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Show us your homemade pipes!

CowboyTed

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I'm curious to see other people's pipemaking experiments. SHow us your first pipe, failed attempts, interesting experiments, odd wood choices or stems. If you made a pipe or even part of a pipe, feel free to show us pictures here.

I tend to like pipes (and cars and motorcycles) that are slightly out of the norm. I find myself modifying estate pipes to experiment with variations on designs, and when I started making pipes from scratch, I found myself making designs that were close to classic styles, but just different enough to make people look again to figure out what's odd.

This is not my first pipe or my latest, but it does stand out as the one I'm most proud of so far. The bowl is made from a Russian Olive burl that I hand in "growing". My grandfather cut down the tree in his yard in Wyoming in the mid seventies, but the stump refused to die. It kept sending up shoots, and I mowed over those shoots for years as I mowed the lawn around the stump. The constant irritation to the tree slowly formed a burl, roughly six inches thick and two feet in diameter. When it finally died and dried out, I harvested the burl.

I made this pipe as a variation of the classic bulldog/Rhodesian shapes. I added a chunk of deer antler as a shank extension. I lined the shank with a brass tube that both reinforces the shank and acts as the mortise to accommodate the stem. The stem is pearlescent acrylic, cut from a pen blank, with a Peterson style P-lip bit. The metal discs on the shank are sterling silver.

I also made him a pipe tamper from the same wood. It's hollow and has a three inch stem cleaning tool hidden inside. The tamping "foot" is sterling silver, and the knurled nut at the top is brass. The nut threads into a hidden threaded fitting in the wooden shaft, to fasten the hidden stem cleaning tool inside. The tool inside is made from a stainless bicycle spoke.

I give my buddy TJ credit for these great photos that make the pipe look even better.

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Charly

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Congratulations, you made a really nice pipe !
As you mentionned, it has some unconventional shape, but it seems to be well crafted.
 

wooda2008

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I used to make some rustic cherry pipes when I had easy access to a drill press.

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greenmonster714

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Leftynick

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My first homemade wood pipe. This is made from Tembusu wood, popular wood in my country to make cutting board, spoon, ladle and bowl with. I am thinking it is suitable because the wood used widely in food preparation. However the wood are not really tough as i already develop several hairline cracks before I even fully break in the pipe. I will continue to smoke this pipe as benchmark, as I still have plenty of tembusu wood and planning to make more pipe with it.
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crack on the mortise. This one is my fault, I pull off the stem immediately after smoking while it is hot.
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another cracking. It is getting bigger after each smoke.

I used instant coffee as stain and seal the wood using a mix of beeswax and cooking oil. The stem are made with same wood and the whole pipe carved using regular saw, chisel and wood file. The only power tool I use were my fathers chordless drill to drill the tobacco chamber and draft hole. Not the best looking but I am proud of it
 

ChinaVoodoo

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View attachment 20835
View attachment 20836

My first homemade wood pipe. This is made from Tembusu wood, popular wood in my country to make cutting board, spoon, ladle and bowl with. I am thinking it is suitable because the wood used widely in food preparation. However the wood are not really tough as i already develop several hairline cracks before I even fully break in the pipe. I will continue to smoke this pipe as benchmark, as I still have plenty of tembusu wood and planning to make more pipe with it.
View attachment 20837
crack on the mortise. This one is my fault, I pull off the stem immediately after smoking while it is hot.
View attachment 20838
another cracking. It is getting bigger after each smoke.

I used instant coffee as stain and seal the wood using a mix of beeswax and cooking oil. The stem are made with same wood and the whole pipe carved using regular saw, chisel and wood file. The only power tool I use were my fathers chordless drill to drill the tobacco chamber and draft hole. Not the best looking but I am proud of it

Maybe see if you can find Buxus cochinchinensis. I read that at one time, before pipe makers used briar, boxwood was the wood of choice for pipes.
 

deluxestogie

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That is a cute little pipe, and unique.

I believe that the cracking of the pipe bowl is because the grain of the wood is at a right angle to the main bore. Or it may be that the wood was not fully cured yet. Heartwood is denser than layers further out, and shrinks less as the wood cures and dries.

Bob
 

Leftynick

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That is a cute little pipe, and unique.

I believe that the cracking of the pipe bowl is because the grain of the wood is at a right angle to the main bore. Or it may be that the wood was not fully cured yet. Heartwood is denser than layers further out, and shrinks less as the wood cures and dries.

Bob

My father gave me that wood and he stored it in his storeroom for almost 5 years before giving it to me. So i think it should be dry enough. But I am not sure because I never dry wood before. I made my guitar with only few month of drying the wood in the sun.

I think it is because of the grain. I tried to match the grain to give more strength to the stem joint. I receive the wood it is cut sectionally rather than made into lumber so I have to improvise. I will see my other pipe made with the same wood if it has the same problem.
Nice homemade pipe Lefty. What other hard woods are available in your area?
there are many hardwood in my area. But tropical hardwood usually have many toxic material that can be released into fumes when made as pipe. So I have to choose carefully. My local pipe crafter favorite wood are tamarind heartwood and balau (shorea sp.) I used balau for my first guitar and it is really hard and heavy, it dulls my saw. Now I regret for not saving some of the leftover wood. Currently I am drying some rose apple wood I got from my uncle to experiment with. It is supposed to have same quality as cherry wood.

Maybe see if you can find Buxus cochinchinensis. I read that at one time, before pipe makers used briar, boxwood was the wood of choice for pipes.

thank you. I will try to find some. It seems to have limited information on the species in the internet.
 

deluxestogie

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Sitter CornCob Pipe

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This pipe (almost completed) is made from one of the massive Boone County corn ears that BigBonner sent to me. The top of the bowl is the slightly flared bottom of the cob. With a 10" bamboo stem, the entire pipe weighs not much more than the stem and its bit. It's just light as a feather. Other than shelling the kernels off the cob, which I did last winter, this has consumed about 90 minutes of effort.

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My segment of bamboo is from a set of untreated, bamboo tomato stakes. This is the small end. Although bamboo is hollow, there is a rigid partition at each node. I was unable to punch through them with a metal rod, so the final length of the bit was determined by the length of my drill bits. The segment could have only two nodes, and each node had to be close enough to its respective end to allow my hand-drill to bore the partition. So a 10" stem is what I got.

[It is possible to bend bamboo, but it requires many hours of steaming, plus torch heat while bending the sand-filled bamboo, and a jig that can hold the bend in place overnight. It might be worth the effort for a dozen or more stems, but not for a single stem.]

I used the same hand-drill to bore pilot holes for the tobacco hole and the angled smoke hole. Taking a wild guess about the final center of gravity, I sawed the bottom at an angle that would allow the pipe, both empty and packed with tobacco, to stand on its own.

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To provide a more friendly bit to the stem, I added a small section of Tygon tubing (conveniently curved from its coil). It's just slipped snugly over the bamboo.

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Using a hand-held, electric Dremel, I shaped the smoke hole to fit the base of the bamboo stem, which was then gently hammered into the cob. Despite careful shaping, the irregular structure of the cob still allowed an air leak at the stem base. I eliminated the leak with a seal of colorless Silicone Cement on the exterior.

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Had this pipe been a more reasonable length, it would now be finished. But alas, Dremel bits are just too short to complete the interior of the bowl all the way to the bottom of the pilot hole. I still have about 3/4" to go. I couldn't locate my narrow rat-tail file, so I'll have to either search for it again, or purchase a new one.

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I've had the materials to make this pipe for a long time. Youn inspired me to begin. So, thank you, Youn, and thank you BigBonner.

Some time next year, I will have a serious look at the corncobs I grew this past season.

Bob
 

Youn

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Nice pipe!
Glad to have awakened this project :)

I note the trick for a friendly bit and the sloped foot of the cob.
 
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