Thanks for the tip on wiping out the bowl. Well I have been using them for about 3 months, no gouges yet. It is a very light scraping action, and you just match the size of the chisel to the radius of the bowl. if you keep the chisel tip in almost the same plane as the chamber wall, it makes it close to impossible to gouge the substrate. Pretty fool proof, but I have been using chisels and files for the past 50 plus years.
I hesitated posting this out of the possibility of concerns such as yours being voiced. But honestly it works so darn well, I had to post.
Why not? You've found something that works well for you. But, as you've pointed out, you're very experienced with these kinds of tools and have developed a sense for how to use them that the average joe hasn't got, and frankly may lack the ability of get.
I've seen so much damage, so many pipes carved out by their owners' mishandling of pipe knives that my preference is to find and exploit less invasive, or technically demanding approaches to dealing with cake. Another popular method restorers use are lengths of doweling of different diameters, one end rounded and covered with some sandpaper and using that to remove cake. It's a gentler approach that doesn't require a lot of skill, just observation.
It's the same thing with buffers. Most people are clueless about how to use one, so they turn pipes into soft lumps. I used buffers professionally for years in making, repairing, and restoring fine jewelry, some of it hundreds of years old, and one develops a knack that most people don't have and frankly will never develop.
