Heartbreaker: Comoys 1057 Blue Riband Giant

[buckaroo]

Yeah, stampings can be hard site unseen. I'm not sure if even that seller would go to that length. I have a Family era Sasieni Four Dot Dnzey XS and right, the A was completely left out - Danzey.

 

[ssjones]

Someone once told me that to be patient on ebay as another one will eventually show up.

That is usually my strategy. But the guy who wrote the book on Comoys Blue Ribands had never seen one to this point...so, finding another might be pretty challenging. But, it's good to have a Holy Grail!
I know they have a lot of misses, but I bought a perfect GBD 9438 Seventy-Six from Shiny Pipes.

 

[buroak]

A broken clock is still right twice a day, but I must admit I have also had an unproblematic transaction with Shiny Pipes. That one almost makes up for the "burn".

 

[disinformatique]

So guys, tell me in detail about this ShinyPipes guy and what exactly he has done to earn the reputation and why haven't Ebay banned him?
Chris,

ThePipeMonk

 

[mranglophile]

So guys, tell me in detail about this ShinyPipes guy and what exactly he has done to earn the reputation and why haven't Ebay banned him?

Here we go again

 

[ssjones]

That pipe still haunts me...
On Shinypipes, do a youtube search.

 

[gloucesterman]

For some reason Shinypipes pictures never display on my computer. Not that it bothers me that much. But I would have liked to have seen that pipe.

 

[bonehed]

Uploaded pictures to imgur - try here gloucesterman

 

[ssjones]

Yep, still haunts me...

 

[ssjones]

I'm curious bonehed - how did you save those pictures? (they aren't available at the ebay page any more)

 

[wolfe64]

If you go to your link and scroll down I see all the pics of the listing although they are not at the top of the page anymore.
Mark

 

[bonehed]

@ssjones - Mark's got it. I just scrolled down on the page you linked and saved.
Their pictures seem to take longer than most do to load, which is fine with me as I'm in the 'stay away' camp anyway... I think whatever image hosting site they use has trouble with heavy traffic... at least from here.
Edit: In fairness - I bought a pipe from them without much research (into them) and got what I paid for without issue.

 

[ssjones]

A buddy on Facebook just did the BIN on this Blue Riband this morning. I can't see the logo with great detail, but zoomed in , it appears to be a stamped C logo?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Comoy-Blue-Riband-1057-Rhodesian-Pipe-/291653878880?hash=item43e7ed0460%3Ag%3AyT8AAOSwHaBWjFJN&nma=true&si=NMWvBlC7LPw4eMhnchcpV3qlXoI%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

 

[bonehed]

Hard to say definitively without more pictures, but looks stamped to me.

 

[robwoodall]

What does "Riband" mean? I always read that as "Blue Ribbon," as in prize-winner. Is that "ribbon" in another language, or a completely different word that I don't know?
Inquiring minds want to know!

 

[ssjones]

The grade "Blue Riband" was taken from the award given to passenger liners that crossed the Atlantic at the greatest speed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Riband
The connection to Comoys, from Pipepedia

Blue Riband. This name was a very clever marketing ploy by Comoy’s, and it was given to celebrate the record crossing of the Atlantic by the great ocean liners of the Cunard Line. It is my belief that the name was first used by Comoy’s in 1936 to celebrate the crossing by the Queen Mary in 4 days 27 minutes. It was priced at $35 in 1943 and the same price in 1965. Certainly it was a rare pipe, and Jacques Cole tells me that they always had great difficulty in meeting the demand for this brand. A catalogue from just after the war states, “Of every thousand pipe bowls that are made in the Comoy’s workshops, forty or perhaps fifty will be picked out worthy to bear the Comoy name.” It goes on to say that, of these, only three or four will be given the name “Blue Riband,”

 

[sablebrush52]

Looking at the second image, which is better focused than the closer one, I'd say that it's a stamp and not a 3 piece.

 

[robwoodall]

Thanks, sable!
You shamed me into doing a bit of research on my own, and also found that the word "riband" is an archaic spelling of "ribbon."

 

[bonehed]

The Riband above is back - did your buddy back out?

 

[ssjones]

Yep, he confirmed it was a stamped C and didn't close the deal.
Now looking at the two pipes again, I'm wondering, if perhaps someone didn't have a drilled C stem made for the one stamped "GIANT". I've seen a fair number of these 1057's and all have stamped C's. The COM marks appear to be identical. A replacement stem is the only conclusion I can draw. Speculation of course and if it is, someone sure did a fantastic job.
COM of the drilled C logo 1057

Stamped C logo pipe