Doctor Fills
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For the first 75 years or so that briar pipes existed they were 100% smooth. The vast majority of pipes made in those days had lots of large fills because imperfections are an unavoidable characteristic of briar, and sandblasting and rustication hadn't been invented yet. Mastic (putty) fills were the only way to deal with the situation.
After blasting and rustication came to the party, smooths became less common---a lower percentage of production. But the ones that did had both fewer and smaller fills.
At the enthusiast/collector level, while most smooths STILL have a few fills, they are usually sand-pit-sized and dealt with using dark(er) finishes and filling cleverness (i.e. non-mastic fill materials), so are difficult to detect.
Smooths with lots of large and obvious fills still exist, they just don't show up often in the racks of guys who frequent boards like this. Functionally, they are "briar corncob" pipes that are used for lawn mowing, camping, fishing, and so forth. Often referred to as "basket pipes". (The label comes from how they are usually sold in B&M's: jumbled in a box as opposed to in a case under glass or attached to the wall with little rubber grabber doo-dads.)
Made these years ago so I really don't remember how long they took. I have several pipes I made back then that I felt were good enough to keep but each had something about it that made it not good enough to sell. I haven't smoked them because I have plenty of others for that. Just keep them to remember the old days.
Fills are just part of the game I think. You just hope they are on the heel or some other part you don't notice. That said I've been pretty lucky, I don't think my pipes have many fills on them.
It all depends on the standard of quality of the maker. Some, like Castello, won't tolerate a fill. They will try to get rid of the flaw by carving the pipe, but it that doesn't work they chuck it.