Gorgeous Pipes from Idskov!

Mr. Carsten Idskov has been making fine smoking pipes by hand since 2001. His pipes are beautiful works of art. I recently contacted Mr. Idskov to inquire about purchasing some of his work and he sent me these pictures of some incredible pipes he is currently offering. These pipes are much too good to keep a secret so, with kind permission of Mr. Idskov, I am sharing these with all of you here at Straight Grain. If you would like to purchase one of these pipes, please contact Mr. Idskov directly at info@idskovpipes.dk or you can visit his site at http://www.idskovpipes.dk/eng/index.htm

My First Old Boy

Today I took the plunge and ordered my very first Old Boy pipe lighter. I have heard so many things about how good they are. they also have been redesigned and improved so how could I resist?

I have several pipe lighters by Collibri, Prometheus, Vector and other brands but for some reason they never seem to work well after the first weeks. I got one no-name that was great but one day it, literally, fell apart. Hopefully this Old Boy will mark the start of a whole new trend of good working pipe lighters for me.

Now I just have to figure out how to add fuel, change the flint, etc.

My Review of Stanwell Vanilla

Do you like tobacco? If so, you will not like this! This is identical to Skandinavik Vanilla in appearance, smell and flavor. It is a bit sticky, overwhelmingly sweet and the casing tastes almost unnatural like diesel exhaust. I love a good quality aromatic now and then. This is not one of them. This is generic fruit flavored candy with some salt, habanero pepper, lots of sugar, bus fumes and maybe a drop of butterscotch. Enjoy!

Building and Maintaing Cake Part 2

In the previous part of this article we discussed using the "Orange Ring" technique to burn tobacco directly up against the wood of the chamber walls to build a good carbon cake. In this article we go over proper cake maintenance and the cake-building method known as "Ashing".

When one is about halfway through a bowl of tobacco there is usually a good bed of ashes on top of the burning embers. One popular method of building cake is to spread some of the excess ash over the inside of the tobacco chamber. This is known as "Ashing".

The way this is done is to place one hand over the bowl of the pipe then gently shake the pipe and allow the fine ash to coat the exposed wood of the tobacco chamber. After doing this you can dump the remaining excess ash then gently tamp and continue smoking the second half of the bowl. Once the bowl is finished, repeat the ashing process one more time then dump the remaining ash. What this does is leave a good coating of tobacco ash along the interior of the bowl. This promotes the building of a good even carbon cake. Some folks will wipe out the shank with a pipe cleaner then smoke the pipe again (once cooled down) with the ash still coating the bowl walls. Doing this helps to "fuse" the ash and tobacco to the wood and therefore provides an excellent base for a good healthy cake.

Once you have built up a respectable cake, proper maintenance is necessasry to avoid the problems that can come from having too much cake. If a pipe has too much cake it can make the bowl heat up to the point where the bowl can crack open and end up as firewood. To avoid this you need to periodically ream the cake. This can be done with sandpaper or a pipe reamer.

The proper thickness for cake is equal to the thickness of a dime. When you cut the cake you should slowly and gently ream the bowl and remove the cake evenly and without creating a crack in the cake. Doing so will cause the cake to split and fall off in a large chunk leaving some exposed wood and an uneven cake. Dump the excess carbon powder from the bowl then whisk out the bowl with a bent pipe cleaner. Check the cake for proper thickness and uniform surface. Continue reaming as necessary.

With proper care and maintenance, you should have a pipe that smokes well and will last for many years.

R.I.P.: Bjarne Nielsen

Legendary Danish pipemaker Bjarne Nielsen recently passed away. It is a great loss to the pipe smoking community and he will be missed by us all.

New Acquisition for 2/22/2008

Stuck at home during a snowstorm I was able to catch today's update at Boswell's site. I saw this chubby bulldog and immediately grabbed my Blackberry and called in the order.

I really love these chubby stubby pipes.

My First Estate Pipe

I've never been one for used pipes. Nothing wrong with them, it's just been a personal quirk for me. I saw this Cristiano on the Briar Blues site and could not resist it. Fortunately for me, it looks like it was only smoked once or twice at the most.

I doubt that I will become a regular buyer of used pipes but this one is a keeper.

Escudo vs Luxury Bullseye Flake

I love a good spun-cut tobacco. A "spun-cut" is the blending of tobaccos rolled up into a big giant "cigar" then sliced into this discs. For several years my favorite spun-cut blend was Escudo. A couple of years ago, Peter Stokkebye released a new spun-cut of their own called "Luxury Bullseye Flake". Many smokers touted this new blend as "the New Escudo" while others felt that it was inferior to the ancient incumbent. Let's compare the two blends here and then see what the Straight Grain readers have to say.

The escudo was the currency of Portugal prior to the introduction of the euro. Escudo is Portuguese and Spanish for "shield". Escudo is a Virginia and Perique blend with brown and gold strands of leaf visible in the discs. The size of the disc is that of a U.S. half-dollar coin. Upon opening a tin of Escudo, one smells the scent of a fruity wine. The flavor is subtly sweet with a good deal of spiciness from the Perique. Popular opinions of Escudo is that the nicotine content is quite high.

Luxury Bullseye Flake is a coin of similar size with strands of bright and brown Virginias and dark Perique. One noticeable difference in appearance from Escudo is a large black center of cavendish. The flavor of this blend tends to be more on the sweeter side with less spice. Popular opinion is that the nicotine content in this blend is not nearly as high as Escudo.

So there you have it, both blends are up for comments. Which is sweetest? Which is spicier? Is there more of a "nick-kick" in Escudo or Bullseye? Let's hear from you!

Building and Maintaining Cake Pt. 1

Hello again!

I have recently taken part in some interesting conversations and debates about the topic of building and maintaining the carbon cake in pipes and I thought it would make a good topic for The Straight Grain.

For the purpose of this article, I will assume that you, the reader, already have a basic understanding of what carbon cake is and how it effects your pipe and it's smoking qualities.

I have heard many theories on what builds cake including, but not limited to, rubbing honey along the inside of the bowl, sanding the chamber to roughen up the surface, smoking only a third of a bowl for a few smokes then graduating to two-thirds, etc. While it is true that some pipes seem to cake faster than others, the same basic principles apply.

What will build cake is the burning of tobacco directly against the wood inside the pipe. This sounds simple enough but how exactly does one do this in a way that can produce more efficient results? What I, and other smokers I have spoke with, have found is to make the "Orange Ring". While this may sound like a pastry, it is actually the method of keeping the outer ring of the tobacco burning right up against the bowl walls throughout the duration of the smoke. To do this, one must tamp and relight often keeping the flame around the outer edges of the tobacco. One should lightly push some of the unburned tobacco towards the outside of the plug to maximize the outer ring's combustibility. Tamp in a circular motion when doing this and tamp light enough so that only the weight of the tamper itself is the only pressure applied.

You will know that you are doing this correctly if you see a bright orange ring in your pipe after a relight. Do not worry about having a glowing ember in the center. The purpose of this techniques is to build a strong even cake along the walls of the pipe. After puffing for a few minutes, let the pipe go out on it's own and slightly cool. Tamp lightly in a circular motion around the tobacco to flatten the ash and gently push some unburned tobacco to the outer ring of the plug. Light your pipe with the flame walking around the outer edges and then check for the Orange Ring. Try to get a complete circle of orange to avoid uneven cake buildup and the dreaded "hot spots".

With the proper care and skill, you should soon start to see a nice carbon caking all along the bowl of your pipe. Be sure to smoke the tobacco all the way to the bottom of the bowl using this technique.

In Part Two of this topic I will discuss maintaining cake and the technique known as "Ashing" and how that may also aid in cake buildup.

Please feel free to contribute your thoughts, comments and tips!

Grain Pictures

I was messing around with my new Canon Powershot tonight and I took a couple of shots of my new Winslow Poker. I tried to be "artsy" by doing a B&W one but you get a good idea of the grain on it. These are big pics so they may take a bit to load full-size.