When buying a new/Old estate pipe, a clean pipe should smoke sweeter where you can enjoy the flavor of the tobacco you're smoking and the pipe. I've heard of the salt and alcohol method and before that I guess you ream as best you can leaving a thin layer of cake? I've never done this With the salt and 40 proof vodka?
What's your experience in this?
Do I leave a pipe cleaner soaked in alcohol overnight in it to?
Here's what I just bought from England one is a Peterson (KP ) the other is a Hardcastle Camden I have already reamed.[
I want to clean them up so they smoke as well as possible. what is your advise? also what would you do, with that Burn on the Peterson KP
Personally I remove as much of the previous owner's cake as possible with a reamer and sandpaper before I smoke an estate. Not into keeping an old cake that may be penetrated with who knows what from the 70s.
I ream as much cake as possible, then Everclear 151 (or higher, if available)/salt treatment - at least twice. I have a pipe that I've done three times and the ghost still haunts it. Makes me wonder what was smoked in it.
I have never done the salt treatment on a pipe, but I probably could have. I doubt my results would have been any better than how I usually clean and deghost an estate. The most I do with any estate is to sanitize it inside and out and to ream the bowl back to the briar. For my cleaning I like to use Everclear or a high proof bourbon.
If a ghost persists after sanitizing , an old timey Burley is called for. Just load that pipe up with Prince Albert or Carter Hall and smoke it out. Those Burley tobaccos will bring a ghost to its knees after several bowls in my experience.
I’m with these guys who want to get rid of all the old cake. I don’t know what that cake is or what the other guy smoke before but I just don’t want it in there. Ream it back to wood. I clean the internals with the high proof alcohol. For the stem and shank I soak pipe cleaners with the booze and run them through till no color shows up on them. If the shank is really stubborn in coming clean, I’ll use a 4/32 inch drill bit, twisted by hand, and just drill out the shank. I like a 4/32 airway anyway. That gunk can be pretty thick in there and you’ll never clean it out with just pipe cleaners in some pipes.
After reaming the bowl, I just soak soft cloth with the alcohol and swab out the bowl until it’s clean. As far as sterilizing the stem that high proof alcohol takes care of any germs or whatever may be left from the last guy. That’s how I do it anyway.
I never hesitate to buy and work on restoring old estate pipes. Making a silk purse from a sow's ear, is fun. Plan on making some charcoal dust.
The stem/mortise:
Scrub, clean, scour, the stem with scrubby pipe-cleaners, and high-proof alcohol Ditto: the mortise area. Get every bit of tar and residue out, down to clean wood. After internally cleaning the stem, tackle the outside by sanding away any deep scratches with fine sandpaper and make sure the button area is clean and without any residue. Coarse grit sandpapers will leave scratches that will have to be sanded/polished out. Finer grits while less aggressive will do the job with less work. If the stem is made from Vulcanite, DON'T wash the stem in hot water. Use cool water or the stem might get cloudy. Suck air through the freshly cleaned stem. You should taste nothing but air. If you taste anything...the stem is not yet clean. Buff and polish the stem.
The bowl:
I sand away almost all the old cake and then thoroughly clean out the smoke hole and tobacco chamber. If there are scratches, dents, etc, in the briar surface, lightly sand them away with fine-grit sandpaper. Polish the briar and assemble the pipe. Load it and smoke it. The pipe should taste fresh, and pray the briar didn't soak up any perfume/cologne. Sometimes pefumey-ghosts only show up when pipe is smoked and the briar is heated. Perfume ghosts can continue to haunt, and can be very difficult to remove. Pipe-Restorers who use Ozone to clean and disinfect pipes, can, most likely, remove any remaining perfume stink -if all else fails.
I have never done the salt treatment. I ream everything out of the bowl that I can, and use a bunch of pipe cleaners dipped in Everclear until the shank is all clean. The final step if there is a persistent ghost is binge smoking strong burley like OJK or 5 Bros in the estate. That will get the remnants of ghost out and you will get a good start with the recaking process.
I had a Grabow pot once that had probably never been reamed, and it had been smoked with (I claim) Captain Black until the bore was about the size of a pencil and the shank was almost gunked shut. That one took forever to get ready, and even after probably 30 bowls in it, I still got a whiff of Captain Black at thee bottom of the bowl.
"Prov'dence don't fire no blank ca'tridges, boys" Roughing It, Mark Twain
Kevin Keith and Fr_Tom have the same methods I use and it works pretty darn good. I did try the salt treatment several times with sea salt and Everclear. It didn't seem to do any better than the Everclear and lots of pipe cleaners. Careful with the Everclear....it can remove the finish. Take the cake down to wood and scrub the heck out of the stem and shank as said before. If you leave any cake in the bowl you may never entirely get rid of a ghost, especially if Lakelands or any other highly scented tobacco, like Mixture 79 for instance, has been smoked in the pipe for any length of time. A few bowls of strong burley is the next step. I prefer Five Brothers but any will do. Lakeland scent can be a real bear. Even with the best of cleanings it sometimes pops up, usually at the end of a bowl like Fr_Tom's Captain Black spook. Mixture 79 clings like the IRS after unpaid taxes. Lets hope your pipes belonged to a Virginia or burley smoker. Good luck!
Great , answers and advice . I will look for Everclear at the liquor store. I haven't seen it around in my neighborhood. It sounds dangerous to drink!
What is it like with grapefruit juice? I mean not for the pipe , for a cocktail?? there will be so much left over from bottle . I only have five pipes. I drink an Icelandic vodka but it's only 40 proof.
I'm going to buy the drill bit. It sounds like an efficient method, turned by hand.I have a British Buttner reamer . it does an ok job what do you use for reaming ? I found a small sharp knife that seamed to help the last reaming experiment I did .
So it doesn't seam the salt treatment is necessary . Is that the case ?
Alex wrote: ↑Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:22 pm
Great , answers and advice . I will look for Everclear at the liquor store. I haven't seen it around in my neighborhood. It sounds dangerous to drink!
What is it like with grapefruit juice? I mean not for the pipe , for a cocktail?? there will be so much left over from bottle . I only have five pipes. I drink an Icelandic vodka but it's only 40 proof.
I'm going to buy the drill bit. It sounds like an efficient method, turned by hand.I have a British Buttner reamer . it does an ok job what do you use for reaming ? I found a small sharp knife that seamed to help the last reaming experiment I did .
So it doesn't seam the salt treatment is necessary . Is that the case ?
So, in my humble opinion, Everclear at 190P is more useful as a wood cleaner than a beverage. Can't remember what the drink was called, but had Everclear mixed with grape juice at a party once in the early 90s. *Red Solo cups and wondering if I would make it home alive*
The only reaming kit I've ever been happy with is the Decatur T-handle set. It is strong - no fiddly parts or springs, and you can really grind at old hard carbon with it.
The salt & vinegar method does work relatively well (I've done it many times) but high end pipe restorers worry about salt getting into the briar and, I am sure, just don't have time for it. I have heard stories from friends about pipes with ghosts that resisted 3 or 4 salt & vinegar treatment cycles, but suspect that the stem and shank may have been the real culprit. People get all busy with the bowl, but if that stem and shank aren't diligently cleaned, the pipe will still taste like old cherry/perfume/hashish, etc.
Alex wrote: ↑Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:22 pm
Great , answers and advice . I will look for Everclear at the liquor store. I haven't seen it around in my neighborhood. It sounds dangerous to drink!
What is it like with grapefruit juice? I mean not for the pipe , for a cocktail?? there will be so much left over from bottle . I only have five pipes. I drink an Icelandic vodka but it's only 40 proof.
I'm going to buy the drill bit. It sounds like an efficient method, turned by hand.I have a British Buttner reamer . it does an ok job what do you use for reaming ? I found a small sharp knife that seamed to help the last reaming experiment I did .
So it doesn't seam the salt treatment is necessary . Is that the case ?
So, in my humble opinion, Everclear at 190P is more useful as a wood cleaner than a beverage. Can't remember what the drink was called, but had Everclear mixed with grape juice at a party once in the early 90s. *Red Solo cups and wondering if I would make it home alive*
The only reaming kit I've ever been happy with is the Decatur T-handle set. It is strong - no fiddly parts or springs, and you can really grind at old hard carbon with it.
The salt & vinegar method does work relatively well (I've done it many times) but high end pipe restorers worry about salt getting into the briar and, I am sure, just don't have time for it. I have heard stories from friends about pipes with ghosts that resisted 3 or 4 salt & vinegar treatment cycles, but suspect that the stem and shank may have been the real culprit. People get all busy with the bowl, but if that stem and shank aren't diligently cleaned, the pipe will still taste like old cherry/perfume/piss, etc.
Everclear is the main ingredient in a popular (at least in my memory) drink known as jungle juice.
I put one of those decatur reamers in the box pass!
"Good enough" is a false idol. Beware those that preach its virtue.
