Pipes with Shellac/Varnish Finishes

[clyde]

As already mentioned even a simple soft cotton cloth sprayed with Pledge or furniture polish allowed to dry works very well even if the deep shine does not last very long. So just wipe the wax cloth as the last step in your normal cleaning/maintenance. Have found shiny finishes do smoke slightly hotter than naturals but most smokers probably subconsiously adjust their smoking cadence when they find the bowl is running hot. I like naturals and enjoy watching the grain develop over time a plus. The naturals are usually buffed when made and the combination of your hand oils and what small residue that comes through from the inside of the bowl makes for a soft buff finish that is quite nice in itself. Low, or no maintenance required and that's a plus too.

 

[archerdarkpint]

Have seven or eight (not the total collection) pipes I picked up along the way and each had either a heavy clear coat or synthetic finish. They all seemed to smoke much hotter than those with just a stain finish and at one point, I was looking at making them all go away. Thinking back they just seemed as if they were suffocating. They'd smoke hot, taste off, and just feel, I don't know, I guess they felt wrong. So I went wild over a weekend and stripped them all with steel wool, then finished with a fine grit sandpaper and kept them at the base appearance.
Well, best move ever...the effort made all the difference and each is a regular now in the rotation. When stripped, some of them were a lighter shade, but after a period of time, they become darker with use/handling and they take on a nice contrast.

 

[wayneteipen]

I'm still looking for where the lungs are located. :lol:

 

[foggymountain]

There is also a question about the health safety of varnished pipes, which may use a synthetic such as polyurethane. Is it carcinogenic?

 

[balagooon]

i HAVE A TASTE FROM A LACQURED PIPE, THEORY THAT SOME PIPE MAKERS spray ON THE LACQUER, AND SOME OF THE SPARAY GETS INTO THE BOWL DURING THAT PROCESS; AND i SEEM TO TASTE THAT RESIDUE FROM THE SPRAY SOMEHOW ALWAYS; yET EVENTUALLY THE BOWL WILL CAKE AND COAT, YET , SOMEHOW i TASTE SOME CHEMICAL RESIDUE WHICH SPREADS THRU THE CAKE? aNYONE TASTE THIS NO MATTER HOW LONG A LACQUERED PIPE IS SMOKED? i HONESTLY DON'T TASTE IT FROM UNLACQURED BRIARS O OTHERWISE; ALSO, SEPERATE FRONM THIS POST; I LOVE MY MEECHAUMS BUT THEY all HAVE A BITA LEATHER TASTE TO ME. tHANKS FOR ALL INPUT

 

[eduardonogueira]

It is simply impossible to get a high-end pipe without some sort of shellac and other extra finishes. Most of pipe makers will tell you that your pipe was just waxed. It is such a lie! Waxes of any kind can't hold the heat of a bowl, it actually gets into the wood and stay there, overtime your pipe will feel strange and slightly heavier to smoke, and finally some of the wax will come out in your fingers. Pipes do not breathe, it may react differently depending on the finish but this is definitely not breathability. A good pipe will receive a very fine coat of shellac over the stain/dye, otherwise the dye will fade quickly, finally sanding and waxed to remove uneven minor parts. The only one pipe that breathe is corn cobs pipes, they have very open pores, they are actually hard-like sponges. What about varnishes? Irrelevant, only cheap pipes comes with this finish, because even the very shine expensive ones will be prepared with sandpaper around 1200-2000 and buffed.

 

[sasquatch]

Yes, most of this thread is total garbage in terms of "facts" - written by people who never stained or finished a pipe in their life.
It was also 7 years old and could probably have been left in the ground.

 

[jpmcwjr]

Perry much. Zack wrote a good post a year ago or so on the subject. Seems shellac is cut pretty hard.

 

[wyfbane]

Wait. Pipes are varnished!? 8O

 

[sasquatch]

Let's take a nice old "dry" block of briar.

Let's punch a big hole in it.

What this picture shows is a little ring of moisture at the top of the block - being driven out by the heat of the drilling process. That moisture is sitting in every block unless the block has been stored on the moon. Ambient moisture, the air is full of it, every wooden object is too.
Every time you heat up a pipe by smoking it, you drive a little moisture out. This is the pressure that blisters a cheap finish. But a thin coat of shellac does nothing to prevent this moisture from being pushed out. And hell, you could probably coat a pipe with Tremclad and it would smoke fine. We aren't talking about water needing to gush out the sides of a pipe, we are talking about a little bit of moisture trying to escape, which it can probably do out the chamber-side anyhow if it wanted. And a well-smoked pipe probably has less moisture content to start with, if a guy is driving it out pretty frequent.
Bad smoking pipes smoke bad for any number of reasons. Usually it's the geometry of the stem and bad drilling. But bad briar (or things that may not be briar), unnecessary metal gizmos, poor build quality... all leads to a bad smoking pipe. The result is that someone buys a 20 dollar pipe, it smokes awful, the finish peels off, and they say "Ah, this is a terrible pipe because of the finish" The might as well deduce that it's terrible because it's brown.
Anyone on this board who is smoking a rusticated or sandblasted pipe is smoking a pipe that has a hard finish on it. The seem to smoke fine.

 

[jpmcwjr]

Great info. And it helps me with a theory I have been working on, that is: Smoking dryish tobacco to the bottom of the bowl does the max to driving out moisture from the stummel. Those who start with poorly cured briar and leave the bottom of the bowl damp will never turn that pipe into a good smoker. But even with a poorly cured bit of young briar, you can improve the smoking qualities by doing the maximum to drive out moisture. Over time, that young pup will start to sing. At least that's my theory, and personal experience.

 

[sasquatch]

And wet smoking seems to be the cause of pipes that stink when sitting, so there is maybe something to that.

 

[wyfbane]

At least that's my theory, and personal experience.

Sound theory!

 

[sablebrush52]

Many moons ago, British makers used to use a thin coating of gum arabic after staining to slightly smooth out the surface, prior to waxing. There's always been some kind of sealant applied to pipes, except for unfinished pipes. My Nordings have a gloss finish applied, which might be varnish or shellac, I don't know, but they all smoke wonderfully well.

 

[phantomwolf]

Funny I stumbled into this thread right after mentioning how I found the Dr Grabow Color Duke line kind of cool and was considering tracking some down. haha Hot-smoking or not, I still want them.

 

[eduardonogueira]

The reason why your pipe gets too hot has almost nothing to do with pipe finishing, it has more to do with the tobacco you're smoking. Oftentimes, it is related with moisture content and thickness of the bowl. Tobaccos heavily on sugar will tend to be burn hot and moist, whereas tobaccos like Stanwell Sungold will burn cooler and dry, simply because it has less oils and moisture in it. Try to smoke a latakaia, oriental base tobacco, it will burn beautfully! Although I don't really like this branch of tobaccos I must recognize that they will never burn hot like most cavendish based tobaccos. As a rule I would say, thin bowls and cavendish based tobaccos don't like each other

 

[mso489]

High gloss pipes are not the current taste, and I go with the trend toward more subdued finishes, but I have a few high gloss pipes and they smoke fine.

 

[phantomwolf]

You know the more I think about it, it seems strange to think pores on wood being blocked would make a difference in heat transfer. Heat radiates. It wouldn't use pores, simple conduction allows it to pass through the wood. It can move like fluid if a medium is heated and carries the heat like such, but I can't imagine air actually moving from inside the bowl-out via pores in 1/2" of wood. I'd say bowl shape, size, and material determine heat dispersion for the most part and as lots of pipers have said above, smoking cadence and tobacco seem to be the cause for building the excess heat to begin with. Anyway, nice topic thought.

 

[sablebrush52]

but I can't imagine air actually moving from inside the bowl-out via pores in 1/2" of wood.

It very clearly doesn't. We've seen cross sectioned bowls that show little penetration of tobacco oils even after decades of use. The most egregious damage has been fissuring in the lower third of the chamber caused smoking too hot.