I put the warm used wet grinds in my bowl tonight for soaking. The tobacco smell is either gone or drowned by the coffee smell. I may get a temporary coffee ghosting, but I'm OK with that. I'm planning on using PA to deghost it, and OTC burleys like PA have what reviewers consider cocoa, coffee, or anise flavoring.

 

[xrundog]

The bowl was smoked hard and shows some heat fissures. Not ideal but the bowl is still usable. Just don’t smoke it super hot.

 

[Searock Fan]

I doubt it will make much difference what you do. If you're like me the smoke will still taste like aluminum. Yuk!

 

[Bbailey324]

I put the warm used wet grinds in my bowl tonight for soaking. The tobacco smell is either gone or drowned by the coffee smell. I may get a temporary coffee ghosting, but I'm OK with that. I'm planning on using PA to deghost it, and OTC burleys like PA have what reviewers consider cocoa, coffee, or anise flavoring.

I like PA as a 'pipe fixer' tobacco. The neutral-ish burley seems to work well for fixing off flavors. I get cocoa, anise, and either rum or bourbon flavors from PA.

 

[rakovsky]

I soaked it overnight in used Medium Roast coffee grinds, then swabbed it again. It has a faint old tobacco ghost, but it's mitigated by the rum and coffee ghosting, and it smells less than my Grabow pipe that I've cleaned regularly.

 

[xrundog]

At some point you just have to smoke it. With luck, the old odor will be overcome.

 

[Sobrbiker]

I’m currently smoking some Five Brothers to de-ghost the heel of a pipe as I type this.

 

[rakovsky]

At some point you just have to smoke it. With luck, the old odor will be overcome.

Xrun,
I smoked PA in it after the deep cleaning. PA is already a great easy burning light smoke, whereas Kirstens probably show their effectiveness most with hot goopy blends.

The PA burned great and easily, with a lot of very very light smoke that is not stinky. The draw was tighter than a Grabow because the internal stem hole is like a stinger.

One Kirsten piper wrapped a pipe cleaner inside his Kirsten, but I think that it isn't meant for one. I'm definitely getting a nic effect, so the Kirsten doesn't stop that.

I wonder how the conical shape of the bowl affects the smoke.

 

[xrundog]

That reads like you mostly got the flavor you wanted. That’s great! Conical bowls are favored for flake tobaccos. The narrowing shape tends to concentrate the coal for a tobacco that might not burn as readily. At least as opposed to say a large billiard. But you can smoke anything in a conical bowl. A disadvantage is that moisture can concentrate at the bowl bottom. Depends on the tobacco and how you smoke.
I think the main advantage of a metal pipe is the ease of cleaning. And having one stem and multiple bowls can be convenient. I have some but find the metal gets hotter than I like.