Smoking Quality

[josh_ford]

I'm sorry if this is a stupid question. I often run across people talking about good smoking quality, which is what we are all trying to achieve, but what are some of the opinions that makes a good smoker and a bad one. What are the technical issues that we should be focussed on mechanically. I understand what I want asthetically but what do I want in the "guts" of the pipe?

Josh

[KurtHuhn]

- good taste
- Uninterupted airflow
- no whistling/turbulence
- smooth draw
- comfortable stem

When combined, all of the above will render a pipe that smokes very well.

[josh_ford]

The good taste, if I'm correct, is merely a function of the brair itself. Is there anything that the maker can do to contribute to a good taste?

Another question is how is the whistling eliminated. I read that on another post but how do you pull that off? Mine always seems to make some noise. Is the smooth draw based on a clear airflow?

I'm sorry for the questions, give me a link to another strand if they answer my questions instead of beating a dead horse. I just can observe what a good pipe looks like but I it's harder to know what the insides look like.

Thanks
Josh

[mahaffy]

Josh, not answering your question, but rather the apology: the only dumb question is the one that isn't asked. Don't apologize for asking --- that's what this board is for! Even questions that have been asked hundreds of times before are good: they make the people with answers think about those answers. Knowing something and not thinking about it --- in any line from philosophy to pipemaking --- is tantamount to losing the knowledge.

[marks]

The good taste, if I'm correct, is merely a function of the brair itself. Is there anything that the maker can do to contribute to a good taste?

Another question is how is the whistling eliminated. I read that on another post but how do you pull that off? Mine always seems to make some noise. Is the smooth draw based on a clear airflow?

I'm sorry for the questions, give me a link to another strand if they answer my questions instead of beating a dead horse. I just can observe what a good pipe looks like but I it's harder to know what the insides look like.

Thanks
Josh

One thing you can do to help ensure a good tasting pipe is to let the briar air after drilling. I think it was Trever who posted somewhere that if you let the briar sit for a month after drilling, it will improve. I will sometimes sit a pipe in a window for several weeks between shaping and finishing.

Regarding the noise in the draw, if you have a clean airway (by that I mean one that has no abrubt transitions or things that can grab the air) you should not have any noise. What I do when making a pipe is to look into the stem airway to ensure that I have a smooth surface all the way through (an LED penlight helps with this). If I get a whistle, I will open up the airway a little more at the button (side to side opening), and that usually takes care of it. I am constantly running a fluffy tapered pipe cleaner into the button, and when it passes easily, I draw on the pipe to check for whistles. If I have none, I am happy. If I have one, I smooth out the inside line a little more. I also sand the airway in the stem to 1000 or 1200 and polish with brown tripoli melted onto a pipe cleaner. The inside is almost as shiny as the outside.

I have one pipe where I really messed up the airflow inside the stem. It was the first handcut stem I made, and the airway through the delrin does not line up exactly with the airway in the stem. I drilled out the delrin and the stem on a drill press, trying to see if I could avoid the cost of a lathe (I bought a lathe immediately after making this pipe). This pipe whistles at me every time I smoke it, but it also smokes dry as a bone. Go figure.

[Tyler]

This is actually not a dumb question, rather a very important one because it is a term that is bandied about as if we all agree on it when in reality I'm not sure that is the case.

To illustrate the point, while Kurt hit on it, he did not use the second most important word in the discussion IMO, illustratin the differences of opinion. That is: a DRY smoke. I would not call a gurgling pipe a good smoker. Kurt, I suspect will agree, as the items he listed are generally the cause of excessive condensate, but I'm surprised he omitted the word. It is actually what I think of first, and so Kurt and I probably think at least a little differently about it.

To address your other question, I am of the opinion that there are more variables to taste than just the briar. While certainly briar is a contibuter (the main one?), if there is less condensate for a given smoke when compared to the same smoke in another pipe of the same briar, it would follow that differing elements are arriving in the mouth because of the condensation (or lack of) changing the chemical make up of the smoke. While this may not affect the flavor of the smoke, it is certainly feesible that it can. Also, taste perception is possibly affected if the temperature of the smoke is different. I could continue to offer theoretical examples, but I think the idea is clear. Of course, the difficulty is the subjectivity of taste, but I think we can be fairly confident in some of the above as factor in taste.

Good question.

Tyler

[RadDavis]

Hey Tyler,

I agree!

I don't care how good a pipe tastes, if it gurgles, it is not an enjoyable smoke for me.

I like a low maintenence smoke.

I want the only reason for me to have to run a cleaner through a pipe during a smoke is to loosen the tobacco if I have gotten it a little tight from tamping.

Rad

[flix]

All,

I'm a new pipe maker also, and have also been smoking pipes for only six months. The first pipe I purchased was a 6mm filter Savinelli. I've tried to use it without filter, with not very good success, it's wet. I also have a Sasieni Oom Paul that gurgles like a son of a gun, wet also.

Now that I'm making pipes, these lessons have been made: don't make a filter or an Oom Paul pipe, they're not going to work well.

My questions: Can either of the pipes above be made so that they work better? Is the Oom Paul a "bad design"/ problematic? Or can Oom Pauls be made without gurgle? Would a new stem "fix" my Savinelli?

I'm now hesitant to make any pipe that isn't either straight or only slightly bent...getting a little gunshy, can't stand that condensate!!!

flix

[KurtHuhn]

To illustrate the point, while Kurt hit on it, he did not use the second most important word in the discussion IMO, illustratin the differences of opinion. That is: a DRY smoke. I would not call a gurgling pipe a good smoker. Kurt, I suspect will agree, as the items he listed are generally the cause of excessive condensate, but I'm surprised he omitted the word. It is actually what I think of first, and so Kurt and I probably think at least a little differently about it.

Absolutely, Tyler. I agree completely. My only excuse is that I occasionally suffer from CRAFT.

Generally speaking, the middle three items will help you attain a dry smoke - though they certainly aren't the only factors. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remember this each time I layout a pipe's airways. So, while I might not think the word "dry", it's never far from my mind. Almost second nature.

And this leads me to a mini-rant that I've been storing up for a few weeks now dealing with the subject of pipe engineering and a thread that was on ASP a while back. A lot of people, some of whom I was surprised to see, really dismissed engineering as a factor in pipe-making, claiming it could be taught, and thus poo-pooed the idea entirely. Needless to say, I do not agree. Putting together a good pipe is far more complex than "just a few holes". What diameter? How good are the transitions? What angles are involved? These are just a tiny set of questions that a pipemaker MUST have answers to when they set out to create a pipe that people will want to *smoke* instead of just look at.

I put a lot of effort into the design of the airway of my pipes, nearly as much as I do into the shape itself. I tend to stress over that most of all. An ugly pipe is just that, and most folks know what they're getting in to when they buy an ugly pipe - since it's readily apparent. A good looking pipe with poor engineering, however, has a giant hidden flaw, masked by its good looks. If that pipe smokes like crap, the owner won't know until the first time it's fired up. And what a disappointment that can turn out to be.

To illustrate, I recently made an all-briar calabash with removable insert for a customer. That pipe took me the equivalent of an entire weekend to make - better than half of it figuring out how to construct the *inside* of the pipe. The outside is easy, cut the lines right, bend this here, shape that, sandblast, etc. The inside, where it really counts, was a major source of stress for me - I made a full scale mockup out of cherry in order to test my theories, and in the process I found a lot of things that could have been disasterous of rendered in the final product. Without that testing, I could have an irate customer instead of one that sang praises for three paragraphs.

You see, engineering really *does* count, and those that discount or forsake it, take their chances with evil gurgling pipes.

[KurtHuhn]

I'm a new pipe maker also, and have also been smoking pipes for only six months. The first pipe I purchased was a 6mm filter Savinelli. I've tried to use it without filter, with not very good success, it's wet. I also have a Sasieni Oom Paul that gurgles like a son of a gun, wet also.

Now that I'm making pipes, these lessons have been made: don't make a filter or an Oom Paul pipe, they're not going to work well.

My questions: Can either of the pipes above be made so that they work better? Is the Oom Paul a "bad design"/ problematic? Or can Oom Pauls be made without gurgle? Would a new stem "fix" my Savinelli?

I almost hesitate to say it, but you may want to examine how you're smoking. That can contribute a great deal to how wet or dry a particular pipe smokes. The only reason I say this is because you mention you haven't been smoking a pipe for very long, and it can take at least that long to really get accustomed to how to go about packing and smoking a pipe.

Like I said, I kind of hesitate to say it, as that's not guarantee of the cause.

That said, and boot ready to be placed in mouth, the answer to whether an Oom Paul can be made to smoke dry is yes. I've made a number of steeply bent pipes that all smoke well. The secret is to be sure that the smoke travels in as consistent a path as possible.

[RadDavis]

A lot of people, some of whom I was surprised to see, really dismissed engineering as a factor in pipe-making, claiming it could be taught, and thus poo-pooed the idea entirely.

Hi Kurt,

Engineering as a factor in pipe making was neither dismissed nor poo-pooed in that thread on ASP.

Rather, the term "engineering" was poo-pooed. Von Erck said he preferred the term craftsmanship, and I agree with him wholeheartedly.

Engineering, to me, implies the use of a bunch of mathematics and formulas and such. Craftsmanship is nothing more than drilling your holes properly where they meet dead center on the bottom with a smooth transition from draft hole to button and with no restrictions anywhere along the way, thus ensuring a dry smoke.

And it absolutely can be taught. It was taught to me.

Rad

[josh_ford]

So what I'm gathering here is that if there are no kinks in the airway and it is smooth, especially in the potentially problamatic bit, the pipe will smoke pretty well? I know that is super over simplified and much harder to actually accomplish but I just don't want to miss anything.

Josh

[ScoJo]

As a chemical engineer by trade, I am completely with Rad on this one. The stuff we are talking about here is not engineering. I'd call it "mechanics", but then someone on here is probably a mechanic and that would make them angry...

[ArtGuy]

I would like to say that contrary to popular belief, aesthetics can be taught too, even to engineers.

[achduliebe]

well that would depend on what kind of engineer. 8O

[KurtHuhn]

Hi Kurt,

Engineering as a factor in pipe making was neither dismissed nor poo-pooed in that thread on ASP.

Rather, the term "engineering" was poo-pooed. Von Erck said he preferred the term craftsmanship, and I agree with him wholeheartedly.

I misunderstood the intent, then. Though, I can't say that I agree on that intent either. I suppose it's a matter of language - which will vary from person to person. I think the term "engineering" does do the activity justice, since you really have to think in the physical sense about how fluid dynamics works.

Or maybe I'm just to young to really appreciate the term "craftsmanship".

[ScoJo]

I would like to say that contrary to popular belief, aesthetics can be taught too, even to engineers.

John's going to have to work with me a lot more before I actually buy that statement.

Engineers do like I do yesterday - start a pipe with a particular thing in mind aesthetically, screw it up near the beginning, then sit and stare at it for a while trying to figure out what the heck to do with it.

Or maybe that's just me...

I wish I had a dollar for every time I was working on a pipe and thought "I hate the looks of this pipe, but I have no idea exactly WHY."

[ScoJo]

Hey Nick, did you ever read my lunch hour paper on pipe engineering?

[bvartist]

Engineers do like I do yesterday - start a pipe with a particular thing in mind aesthetically, screw it up near the beginning, then sit and stare at it for a while trying to figure out what the heck to do with it.

Where'd you find an engineer that would actually "start" something?
Every engineer I've ever worked with usually just drew the things up and then let us "mechanics" and "craftsmen" do the actual work on it.

Reguardless of the words used, we all strive to produce the perfect or near perfect smoking pipe, whether or not we call ourselves craftsmen or engineers, the result is the same. I am a little of both, and not ashamed to say it! And definitely old enough to know what the term craftsmanship means!

[alexanderfrese]

Besides the question wether the engineer ever starts something, all my experience with engineers is that they hardly ever start something to achieve a goal that would even come close to a semantic remembrance of the word "aesthetics".
Don't get me wrong, there is beauty within every thing that works fine, I even tend to call every smooth running process "elegant" but I have worked long years in graphic design for engineers, and aesthetics was always last…



Craftmanship or engineering? For my point of view there is one idea: The craftsman does something because he knows it works. He knows it because it has been tried and true for decades – or even longer. Sometimes he will try to alter things and – if he succeeds – add this experience to the ever flowing stream of the tradition of his skills.
Pros: They don't work against the nature of things.
Issues: This way it takes lifes to invent new things.

The engineer does ist, because his calculation (drawing, thinking, etc.) tells him so.
Pros: Every second of an engineer might bring up something new.
Issues: If his figures tell him so, he will try to let the earth revolve the other way round.
Minor Issue: There is a big chance that the engineer might reinvent some knowlegde that was already there before – though it was not founded in some figures before, but in tradition.

The way to go: There is some chance of improvement, if the craftsman, the engineer and the artist manage to get down from their ivory towers to work together.
May that be three people, may it be all in one person…