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Hey All, I think I've finally got the wherewithal to try my hand at actually making pipes, instead of just lurking here and commenting on others. I've seen it said often that you should start with a softer wood than Briar (Olive is mentioned regularly). I helped my dad cut down a Pecan Tree this weekend and was wondering if, when properly dried, it would be a good wood to practice with. Pecan is a variety of American Hickory, and thus is probably not toxic, but I don't think that it's as dense as even Olive, and may burn when made into a pipe. What do people think?

It should probably be okay. I've seen pipes from walnut, so I imagine other nut woods would be largely safe (not counting nut allergies).

Pecan wood is often used for barbequeing and meat smoking, so I doubt that it's toxic.

Although many alternative woods make beautiful pipes, the main drawback is that they don't sell as well as briar. The advantage to you is that you're getting the wood for free, so your beginner screw ups won't cost you the loss of expensive briar.

Posting those Pecan Wood pipes in the Gallery for critique will gain you invaluable feedback, so that when you move on to briar you will (hopefully) have passed the beginner pipemaking stage. Charl is a good example of someone who began with Olivewood and is now making very nice briar pipes.

Concur - I did a bunch in olive out of a 50 dollar slab that gave up some 10 pipes. Much easier to carve and less costly if you blow it, in the early going.

Course, now if I screw up a briar block, I just call it art and raise the price.

Well, thanks Frank, but I'm just learning still. Just use whatever wood you might possibly think of and can lay your hands on, Nate. Just make pipes!