Forgive the length of this, but I'm lacking the time and energy to edit at the moment, so it's just on the fly.
As I wrote in my articles, in the organic coating arena, I've not experienced anything objectionable once the pipe had been smoked a few times, and most of them seem to be quite neutral, or at least unobjectionable from the start. I have no issue with organic coatings. (I'm sure someone can concoct a recipe that would change my mind, but I would cast some doubt on the benefits of doing so...)
In the 33 years I've been actively buying, selling, trading, collecting and smoking pipes, thousands of briars have gone through my hands. (My collection is currently in the range of 300; I'm desperately trying to focus it, with little luck.) I think my sample size would be considered by most to be sufficient to draw some reasonably valid conclusions. Taste is important to me. Every pipe that has become one of my absolute best smokers has been either uncoated in the beginning, or coated with an organic substance. Every silicate coated pipe I've ever smoked has never developed into one that I fully enjoy, except in those cases where I've gone back to zero, removing the whole mess, and starting from scratch. In one case, not enough to be considered a reasonable sample (you can draw infinite many lines through a single point), what I found under the coating of a pipe that had been smoked for years by its previous owner was green-tasting wood - briar that had never been sufficiently dried. An anomaly, I would hope. But, it would seem to support the idea that silicate coatings effectively seal up whatever is behind them once they've hardened into their anhydrous state.
The breaking in of a pipe, the part that actually forms a protective layer between briar and tobacco, is first the result of heat hardening, in a sense annealing the surface of the briar. This does not fireproof the wood by any means, but raises its combustion temperature by altering the physical structure of the wood. It's this physical change that allows the further development of cake to proceed with less risk of damage. An organic coating does not serve the same purpose, though it very likely does assist in the cake's adherence in the early bowls. The heat-treating will still take place through the coating, of course, so the coating in all likelihood does no harm. (Some pipe makers in the past who have "flame treated" their bowls knew the benefit of this heat-hardening phenomenon. So did ancient hunters and warriors who heat-treated wooden spear and arrow points.)
If a pipe burns out, assuming (a big assumption, apparently, at least according to some pipe makers), the thing is smoked carefully and gently during the break-in, it's because of a flaw in the briar. A coating ain't likely gonna stop it. (The only two pipes I've ever owned that burned out both had cavernous voids or soft spots just beneath the surface of the wood, something the maker could not have known about. AND, they were both coated with silicate coatings.)
Will silicate coatings offer more protection? Apparently, yes. But, at what cost?
A pipe maker once said to me, when I was discussing the taste of his coatings with him, that he KNEW it didn't taste great, but "most people can't tell the difference." I considered this a disservice to the smoker, and thought it a bit disdainful of his customers. If a pipe maker's goal is to produce the best smoking, best tasting pipe possible, if even a few report that the coating interferes with the enjoyment of the tobacco, I would think it would be in his ultimate interest to consider something else.*
One of my past favourite makers, at the coaxing of his importer/representative, decided at some point to begin using a silicate coating. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and acquired a couple pipes with his new formulation. Compared with his previous work, they don't deliver the groceries. I no longer acquire his work. Maybe it's just his specific recipe. Maybe it's the silicate. (I've got enough evidence to know which side of that coin is likely to turn up when tossed.)
In discussing this with a friend who makes pipes, I had him do two pipes for me; one coated (silicate), one nekkid. After twenty bowls, the uncoated pipe was delivering a wonderful rich smoke. The other one, not so much. After going back to bare wood and starting over with it, it quickly matched the uncoated one. Again, only a single data point, but not an insignificant one.
The video is interesting, and quite dramatic. A real world test, though difficult, if not impossible to accomplish, would yield results that are much less dramatic. Covering your car with space-shuttle tiles to keep it from burning up during reentry would accomplish the job. Most of us tend to drive at somewhat lower altitudes.
If pipe smokers subjected their pipes to that level of abuse, they'd be replacing their uncoated briars every week. The fact that pipes have been made from briar for over 160 years might suggest that the problem isn't as significant as some would make it seem. That I collected data from quite a few makers and sellers indicating that burnout rates are less than 1 in 1000 of uncoated bowls (in some cases, much less) suggests that the whole "protection" argument might be something of a red herring. But, if it offers comfort to the maker to coat their bowls, and those coatings don't make the pipes taste funny, no harm, no foul. And, maybe, the organic coating does offer some very slight prophylaxis, as well as a more effortless establishment of an early cake, but it's not going to help if the wood is flawed, or if the smoker puffs on his new briar like a Hoover.
It has become sparklingly clear that this is a very contentious issue. Ridiculously so. It has also become clear that amongst the many pipemen I've discussed this subject with over the past decade or so, the vast majority who are concerned with the way their pipes taste prefer uncoated bowls, though more recently, in a few cases, I've convinced them that organic coatings should not be so quickly disparaged, even though I myself was once one of their detractors. I don't ever have to buy a coated pipe, so, really, it doesn't matter to ME, personally, what someone uses. (Yeah, I know. I don't ever have to buy another pipe of any sort again, but sometimes, I just can't help myself.)
My goal in smoking a pipe is, and always has been, to derive the greatest possible enjoyment from the experience. My goal in writing about pipes and tobaccos is to offer whatever experience I may have gained over the years to others in the hopes that it might present a bit of direction towards achieving similar ends. Lord knows, I don't do it for the money...
*If a chef chose cheaper cuts of meat because "most people can't tell the difference," the protests would be heard loudly and clearly, and no one would defend his choice.
