The Brigham System has been on the market since 1938 when it was patented by Roy Brigham in Toronto, Canada. The original system consisted of a long aluminum tenon/filter holder into which fit a tube of untreated Rock Maple, which absorbed moisture from the smoke stream as it passed through the stem. Pipes from this… Continue reading A New System Stem for a Patent Era Brigham 229 Author
Working with translucent or transparent pipe stems can be a real test of patience and skill. As everything is (almost painfully) visible, there is no margin for error when drilling, shaping or slotting Perspex (aka clear acrylic). To complicate matters further, cleaning clear acrylic with alcohol can lead to the formation of cracks inside the… Continue reading The Trials of Perspex – A New Stem for a French C.G.T. Elite
The Bavarian style long pipe is an iconic and historical piece of pipe history, bringing to mind long evenings by the fire, perhaps with a good book. In North America, at least, the style tends to be an outlier of sorts - you just don't see people sitting at a park bench smoking a two-foot-long… Continue reading Repairing an Acrylic Mouthpiece on a Vauen Enzian 4 Bavarian-Style Pipe
The Gourd Calabash pipe, in its current form with gourd body, rubber stem and meerschaum or clay bowl, has been around since the Second Boer War in South Africa (1899-1902). According to this article on smokingpipes.com, the war led to shortages of briar in Cape Town, pushing pipe makers to find an alternative material. Gourds… Continue reading Major Restorations for an Early 20th Century HBB Gourd Calabash
In the tobacco pipe world, pipe shops can usually be divided into two camps - those that make pipes and those that repair/restore pipes. It is somewhat counterintuitive, but these two activities are very different and require different skill sets and different equipment. I've been repairing and restoring smoking pipes since 2014 but have never… Continue reading And Now For Something Completely Different – Carving my First Hobby Block
Smoking pipes have traditionally been made from only a handful of materials - clay and meerschaum originally, then briar and an assortment of fruit woods like cherry and pear. Most recently, Bog Oak, also called Morta, has entered the fray. So what exactly is Bog Oak? Bog Oak/Morta is semi-petrified oak that has lain under… Continue reading Pinning Multiple Cracks in an Otherwise Lovely Rattray’s Bog Oak (Morta) Pipe
This is the second heirloom pipe send to me for work, along with the Medico Square Pot about which I wrote last time. This time I'm working on an LL Bean Bent Billiard fitted with an interesting Smokemaster filter system first produced by Briarcraft in the USA in the early 210th Century, and again later… Continue reading Tenon and Stem Repair for an Interesting LL Bean Bent Billiard
It's that time of year again! This Sunday, 20 Feb 2022, is International Pipe Smoking Day and to celebrate, DadsPipes is pleased to offer 15% OFF ALL PIPES & ACCESSORIES Sale prices in effect from Midnight (00:00) Eastern Time Friday Feb 18 through to 8pm (20:00) Eastern on Sunday Feb 20. Grab your IPSD 2022… Continue reading IPSD 2022 Weekend Sale!
Often when we think of family heirloom pipes what comes to mind is Grandpa's collection of Patent-Era Dunhills or a complete set of Peterson Sherlock Holmes pipes, but the truth is that the vast majority of pipes sold during the Golden Age of pipe smoking (roughly the 1950s through to the 1970s) were relatively inexpensive,… Continue reading Rebirth of an Inherited Medico VFQ Foursquare Pot
It's that time of year again, with all the wonder, joy, kindness, caring, stress, anxiety, loneliness and yes, even loss that comes with it. Moreover, it is another COVID Christmas, which adds another, less welcome, dimension to the 2021 Holiday season. Here at DadsPipes, as in many places across Canada and around the world, local… Continue reading Merry Christmas from DadsPipes
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