One trick is to get the pipe cleaners that work for you. Some get best results with tapered ones, and other prefer the non-tapered, and of course there are bristled and non-bristled, and churchwarden in both versions. There's no rule here. Some find the thick end of the tapered useful and even necessary, whereas others like to work entirely with non-tapered. Bristles are good now and then, though some probably use them exclusively. And so on. Be sure to know what you are buying, so you get what you want. As jvn' shows us, the possibilities are endless.