About a week ago I posted a thread about getting ripped off on ebay when I won an auction for a straight billiard Brigham, and received a French made bent Rock Briar with a cracked bowl, and a non original poorly fit stem. After having no luck with the seller I got my money back from ebay and got to keep the crappy pipe.
So after fuming for a couple of days, I decided to go ahead and try to fix it up. Had to top the bowl some to get rid of some front damage, and of course fill in the crack which after reaming and cleaning the bowl showed that it went all the way through. Drilled out the shank to 5/32, and cleaned the crap out of it. The stem which was stamped Italy, would not fit all the way into the shank, and the outside diameter was larger than the shank too. Much sanding, filing, and finessing got the stem fit in the mortise and flush with the shank. Lost the Italy stamp, which didn't make much difference anyway, given the pipe is stamped France. Coated the entire inside bowl with some pipe mud, then a little staining, polishing and waxing later and the pipe didn't look half bad, even reminded me of the rustication on Custom Bilt pipes.
I ended up smoking a couple of bowls of OGS to seal the pipe mud, and much to my surprise the little bugger smoked pretty nice. Next I tried some Lane 1-Q mixed with H&H Louisiana Red, and I was getting more impressed with it. No gurgles, passes a pipe cleaner with ease, and the Italian stem was much nicer than I expected. The button is formed like some of the Dunhill fish tale buttons, kind of wide with the end of the button a concave shape, very comfortable.
So now I'm not as pissed off as I was, but I still wish I had the Brigham pipe... :|
First two are of the original condition:
Here's the pipe after the restoration:
So after fuming for a couple of days, I decided to go ahead and try to fix it up. Had to top the bowl some to get rid of some front damage, and of course fill in the crack which after reaming and cleaning the bowl showed that it went all the way through. Drilled out the shank to 5/32, and cleaned the crap out of it. The stem which was stamped Italy, would not fit all the way into the shank, and the outside diameter was larger than the shank too. Much sanding, filing, and finessing got the stem fit in the mortise and flush with the shank. Lost the Italy stamp, which didn't make much difference anyway, given the pipe is stamped France. Coated the entire inside bowl with some pipe mud, then a little staining, polishing and waxing later and the pipe didn't look half bad, even reminded me of the rustication on Custom Bilt pipes.
I ended up smoking a couple of bowls of OGS to seal the pipe mud, and much to my surprise the little bugger smoked pretty nice. Next I tried some Lane 1-Q mixed with H&H Louisiana Red, and I was getting more impressed with it. No gurgles, passes a pipe cleaner with ease, and the Italian stem was much nicer than I expected. The button is formed like some of the Dunhill fish tale buttons, kind of wide with the end of the button a concave shape, very comfortable.
So now I'm not as pissed off as I was, but I still wish I had the Brigham pipe... :|
First two are of the original condition:
Here's the pipe after the restoration: