Changing Focus...

Subject: Changing Focus... Mon Feb 04, 2008 11:09 am

For the last decade I've focused on xxl to magnum sized pipes.My tobacco of choice has been full english blends most noteably dunhill's #965.This was back before I met my g'friend when most of my nights were spent at home watching TV.Smoking one of my moster pipes might take an hour or two and that was fine.It's not like I was doing anything else Laughing

Now however I have less than an hour at night before I go out.Also,my tobacco taste has changed too.My "go to" blend is now MacBaren's Navy Flake.Obviously flakes just don't work as well when smoked in HUGE pipes so I've moved on to smoking grp 4's and 5's.

All of this has made me seriously consider selling off a good chunk of my collection of monsters in favor of smaller pipes.

I'm curious to know if any of you have ever experienced something similar to this?

Best,
Dock

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Subject: Re: Changing Focus... Mon Feb 04, 2008 11:28 am

Dock, my tastes have changed as well to include smaller pipes - almost nosewarmers - and pipes with smaller bowls. Like you, the change has been driven by a change in tobacco tastes.

I'm keeping many of my larger-bowled pipes because I enjoy smoking ribbon cuts and English blends in them, but like you I'm smoking flakes in smaller bowls.

Obviously, a change in preferences is tough if it requires the sale of a substantial number of pieces. People with an interest in a specific type of pipe are only a segment of the market, so we're always trying to sell a lot of pieces to a small group. It's easy to saturate the market pretty quickly.

What's amazing to me is that a lot of guys prefer to buy on eBay as opposed to people like you and me who sell on boards like this one or on others.

eBay is such a crap shoot these days and, by definition, anyone who buys a pipe on eBay is paying a price at the absolute top-of-market thresshold. If they weren't top of market, someone else would win!

Good luck with whatever you decide. When you come to that fork in the road, take it!

Subject: Re: Changing Focus... Mon Feb 04, 2008 4:05 pm

Dock,

I keep 9 pipes in rotation and I make sure there is a good mix of bowl sizes. I have pipes that will allow me a 1-1/2 hour plus smoke and pipes I go to when I'm pressed for time say 1/2 hour to 45 min. I'd hold on to the pipes you have, you never know your situation and tastes could change back to the way they were before.
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United We Stand, Brothers Of Briar

Joined : 12 Jan 2008 Posts : 41 Location : UK

Dock,

I understand your dilema. My tobacco of choice in winter months tends to be flakes and plugs.

Which I smoke in group three or four bowls, large bowled pipes Oom Paul's and Calabash I keep for milder mixtures.

What I am implying is that tastes change, hence would not consider selling off other pipes.

My tastes could change again, and I would regret selling them.

Joined : 25 Dec 2007 Posts : 26 Location : N.C.

Yeppers, happened to me. I use to really like BIG bowls and HEAVY Latakia...

Now smaller bowls, bamboo shanks, light VA blends and Burley blends.. go figure...

Enjoy the new adventure. Very Happy

Subject: Re: Changing Focus... Mon Feb 04, 2008 7:12 pm

Same here! The first few years I really got into it I leaned towards very large pipes, mostly freehands and I smoked a lot of heavy English blends such as SOTE. While I still like my big pipes, the lack of opportunity to smoke them along with a change in my palette has prompted me to change directions just a bit. I have been focusing more on a little more traditional shapes. I still like bents but I have grown very fond of billiards, apples and egg shapes. My taste in tobacco has leaned towards the more American blends, well, you know such as Walnut and other burley based blends.
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"Man is the only religious animal. In the holy task of smoothing his brother's path to the happiness of Heaven, he has turned the globe into a graveyard."

Mark Twain

Subject: Re: Changing Focus... Mon Feb 04, 2008 7:14 pm

My recent shift in preferences isn't so much the chamber size, but the pipe shape. I've always preferred half to full bent pipes, and recently I've become fascinated with straight pipes with long shanks, such as Lavots, Canadians, and the like. I think it occurred when it dawned on me that the best way to hit the center of the bottom of the bowl is with a straight shank?

Though, now that I think of it, I do seem to be including smaller bowls in my rotation. Not a shift in my tobacco preferences so much as having shorter time periods with which to smoke, as previously mentioned.

Natch