Question for you all. I'm going to have to redo the stem on the large freehand with the natural face seen here:
When making the stem, the bamboo/stummel joint seemed much tighter than the bamboo stem joint, so being the bright guy I am, I decided to glue the stem into the bamboo, and use the bamboo/stummel joint as the one where you can separate the pipe. However, the bamboo/stummel joint has become much looser of late. Not sure why really. Perhaps the copper tennin has worn away some of the wood or perhaps the metal has gotten contracted or bent. So here's my delema: Do I chuck the whole stem, and start anew, making some sort of vulcanite insert for the bamboo which the stem would fit into? Or do I try and cut the copper and work some sort of vulcanite tennon to insert into the piping?
Additionally, do you all think the pipe would look better with more bamboo on and less plastic on the stem? Or is the current look OK?
Hey Nick, I had the exact same problem with the bamboo I made. If you look in my gallery, you can see the "before and after" pictures of mine. I did as you are stating and made it so that it could be taken apart from both places for ease of cleaning. I know most people do not keep 8" pipe cleaners on hand, so I made it so that you could use the shorter 6" cleaners. I do love the look of that pipe though, I think it will be wonderful when finished.
One of the reasons to permanently affix the shank/bowl joint on a bamboo is because removal and replacement of the tenon over and over will make the joint week. As for the stem shank joint, you should always try to use a ring to reinvorce the bamboo. The bamboo is not strong enough in itself to take the insertion and removal of a tenon numerous times without giving way and creating a wobbly joint. You should turn down a small tenon on the stem end of the bamboo and then slide a vulcanite ring over it. This reinforces the bamboo and doesn't allow it to flex when the tenon is inserted.
As your current perdicament stands, I would suggest the following. If you pass the last 1/2" of the stem over an alcahol burner, bringing it up to the temperature where it would naturally be flexible, (that is the end where it joins the shank) you should be able to simply remove the stem from the brass tenon, leaving it inserted in the bamboo. You could then make another stem that would attach to the bamboo using a reverse mortise/tenon setup. This is actually not uncommon with bamboo pieces. I do it on very delicate pieces sometimes.
FWIW, I do think the pipe would benefit from a longer, if not larger, piece of bamboo. It looks like it has a fair amount of heft to it presently and seems a bit top heavy.
If anybody else has specific questions about working with bamboo, don't hesitate to ask. I use it a *lot* and have performed every type of expirament with it you can possibly imagine. Hope this is helpful.
I'm thinking about drilling a hole in a large piece of bamboo, turning a briar shank, and attaching a super-ultem 4000 stem. Will the bamboo be heat resistent enough to smoke tobacco in it, or should I line it with cork? 8O
Well, I did a good bit of thinking on this. The longer bamboo just didn't look right. Not how I envisioned it. (I did alot of cut and paste in MSPaint...hehehe) Not bad, per se, but not what I was looking for. I finally figured out what it was I was looking for. The look I was going for was more the shank extensions made from bone or horn with the fancy stem. So I called up Tim West who live here in Columbus - don't know why I haven't talked to him yet dduuuhh Nick - and asked if he could turn me up such an extension. Well I'm heading out to his shop over lunch tommorow - looks like it might run long, drat! - to see what we can work up. Too much fun.
