Purchased this lightly used Kaywoodie Saxon

[Bivymack]

Found it at an estate sale for $12, was in the market for a beat around pipe and this was in great condition compared to many other used pipes I’ve seen. Can’t find much information about this pipe, and can’t find this exact make anywhere with this style of stem. Anyone got any insight?

 

[mso489]

I think the Saxon series still includes pot shapes, and most of the pipes in the series cost about forty bucks. I have a billiard, a billiard panel, and a pot panel, and they are fine smokers. The bowls are sufficient, and the walls are fairly thin, making for light weight, but they insulate very well and are never hot to handle. According to a Forums member, the whole line of Kaywoodie, Medico, and Yello-Bole are turned out mostly by one man, Bill Feurbach, in a 15,000 sq. ft. factory, which must include a lot of storage. Despite the machinery, that sounds like an artisan (one-man) operation to me.

 

[Bivymack]

Thanks for the info! Sounds like I got a decent deal hand crafted by the artisan himself. And thanks for welcoming me to the forums the other day.

 

[wyfbane]

Nice looking pipe for a really good price. I am alway happy for our folks here when they get a great deal at yard sales, estate sales, and such. It's like rescuing an animal from the pound. If one of us don't buy it, it'll likely get put down. lol

 

[kcghost]

It's a nice looking pipe and should serve you well in the future.

 

[Briar Lee]

Sometime in the seventies Kaywoodie dropped the famous ball stinger and screw stem, and made cheap push stem, sand blasted, nylon stemmed, polyethylene coated pipes like that Saxon.

Lee also dropped the screw stem, but retained all the same briar quality and the removable Lee stinger still fits the high grade vulcanite push stems, and the last Lee, was polished smooth, oil cured and oil finished.

Of course you can still buy a new Kaywoodie, which will be an order of magnitude better constructed than an old Saxon.

I own an old Kaywoodie Magnum from the early seventies (still had the ball and screw stem) to remind me that quality pipes indeed do smoke a lot better, than low quality pipes.

But you might have hit the jackpot, it’s impossible to know.

But the odds are the reason it survived in such nice shape is, it was a nasty, hot, horrible smoker.

 

[mso489]

I have one of the old screw-in stem and stinger Ruff-Tone Drinkless series which I bought new. They no longer make them with the screw-in feature, only push-in stems. I thought this old dog might be hard to clean, etc. To the contrary, the stinger/stem clean in seconds. As a bonus, the old gray-brown matte finish after several years has bloomed into a reddish undertone with a high polish. Who knew? It's kind of spooky; the pipe has become an adult.