I've always just used Everclear, pipe cleaners and Q-tips.... Everyone has their own method, but that works for me
Which Do You Prefer? Salt Or Cotton Balls For Bowl Cleaning?
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Many thanks, pitchfork. I used water on one particularly nasty pipe and noticed no ill effects, but that was before seeing other folks warn about water. Thanks for giving me more insight into the matter.
I also take a lot of tobacco chambers down to bare wood. I go slow and move to progressively finer sand/polishing papers. I would always like to leave cake, but often the cake is so uneven or spotty that I feel going to bare wood is the least bad option. Certainly using a reamer on most of the pipes I clean up is out of the question. One part of the bowl wall would become gouged bare wood while other parts would still have a thick layer of cake.
Back to the subject of water, I have seen old pipe maker catalogs recommend wetting the bowl walls before the first smoke. I wonder if this is still advised by any pipe makers (at least the ones that do not pre-treat their bowls)?
I also take a lot of tobacco chambers down to bare wood. I go slow and move to progressively finer sand/polishing papers. I would always like to leave cake, but often the cake is so uneven or spotty that I feel going to bare wood is the least bad option. Certainly using a reamer on most of the pipes I clean up is out of the question. One part of the bowl wall would become gouged bare wood while other parts would still have a thick layer of cake.
Back to the subject of water, I have seen old pipe maker catalogs recommend wetting the bowl walls before the first smoke. I wonder if this is still advised by any pipe makers (at least the ones that do not pre-treat their bowls)?
I've used the salt treatment for many years with great satisfaction but the cotton ball method is certainly intriguing.
I abandoned both salt and cotton balls in the bowls. (I maintain a very thin carbon cake.)
I found that the foul tastes can be removed by cleaning the shank only.
I found that the foul tastes can be removed by cleaning the shank only.
There is also the ozone treatment offered by Mike at Walker Pipe Repair. Does anyone have any experience with that?
I haven't used Mike yet, but I would in a heartbeat if my own methods fail.
First, all of my estates get at least two or three salt and Everclear treatments. Afterwards we move on to three or four alcohol retorts. And if that giant killer still comes up short I set up my own ozone closet: a room ozone cleaner in our sealed basement bathroom for 24 to 36 hours.
Mike has something equivalent to a hyperbaric chamber that is infinitely more concentrated but maybe not quite as fun as a DIY program. Even then he'd still be my go-to guy if I had to yell calf rope.
Fnord
First, all of my estates get at least two or three salt and Everclear treatments. Afterwards we move on to three or four alcohol retorts. And if that giant killer still comes up short I set up my own ozone closet: a room ozone cleaner in our sealed basement bathroom for 24 to 36 hours.
Mike has something equivalent to a hyperbaric chamber that is infinitely more concentrated but maybe not quite as fun as a DIY program. Even then he'd still be my go-to guy if I had to yell calf rope.
Fnord
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