Estate Pipe Has Perfume Smell/taste

[thegriffiths]

Hello pipers!

I have just bought an estate pipe that is in great shape but it must have been in with an older woman's perfume or something. It smells of a floral perfume. I put salt with alcohol in the bowl and stem and let it soak. 2 days of drying out and just smoked it. It was horrible. Tastes like the perfume. Any recommendations to fix that? It's a really nice pipe and I really want to be able to enjoy it.

Thanks!

Matt

 

[Piping Abe]

Welcome to the forum

Ream all the cake away and try a retort. If that doesn’t do it, sand it down to bare wood. Also note that the tenon/shank/stem are probably also ghosted. Clean them and possibly sand to bare wood as well.

Learn to smoke similar blends is also another option.

 

[Ahi Ka]

I’m guessing you’re not a fan of Lakeland’s tobacco…

 

[Chasing Embers]

I’m guessing you’re not a fan of Lakeland’s tobacco…

Or it was used as a weed pipe and perfume was used to cover the smell. I've ran into that with a few estates.

 

[AppalachianPipe92]

This is very unfortunate. If it were me and a pipe I really liked, and spent a decent amount on, I would tear it town and rebuild it. If it was a costly pipe, I'd send this off to be done.
As said above, sanding the bowl down would be the first step. If the draw wasn't already to open, I'd then ream or even redrill the airway (up 1/64th of a size). THEN, I'd fill it with used coffee grounds and clean it out once they dry up. And lastly, id smoke Burley in it for a few weeks. 5 Bros, Pegasus, OJK - something like that. I've even gotten the ghost out of pipes with just heavy Burley usage.

This is alot, and I'd have to really love the pipe to go through all the trouble, or even to send it off.
YMMV

Best of luck. Lots of restoration experts in the community that hopefully chime in.

 

[mikethompson]

You've done the salt soak, but have you tried damp coffee grounds? That has worked wonders on a few of my estates.

 

[OzPiper]

You have to exorcise the shank and mortise as well as the chamber
Most of my pipes are estates. Cleaning the shank and mortise often requires a lot more time and effort.
A lot of skankiness can reside in that small space.

 

[starrynight]

Battling this right now with my (I believe 30's era) Dunhill Canadian. I love the pipe, and it smokes great, but I cannot get this "floral" perfume, possibly "sour" taste out of it. I was considering getting the heaviest lakeland, and just embracing it.

 

[Piping Abe]

Battling this right now with my (I believe 30's era) Dunhill Canadian. I love the pipe, and it smokes great, but I cannot get this "floral" perfume, possibly "sour" taste out of it. I was considering getting the heaviest lakeland, and just embracing it.

Probably Deer Tongue ghost.

 

[anotherbob]

You've done the salt soak, but have you tried damp coffee grounds? That has worked wonders on a few of my estates.

My one pipe that soured for real as in had a nasty taste that wouldn't go away, got fixed with the damp coffee ground treatment.

 

[kcghost]

You've got a real problem on your hands. Most likely it is a pipe that was heavily for Lakland blends. I don't have the patience to treat such things.

 

[georged]

Do the salt and alcohol thing, but use activated charcoal (the sand-size ganules, NOT pellets or powder) instead of salt.

Two rounds of that has removed the most nasty smells I've ever encountered (meaning many hundreds of pipes).

 

[TheIronMonkey]

I’ve used @georged ’s method of activated charcoal to clean out a gourd Calabash and it worked very well.

 

[LotusEater]

Buy some Grousemoor and light it up.

 

[ParkitoATL]

I've had two different pipes with the same perfume ghost and they tasted nothing like Ennerdale or any of the Lakeland blends I've tried. Lakelands taste organic to me, like sweet almonds. This perfume ghost is more akin to baby powder, a synthetic smell. Someone posted about a particular blend that was very popular back in the day and said that if a pipe tasted like perfume, it was this blend that caused it. I wish I had written it down.

 

[RustiePyles CPG]

+1 on the activated charcoal, it works wonders.

 

[starrynight]

Got some coffee grounds packed into the Dunhill. Will let everyone know how it works for me--heard lots of good about it.

 

[ParkitoATL]

I’ve used @georged ’s method of activated charcoal to clean out a gourd Calabash and it worked very well.

Can you link to that or describe it?

 

[TheIronMonkey]

Can you link to that or describe it?

Amazon.com

 

[ParkitoATL]

Sorry, didn't see his post above about using charcoal instead of salt.