No. Some bowls are exquisite, some are great, some are okay, and some are terrible. The terrible ones are caused by a few factors.
1. Breaking in a new pipe. I primarily smoke cobs and as such they are almost always nude. Until a decent layer of char develops on the internal shank and bowl walls I get a burnt wood flavor with them. Goes away after about four or five smokes.
2. Smoking a non-latakia blend in a latakia pipe. I like latakia--a lot--but I don't care for ghosting, which latakia can do sometimes. As such I have pipes that I smoke English/Balkans out of, and pipes I smoke everything that doesn't contain latakia out of.
3. Smoking the wrong type of tobacco in the wrong kind of weather. I love my English and Balkan blends. I don't love them so much when it is 150 F outside with 456% humidity and I have to smoke outside. Unfortunately hot and sticky weather is common to FL and I often smoke outside so I do smoke a wide variety of burley, Burley/VA, VA and VA/Per blends. These seem to be less bothersome when it is hot outside.
4. Smoking a tobacco I just don't like. I like trying all different kinds of tobacco. I like writing up reviews for tobaccos. However, some tobaccos, I just don't like. When writing a review I always try to give a tobacco a fair shot; I never write based on the first bowl--some tobaccos have a learning curve. So I need to smoke something a minimum of five or six times before I will write a review.
5. Smoking a pipe that is dirty or hasn't had a rest. I don't like smoking from a dirty pipe. I find that if I smoke bowl after bowl of anything from the same pipe I don't care for that either. In general I try to give my pipes a minimum of a day's rest and will smoke from various pipes in a day. I also regularly clean my pipes, sometimes with ethanol (I prefer white lightning, though any neutral white spirit will do the job) but mostly without. Regardless once the pipe has been cleaned it is rested a minimum of one day.
To ensure that user error doesn't cause problem 5 organization is key and I have a pipe rack that holds only pipes that have been cleaned and are resting.
1. Breaking in a new pipe. I primarily smoke cobs and as such they are almost always nude. Until a decent layer of char develops on the internal shank and bowl walls I get a burnt wood flavor with them. Goes away after about four or five smokes.
2. Smoking a non-latakia blend in a latakia pipe. I like latakia--a lot--but I don't care for ghosting, which latakia can do sometimes. As such I have pipes that I smoke English/Balkans out of, and pipes I smoke everything that doesn't contain latakia out of.
3. Smoking the wrong type of tobacco in the wrong kind of weather. I love my English and Balkan blends. I don't love them so much when it is 150 F outside with 456% humidity and I have to smoke outside. Unfortunately hot and sticky weather is common to FL and I often smoke outside so I do smoke a wide variety of burley, Burley/VA, VA and VA/Per blends. These seem to be less bothersome when it is hot outside.
4. Smoking a tobacco I just don't like. I like trying all different kinds of tobacco. I like writing up reviews for tobaccos. However, some tobaccos, I just don't like. When writing a review I always try to give a tobacco a fair shot; I never write based on the first bowl--some tobaccos have a learning curve. So I need to smoke something a minimum of five or six times before I will write a review.
5. Smoking a pipe that is dirty or hasn't had a rest. I don't like smoking from a dirty pipe. I find that if I smoke bowl after bowl of anything from the same pipe I don't care for that either. In general I try to give my pipes a minimum of a day's rest and will smoke from various pipes in a day. I also regularly clean my pipes, sometimes with ethanol (I prefer white lightning, though any neutral white spirit will do the job) but mostly without. Regardless once the pipe has been cleaned it is rested a minimum of one day.
To ensure that user error doesn't cause problem 5 organization is key and I have a pipe rack that holds only pipes that have been cleaned and are resting.
