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Wow, that's really nice. Normally, I'm not too fond of the look of olive, but this one works for me. The grain flows well on the nice clean shaping and a good shine on the finish. Most olive wood pipes I've seen are lumpy and matte.

But the real point of interest is the shank cap and stem. Did you hand-shape the "p-lip" or is it a pre-mold. How did you do the cap? How about the military style mortise? Do you have a special bit? How did you shape the "tenon" to match?

Nice, Olivier! Did you use shellac, or maybe varnish on this one?

First of all, thanks The stem is a Savinelli prefab. Darn expensive but worth it imo. Decent stems are difficult to come by on the dark continent. The cap is handmade from alluminium. I copied the standard Savinelli system so the pipe uses the 6mm filter (if wanted of course). The Finish is Nitro cellulose varnish which I understand is banned in the US. According to the manufacturer, water resistant, abbrasion resistant and heat resistant. I actually tested the stuff for heat resistance with a blow torch and managed to burn the wood underneath the coating without visible damage to the coating itself. Remarkable, but I'm not completely satisfied so I will be running a few more tests.

Nitrocellulose lacquer isn't necessary banned in the U.S., but it is restricted. You can still get it, you just have to hunt it down in specialty stores that cater to woodworkers or metalworkers. Large manufacturers (like car companies) stopped using it to avoid governmental interference and lawsuits from employees.

Oversized Ostrogoth wrote:Nitrocellulose lacquer isn't necessary banned in the U.S., but it is restricted.

Now you have me curious. What's so dangerous about the stuff that it is Government regulated?

The solvent used is typically highly toxic. And inhaling the stuff (while it's atomized by a sprayer) can wreak havoc on your lungs without a good filter mask with VOC canister. There's quite a few older guys out there that used to work in autobody shops that foolishly didn't protect themselves - and now they can barely walk across a room with the aid of an oxygen tank.

It is a lovely finish for cars though, and is really easy to apply in your garage with nothing more complex than a decent spray gun.

Oh, they really monitor us at my work on this (I work in R&D for a wood finish manufacturer), this is our bread and butter, but it is highly regulated, the solvents we are allowed to use, the palsticizers we are allowed to use, etc. etc. Most of the REALLY bad stuff isn't used any more, we make a few NC lacquers that almost all of the solvent is acetone with a bit of really slow stuff to help it flow out. It is definitely still available here, check any local woodworkers store or website. Between VOC (volatile organic compound) legislation in the northeast and california and MIR (max. or measured incremental reactivity) legislation now nationwide, not to mention the phthalates, APEs, NMP, and several other chemicals the government has now deemed are not safe anymore it's given me a bit of job security at least.

Nice pipe by the way.