I haven't made any pipes from scratch yet but plan to in the near future. I have been doing some work on some of my store bought pipes, adding shank extentions, changing the shape, and polishing with carnauba wax. I have noticed that when I polish a pipe with the wax and get a very shiny finish on it that after I smoke it the shiny finish starts to wear away. Is this because I'm not putting enough coats of wax on it ?
Thanks Bill
Carnauba Wax- How Many Coats ?
I believe he doesn't use any. He sands to a very high grit and the wood takes on a shine of it's own. I've done both in the past. It creates a very interesting combo if you use both. The carnuba will bring in it's own shine but when it wears there is still quite a bit of shine left over (from just the wood). You can tell a difference, don't get me wrong. But both are relatively shiney.decee wrote:Yes, please do. What finish material would you use?
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Wax wears off. No way. I believe they have some additives or it is some other sort of material coming from the petrochemial industry when they sell their everyday-pipes declared as »waxed«.
I reached some quite nice sort of shine just polishing the wood of revamped estates (which were completely sanded to the wood before) with coarse and fine buffing agents. I think they are what you call brown tripoli and white compound. It's far from beeing a real glassy shine, but it's even further from beeing matte or semigloss. And it gives a nice smooth and rather natural feel in your hands.
I quite often use pure linseed oil as part of the finishing process. Two issues: It is not neutral as far as the grain contrast is concerned. I tends to fire up the grain all by itself and brings out lot of the reddish briar tone, so using linseed may spoil the lighter tones of a yellowish or orange-toned contrast stain. Oter issue: It's not that easy to handle, since it dries very slowly. If you really use the pure product (without any drying agents), it takes up to seven days, until it doesn't feel that sticky any more. Usual procedure is putting lots of it to the wood, wait 30 minutes, and take every rest still on the wood away with any soft tissue. This must be repeated, until there are no longer any areas, in which there is residue left, but the whole stummel remains shiny and wet. Of course, this last residues have to be taken away, too.
If I leave them drying at hat point, and polish it with a coarse linen buffing wheel, I get some very smooth matte finishes, which I like very much.
I also did the test, and left the last oiling step (with the glossy stummel) to dry. It never seems to dry. It feels sticky even after ten days.
But if I polish those stummels the usual way (brown tr./wh. compound), they reach a state of shine close to the wax.
Even this finish tends to become matte by handling. But it doesn't wear off as the wax does, it just becomes rougher, since it's no lacque. So it is easy to reshine it by means of normal polish, even without a buffing wheel.
I am still experimenting on this pocess, so don't take it as a manual.
If I remember correctly, linseed finishes still leaves the wood breathable, allthough the disussion about the importance of this fact seems to contain a lot of voodoo.
Alex
I reached some quite nice sort of shine just polishing the wood of revamped estates (which were completely sanded to the wood before) with coarse and fine buffing agents. I think they are what you call brown tripoli and white compound. It's far from beeing a real glassy shine, but it's even further from beeing matte or semigloss. And it gives a nice smooth and rather natural feel in your hands.
I quite often use pure linseed oil as part of the finishing process. Two issues: It is not neutral as far as the grain contrast is concerned. I tends to fire up the grain all by itself and brings out lot of the reddish briar tone, so using linseed may spoil the lighter tones of a yellowish or orange-toned contrast stain. Oter issue: It's not that easy to handle, since it dries very slowly. If you really use the pure product (without any drying agents), it takes up to seven days, until it doesn't feel that sticky any more. Usual procedure is putting lots of it to the wood, wait 30 minutes, and take every rest still on the wood away with any soft tissue. This must be repeated, until there are no longer any areas, in which there is residue left, but the whole stummel remains shiny and wet. Of course, this last residues have to be taken away, too.
If I leave them drying at hat point, and polish it with a coarse linen buffing wheel, I get some very smooth matte finishes, which I like very much.
I also did the test, and left the last oiling step (with the glossy stummel) to dry. It never seems to dry. It feels sticky even after ten days.
But if I polish those stummels the usual way (brown tr./wh. compound), they reach a state of shine close to the wax.
Even this finish tends to become matte by handling. But it doesn't wear off as the wax does, it just becomes rougher, since it's no lacque. So it is easy to reshine it by means of normal polish, even without a buffing wheel.
I am still experimenting on this pocess, so don't take it as a manual.
If I remember correctly, linseed finishes still leaves the wood breathable, allthough the disussion about the importance of this fact seems to contain a lot of voodoo.
Alex