Blowfish and Horned Egg

[jogilli]

Good day

These two are in the final stages of completing.. figured I'd go ahead and post them now instead of later.. never know what the weather will be like when their done..

Comments Welcome as always.. and enjoy the rest of your Sundays

James

[Sasquatch]

James, the carving on the blowfish, on the stummel, is excellent. In fact it's good enough that I'm gonna be real hard on the pipe because it deserves to be better (next time).

The stem placement, angle, and size, are all ... subideal. If you follow the flow of the pipe, the shape of the shank, (I oulined this with a yellow line), you get a completely different angle than what your stem is coming out on. The placement of the stem is high on the shank (you COULD have this angle, but the placement would have to be a half-inch lower on the pipe), and so the net effect is that the lines of the pipe are broken. I have re-drawn this, and I think everyone will immediately see that the pipe looks "correct" suddenly.

If you get away from the idea that the ring on the stem needs to be perpendicular to the stem, the pipe comes alive - in fact, I don't think it's wrong to ask why the same stem belongs on two completely different pipes, and the answer, obviously, is... it doesn't - and in this case, the stem has nothing to do, aesthetically, with either of the pipes it's on.

You're doing a ton of good stuff here - I love the blowfish stummel, love the edge work, the grain - it's terrific. But compositionally, you are not making whole pieces, you are making stummels and stems and simply connecting them with predictable results.

[jogilli]

Sas

Agree with all you said.. the stummel can't be fixed.. maybe I'll work on a new mouthpiece over the next couple of days and reuse the current mouthpiece.

When the pipe was first drilled the angle was greater than it currently is, (done as one piece ) but I misjudged the curve when placing the first brass ring.. and ended up sanding through the bottom of the brass and had to remove it.. along w/the inner briar ring.. sanded down a bit and ended up reducing the airhole/mortise connection point..

I went with a smaller brass ring and it all matched...

I have the next blowfish already laid out and will change some things..

First off the I chose to do a military mount.. (I will do this again) but the end taper is 7mm.. way too small to off set the drilled airhole.. if I would have gone w/a minimum 9mm (end) mortise (or 8 for that matter) I would have had a .5 (8mm) to 1mm (9mm) difference of the airhole and could increase the morise angle..

Also the mortise will have to be on a portion of the curse that isn't so drastic.. allowing placement of the larger brass ring that would be deep enough that it isn't sanded through and has to be removed..

Live and learn..

maybe I'll do the mouthpiece again... the pipes have a week of finishing treatment coming up anyway...

Enjoy your day

james

Here is the pipe before the brass ring mishap

[jogilli]

As much as it pains this Texan to admit a Canadian was correct.. new mouthpiece completed and final pictures taken...

tks for the hint Sas.. now I have to make a pipe for the other mouthpiece









James

[Abi Natur]

Hi James,
looking good, in the second attempt even great,but i like the shape anyhow!

Best,
Abi

[jogilli]

Abi

thanks.... the second shape came out looking great in my mind.. but the original design would have been a kapow moment..

James

[wdteipen]

James, that's a beautiful pipe. Well done. The only thing I see that might improve the overall composition is to shorten the stem a tad. Nice job!

[jogilli]

Wayne

thanks.. I used photoshops filter of charcoal & chalt and now have a new desktop background

james

[jogilli]

and now for the finished version of the canted egg w/horn shank...

tks
james