Because you asked...for your scoffing pleasure:

My first attempt:



Later attempts:





The darker colored one on the bottom is a horrible smoke. I've smoked the other two more than any of the others I've made.

The poker (the one with a tubular appearance in the middle) has a bit of the natural briar's burl visible and left as sort of an intentional imperfection. I like the appearance of the burl. A lot of Danish carvers leave it across the entire top of their freehands. It is also not stained, just waxed with carnuba and buffed.

Speaking of freehand, these were all shaped with nothing more than hand saws and a dremel tool, and lots of sandpaper. People who make pipes shouldn't be called pipe carvers, they should be called pipe sanders.

WOW Ras!

Are you kidding me here? these look perfect..I love smoking pipe..dont any more..have fought that urge most of my life..My kids bought one of those cigars in a glass to tempt me..he-he..it was part of a birthday gift..had it for years then it disappeared. Well that is my take on this pic..

Sherri

These are great pipes.

What wood are they made of, and what treatment have you given the surface. The first one really look great, and the second one too. It's nice to see that people still enjoy to make their pipes them selves.

The pipes look great.. thank you for posting them.

The wood is briar. The surface is just sanded glass smooth, a stain is applied, then buffed with a flannel wheel and carnuba wax.

They sure are nice. I especially like the carving on the first pibe, really nice shape. And yes, while diggin' in the wikipedia after the briar wood, i found the pipedia site, and a whole lot of links to danish pipecarvers. There are indeed many.

The second pipe, is that what you call birdseye structure in the wood? I think i've heard a danish pipecarver talk about this phenomenon.

Yeah, sort of birdseye. Its a low quality block as far as the grain goes - birdseye is what you see on the cross section of the grain.

I own a Danbard (Danish carver) and like it - I'll likely collect some more of his work.

I appreciate your comments. If they smoked as well as you say they look, I'd be in business.

Here's an example of some nice birdseye on a pipe with some very tight, straight grain.

See how much nicer the grain is on the block this was made from compared to to the briar mine were carved out of? They have to cut up a lot of blocks before running across one this nice. Part of the reason this one is $930.

Well, you're are quite welcome on the comments, i find pipecarving really interesting. It's an art to make a beautiful pipe, but to make a beautiful pipe that smokes well is an art of perfection i guess.

Somehow i've never managed to come across a block of briar, but if i ever do you can be sure that i'll let you know the result.

Making it look nice is the job of an artist. Getting it to smoke well is the job of a physist. Things like shape of the bowl, turbulence in the airway, shape of the airway, relative diameter, and other things effect how it smokes.

You should try to contact a carver there, if you're interested, and ask him if you can watch him make a pipe.

Yeah well, maybe i ought to do that. There's a carver about 2 miles down the road from where i live, but i haven't quite gotten around to knock on his door yet. Maybe i'll have a look some day soon, but you know how it is, if i had a swear jar with to-do notes, it'd be full (not that i cuss that much )