Meer Changing Color

[colcolt]

My storient meer is three weeks old now. I think the colors are beginning to pop out or maybe it's just my imagination. Here are a couple now and then before. What do you think? Is it an optical allusion? The shots I took when it was new was from direct flash while the ones today I used bounce light so the colors would be better to see. Direct flash washes things out.
three weeks old

New

three weeks old

New

 

[irishsmoker]

Yes i do believe I see some yellow coming through there!

 

[baronsamedi]

Cool, huh? One of my favorite things about Meerschaum.

 

[colcolt]

I'll bet it was that awful FM that did it. :mrgreen:

 

[bentmike]

Nice- I see it! Sure is fun starting with a fresh meer isn't it?

 

[photoman13]

yeah that look great! Definitely some color. Oh and i made a flash diffuser for taking photos where washout is a problem for my digial slr with a cigarette pack. Here is the link about it.

 

[colcolt]

Nice- I see it! Sure is fun starting with a fresh meer isn't it?

Oh, yeah-it sure is...kind of like watching your puppy grow up. (I'm a big dog lover)
Love that diffuser, photoman. Talk about ingenious!! I use a Nikon flash that will rotate and swivel in about any direction and I aim it at a wall behind me or just straight up at the ceiling. Wonderful soft light. I did have a 28x28 Westcott light box with a Photogenic 600 w/s lights but when I gave up weddings, the went too.

 

[lankfordjl]

Very nice. I'm hoping to get my new meer in the mail soon. Can't wait to get started on it.

 

[barkar]

I have been puffing away on my new meer for several days now. I can't seem to let it sit. Hell today I smokes Amphora (brown pouch) mostly burley with some virginia and oriental. I don't like Amphora tobacco but even this stuff tasted OK. I wish I had discovered smoking meer long ago. Only down side is, the pipe gets damn hot if your not careful.

 

[gwtwdbss]

That's a really nice pipe! The color is certainly coming along.

 

[dirtybearpipes]

That's so cool! I wonder what causes it?

 

[spartan]

This is just a guess... But I think that super oily tobaccos like say... Penzance would blacken up a meer right quick.
Definately a black rope tobacco might do some really cool damage as well haha.

 

[colcolt]

Only down side is, the pipe gets damn hot if your not careful.

I started out having the same problem but cutting back puffing too much did much better. I gauge it by being able to put the bowl to my face. If it doesn't burn and just offers a slight warm feeling I feel I'm doing the right thing. If it begins to get a little too hot to hold I know I need to stop and back off for a few minutes.

That's so cool! I wonder what causes it?

The nicotine content and type of tobacco from all I understand. Moreover, the frequency of smoking it will aid in how quickly it starts coloring and in my case, about three weeks.

 

[grizzly86]

That really is a beauty. Makes me want another meer. ::

 

[spartan]

You're attributing the coloring of a meer to the nicotine content?
I always understood it was the oils/tars in the tobacco.
1 drop of nicotine is a fatal dose. So I doubt the coloring of a meer is due to nicotine. Otherwise noone would be smoking one, because they'd all be dead.

 

[topd]

Oh come on Spartan... Ha, you know he meant the tars and oils. Some say it's the nicotine because it's short for

all that stuff. Some pipes tear right off coloring like mad and others just poke along taking their time. It

all has to do with the density and porousness of the individual stone. There's an actual chemical formula for the

stone but I'm not going to copy and paste it here, you can look it up.

When I first started smoking meerschaums it was thought that it came from a build-up of tiny ocean creatures that

fell to the bottom and fossilized over millions of years. I always liked that explanation and was kinda disappointed

when it was proven wrong.

Anyway, that's a nice pipe colcolt, keep smoking her, she'll come around beautifully.

 

[colcolt]

You're attributing the coloring of a meer to the nicotine content?
I always understood it was the oils/tars in the tobacco.
1 drop of nicotine is a fatal dose. So I doubt the coloring of a meer is due to nicotine. Otherwise noone would be smoking one, because they'd all be dead.

Not entirely nicotine alone but all the other goop as well. One drop is fatal? If that was the case, I would have been dead long ago. I've probably had a chamber pot full of nicotine over the decades and still kicking. Maybe it's my nine lives.
I can see this meer looking good in about another 4-6 months at this rate. Around that time it'll probably be ready for it's first taste of bees wax.

 

[spartan]

Didn't mean to get off topic but nicotine is a clear liquid. And it's only fatal if the Lethal Dose is consumed all at once lol. I'm sure we will all consume many liters of it over our lifetime. As long as you don't eat a package of cigs all at once, or drink the refill liquid in the E-cigs, or eat your chew tobacco all at once we should all be fine.
A drop of water is reckoned to be about 0.05 ml in volume.
I ml of water weighs 1 gm, so one drop of water weighs 0.05 gms
There are 1000 milligrams in a gram, so (0.05 x 1000 =) 50 milligrams would be the approximate weight of one drop of water.
If the Lethal Dose of Nicotine is 0.5–1.0 mg/kg and I weigh 170lbs = 77.1107kg then 1 drop of nicotine comes damn close to a lethal dose for my body weight. If you're skinny you're a gonner.
Wiki answers - http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_pure_nicotine_deadly

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine#Toxicology

http://www.news-medical.net/health/Nicotine-Toxicology.aspx

 

[unit562]

Still, it a beautiful pipe and I look forward to continuing to watch its change.
makes me want a Meer of my own

 

[topd]

Point Taken....