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I'm on my 3rd pipe, 2nd time drilling my own and my first bent.

I just faced the shank relative to the air hole rather than the tenon and now the stem is (of course) not sitting flush. I am hoping I can still correct this on the drill press.

My plan is to line up a forster bit using the long axis of a 10" piece of delrin tenon inserted in the mortice as a guide, and then just re-face the shank.

Any other brilliant ideas before i do this?

If you haven't drilled the mortise yet just re-face when you drill it as long as you have enough length. If not an option maybe try to make it more like a freehand so you don't need a flush fit stem.

mortice is drilled
Its my first attempt at a bulldog so I don't want to pop a freehand stem in there....

Well maybe try putting the delrin in the mortise, chucking the delrin into the drill press chuck so you can clamp the stummel to the table with the mortise aligned with the quill. Then remove the delrin and replace with a Forstner bit to drill perpendicular to the mortise. It will likely be close but not perfect. Be careful and go slow with the Forstner as it could catch and do more harm than good when drilling on an angled piece. Make sure the stummel is clamped very well and the clamp holding the stummel is tight to the table.

Delrin isn't going to get you where you need to be for a flush fit. It's too flexible. For carpentry, they say measure twice, cut once. For pipe making, I say drill right the first time.

However, you may have a shot at proper facing if you line up everything as close as possible and them drill out the mortise with the next size drill bit and the forstner bit. Short of that, just set it aside until you have access to a lathe and face the stummel with a pin gage in the mortise.

Your only other option is to use sandpaper on a flat surface and face it by hand. That will probably take you a couple hours to get right.

calsbeek wrote:I'm on my 3rd pipe, 2nd time drilling my own and my first bent.

I just faced the shank relative to the air hole rather than the tenon and now the stem is (of course) not sitting flush. I am hoping I can still correct this on the drill press.

My plan is to line up a forster bit using the long axis of a 10" piece of delrin tenon inserted in the mortice as a guide, and then just re-face the shank.

Any other brilliant ideas before i do this?

What tools are you using?

I'm using a drill press and a forster bit, dremel, sandpaper, files, rasps.

I have access to a metal lathe, but it has a six jaw chuck that won't hold a block of briar well enough to use reliably.

The right way to do this is to find a rod that fits the mortise snug, chuck that in the metal lathe and use it as "center", and re-cut the face of the shank on the pipe that way.


On a drill press, your idea if I understand it, is actually similar - chuck a rod of some kind in the press, hang the pipe from it, using the mortise as a guideline, then freeze the pipe in position in the vice, and swap over to a forstner and mill the shank end that way. It won't be perfect but it's worth a try.

Really what this all does is help you develop a step-by-step method where this crap doesn't happen. Face the shank, then drill the mortise.

So here's how it turned out: not perfect, but passable for where I am I suppose.
Lesson learned.

back to shaping (and now trying to figure out how to cut rings without the lathe)

You can still tweak the fit with sandpaper (I'd use 600 or 1000 grit) on a hard, flat surface by hand. Just take your time and you can eliminate any and all light gaps using light pressure with the shank face flat against the sandpaper.

Sasquatch wrote:...[position by hanging from a chucked rod] then freeze the pipe in position in the vice...

Except for that niggly "real-world implementation of the idea" detail at the end, that oughta work!

Yeah I give the whole operation about a 70/30 chance of going skewiff.

Hey thanks for the vote of confidence guys.

It's not a vote of anything dude, chill out.

You don't have proper tooling, you screwed up your order of operations, needed a rescue, and you managed it not bad by the looks of things. It's a win.

But understand that to most of us here the tiniest pin-prick of a light gap is unacceptable, the tiniest bit of angle change in the mortise (from original design)... these things make us hate our pipes, sometimes they ruin pipes. We try real hard not to have this stuff happen! That forstner could have grabbed, gobbled, thrown and totally wrecked the pipe, but it didn't, so great!

Totally chill.
I was kidding....emoticons just don't convey sarcasm like they used to.


I've read enough on this forum to feel totally humble about my operation and my production. I appreciate all the advice and the criticism. I'm sure this pipe will get absolutely torn apart when I post its finished version, and thats great, I'll learn to improve. But I'm already pleased with the small victory of correcting an error.

cheers
Ryan