Comoy’s London Pride 430

[craig61a]

Picked up this Comoy’s…

Stem and chamber need some work. I usually wait until I have a number of pipes that need fill work on the stems. Same as chamber work. That way I don’t waste epoxy or ‘cement’.

But this is cleaning up nice…

 

[Hillcrest]

Very nice. I have the 215 bent billiard. Enjoy !

 

[Sig]

I absolutely love old Comoys.
Them and old GBD have some of the best shapes and are great smokers.....in my opinion.
Comoys are getting harder to find lately.

 

[Zamora]

Very nice, Comoy is such a classy brand

 

[craig61a]

Today I went about cleaning up the chamber. There was a lot of carbon in there, especially toward the bottom.

Once I removed a good portion of the carbon, the shape of the chamber is not too bad. There’s some charring mid chamber, but no ‘alligatoring’.

I may just coat the inside to smooth out the chamber wall.

 

[Joe H]

That's got to be the coolest pipe shape I've seen, pretty much ever! I can see why you didn't wait to start on it. Your refurb is going along great!

 

[hall222]

Looks great.

 

[craig61a]

I did some more work on the chamber. Removing more carbon…

I got it down to where the bottom of the chamber looks a lot better - relatively.

I suspected that this pipe had been mudded prior to me receiving it. There’s a divot at the face of the chamber wall across from the airway. And the button of the chamber was sort of picked out in an oval shape.

The prior owner loved use a pick…

The patch near center of the bowl pretty much all the way around has material missing and there’s a void in the wood. Not a big deal. A mix of activated charcoal, pumice, and waterglass will fill that in nicely.

Once dried I can redrill the airway and everything should line up nicely for a smoke all the way to the bottom of the chamber…

 

[craig61a]

That's got to be the coolest pipe shape I've seen, pretty much ever! I can see why you didn't wait to start on it. Your refurb is going along great!

Yeah, it’s kind of a cross between Zulu, Bell, and Dublin.

Zulu/Yachtsman pipes are on my fave shapes.

 

[craig61a]

One thing I found unusual is this metal tube in the airway of the stem.

I’ve seen threaded inserts where stingers screwed in, but this has no threads.

I’m guessing that this was something done early on in the manufacture of these pipes - for what reason I do not know.

 

[ssjones]

Very cool, we don't see many London Pride pipes or the 430 shape (I can't recall one in recent memory).
The metal reinforced tenon was reportedly introduced around 1940 and used sparingly past WWII (exact date unkonwn), and that infomation is anecdotal. It was typically only used on high grades, Blue Riband, etc. Here on a London Made that I owned.



And on a Straight Grain I once owned, with the reinforced briar shank to boot.

 

[ssjones]

Comoys didnt flip shape numbers much, but the 430 is also a standard bulldog.

 

[craig61a]

Chamber repair effected…

Now I wait.

 

[bayareabriar]

One thing I found unusual is this metal tube in the airway of the stem.

I’ve seen threaded inserts where stingers screwed in, but this has no threads.

I’m guessing that this was something done early on in the manufacture of these pipes - for what reason I do not know.

View attachment 312795

I’ve seen them on quite a few 1920s-early 1950s pipes. The earlier ones being the royal and tradition. The latter being blue ribbon and tradition. So, in line with what SS was saying, just a little earlier than the 40s. Really cool pipe!

 

[craig61a]

Very cool, we don't see many London Pride pipes or the 430 shape (I can't recall one in recent memory).
The metal reinforced tenon was reportedly introduced around 1940 and used sparingly past WWII (exact date unkonwn), and that infomation is anecdotal. It was typically only used on high grades, Blue Riband, etc. Here on a London Made that I owned.

View attachment 312810

And on a Straight Grain I once owned, with the reinforced briar shank to boot.

View attachment 312811

As usual in situations like this, I haven’t found any information that would lead me to a determination one way or another.

But I would guess this was something that was done at an earlier date.

This pipe does have a circle COM, so I would assume it’s post 1950?

 

[bayareabriar]

As usual in situations like this, I haven’t found any information that would lead me to a determination one way or another.

But I would guess this was something that was done at an earlier date.

This pipe does have a circle COM, so I would assume it’s post 1950?

Spot on. I’d say early 1950s

 

[craig61a]

Well, in any case, I recall seeing something like this before (The shape). I really dug it.

As luck would have it, I missed out.

So when I saw this one I snapped it up.

It’s a bit larger than most Zulu shapes, it goes about 6” long. I like that as well.

 

[craig61a]

About 24 hours later…

The chamber repair has dried a bit. I ran a 1/8” bit through the airway to remove any material that had wicked in there. It’s easier to do that before the material becomes rock solid.

The material will dry and shrink some more in about a weeks time.

A before and after perspective…

 

[jguss]

The London Pride didn’t exist until after the war, and once hostilities ended it took a few years for Comoy’s reconversion. I’d put this one at late 1940s.

Really cool pipe!

 

[craig61a]

The London Pride didn’t exist until after the war, and once hostilities ended it took a few years for Comoy’s reconversion. I’d put this one at late 1940s.

Really cool pipe!

I’ve read that after the war, the British pipe making industry didn’t get back up to speed until the late 1940’s/early 1950’s. So you’re most likely correct.