first - i ordered a bent pipe kit... because of that i choose a fancy type of mouthpiece... after receiving the kit, i have seen that in reality i got a straight pipe kit and a fancy mouthpiece... there was not much to do about it - had to work with what i had..
second problem i had was the size - yes, you read it good
- the block was huge
... i sent the drawing of what i wanted to make (it was something like a freehand Nording) to the pipe kit supplier and they have told me that the medium sized block will not be big enough.. so, i ordered a bigger one... at that time i was not thinking to make more than 2 pipes in a whole year (because of the money i had available but eventually i got hooked and found the way to make more)...
huge block gave me the chamber that is over 6cm high
... i could easily sand it down but i wanted also to keep the bark of the plateaux so, i had to figure what to do...the result can be seen in those pictures... a huge pipe that smokes preety much cool for about 4hours (my guess as i never filled it all the way to the top)...
in fact this was a really nice block to start with... no dots, cracks or anything on it... very nice....
i was making that pipe for myself for arround a month and a half - this took me so long just because i did not have all the tools - polishing wheels were needed...
she has several layers of carnauba there and surface looked really nice - i had luck to make it look nice first time i did it...
those are sweet memories when i look at it now - i am still using her but not that often mostly due to her size...