This was the $20 stummel I picked up on EBay the other day and got some good suggestions on stems shapes to use. It proved to be interesting- I think the silver plated ferrule contained a bone screw on the original stem- no trace of that remained and the base of the ferrule was so far gone, it couldn't be saved. I used a flat sanding disk to sand the base off leaving a metal tube. I faced off the stem on the meerschaum stem and turned an ebonite sleeve that fit into place. Epoxied the tube, sleeve, and stummel together. For the stem I used a Delrin tenon and acrylic stem- adjusted the size of the mortise with a chucking reamer to get the fit just right. I hate bending this material- it's really a challenge- I ended up using boiling water and spot heated a couple of stubborn spots with a flame. This was the sharpest bend I've done in acrylic- I ended up doing the final 10% of the shaping after bending to work out some problem areas...(and after seeing this enlarged on screen, I'll be working down the underside of the stem a little more tomorrow...)
...and this is what I started with...
...and this is what I started with...