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Relaxing after a wonderful salad, perch and snow peas dinner with strawberries for dessert. I'm near the half way mark of this bowl of Watch City Bi-Polar Express (Christmas 2024) in a 1960s Austrian meerschaum bent apple with a tapered yellow acrylic stem. Working on a review of this blend. Community Coffee, neat, will be my drink when this bowl is finished.
Austrian_meer_apple.jpg
 
My latest pipe was a bowl EGR in my Brigham bent Dublin. I'm a little frustrated with the cone-shaped bowl. Any hints on reducing the congestion at the ends of a bowl? It produces much more moisture than a cylindrical bowl and so I get more dottle. Otherwise it smokes nicely, until it suddenly doesn't. I really don't want to use a meerschaum plug in it, although that would solve the problem. It works very well for my figure meer which also has a tapering chamber.

I also had a bowl of Exclusive in my Anton & Co. hardwood. It is a well-behaved pipe, I had misgivings about it at first because the factory finish on it blistered. It's a solid pipe and not disappointing. Good night guys.

Brigham 147 Voyageur Bent Dublin.JPG
 

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Relaxing after a wonderful salad, perch and snow peas dinner with strawberries for dessert. I'm near the half way mark of this bowl of Watch City Bi-Polar Express (Christmas 2024) in a 1960s Austrian meerschaum bent apple with a tapered yellow acrylic stem. Working on a review of this blend. Community Coffee, neat, will be my drink when this bowl is finished.
View attachment 23450
Bi-Polar Express? Sounds a little dodgy. I hope you catch it on a good day.;)
 
I smoke primarily on my way to and from work. This is because I don't have a place to smoke indoors at home and it routinely gets very windy here. Windy enough outside that smoking a pipe is impossible and standing outside is very unpleasant.
I sincerely wish I had a place to enjoy a pipe without A- smelling up my car to the chagrin of my poor wife, or B- braving the elements of snow and wind like I'm some Ernest Shackleton wannabe.
This morning I had a bowl of C&D Byzantium in my beater mm cob. Up until this point, I have not been partial to the C&D blends I have tried and it caused me to write off C&D as a blender of tobacco. I thought I just didn't like the tune they were whistling as far as tobacco blending was concerned. This is where that trend ends. Byzantium is a great smoke and I'm happy to have found it.
Happy Monday, time to start fasting in preparation for the whale of a meal I'm going to cook at Thanksgiving.
Bugger GM, if I win the lotto Ill gift you a heated, ventilated, donga with a bar (y)https://www.yourdictionary.com/donga I am sure a lot of us have or do feel your pain.
 
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Enjoyed a light low calorie snacking, had a delightful chat with an old friend, and just finished smoking year 2013 Capstan Blue Flake in a straight black 1963 Dunhill LB Shell 4S billiard with a tapered black vulcanite stem. Fed all the ferals, too.
Dunhill_1963_LB_billiard.jpg
 
A quarter of the way through this bowl of year 2019 Prince Albert in an undated, unbranded straight smooth brown made in France Los Alton VBF Canadian with a tapered black vulcanite stem. Took a reading break to check on the ferals. Only Tomato the Brave bothered to come in to eat. Didn't see Abner the Eager. Sleepy Suzy is still by my side. I may end the day with this bowl, but quiet reading time is always enjoyable, so who knows what I'll do?
Los_Alton_VBF_Canadian.jpg
 
My latest pipe was a bowl EGR in my Brigham bent Dublin. I'm a little frustrated with the cone-shaped bowl. Any hints on reducing the congestion at the ends of a bowl? It produces much more moisture than a cylindrical bowl and so I get more dottle. Otherwise it smokes nicely, until it suddenly doesn't. I really don't want to use a meerschaum plug in it, although that would solve the problem. It works very well for my figure meer which also has a tapering chamber.

I also had a bowl of Exclusive in my Anton & Co. hardwood. It is a well-behaved pipe, I had misgivings about it at first because the factory finish on it blistered. It's a solid pipe and not disappointing. Good night guys.

View attachment 23451
@Singed I have similar problems with those kinds of bowls namely acorn shapes, but have a problem Dublin like Vauen too. I try the Peterson packing method and sometimes use some different blend as a sacrifical packing at the bottom. It is annoying to dig out decent unburned dottle wet tobacco at the end of a smoke. I've tried stirring it up and relighting, but this is usually not worth it taste wise. That's one reason I like cobs, as they will usually smoke right to the bottom.
 
Good morning,
Smoking a Pete SH deerstalker,Sutliff blue note, Mc Cafe k-cup. Rainy but warm 56 degrees here.
Singed, have you ever tried the Nording keystones ? I have had good luck using them and they are not too expensive either.
I have EZ, thanks.:) The plug is a preferable solution for me because it lasts longer and is less mess. It doesn't reduce the bowl size much, it is a large bowl to begin with, and it fits well. If the plug rattled around I would seek another solution, time will tell. The keystones are great in my Nording Shortie and they also work well in Falcon pipes in place of their proprietary rings.
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Good morning BoB,
I enjoyed a bowl of PA match in my beater mm cob.
Many Christmas gifts are to arrive today in the mail. I'm not very good at wrapping gifts, I can't usually get the wrapping paper tight enough. Still, I think that when I bought gifts for everybody this year, I nailed it so I'm excited to gift em'.

@Singed
I use pipe mortar in all of my cobs to fill the bottom of the bowl after I have removed the wooden piece that juts out into the bowl. I have also used it in briars to fill cracks in bowl sides. Its a more permanent solution than the keystones that EZ suggested. I would try his idea first. Even so, here is a YouTube video that elaborates on the pipe mortar if you or anybody else is interested.
 
Good morning BoB,
I enjoyed a bowl of PA match in my beater mm cob.
Many Christmas gifts are to arrive today in the mail. I'm not very good at wrapping gifts, I can't usually get the wrapping paper tight enough. Still, I think that when I bought gifts for everybody this year, I nailed it so I'm excited to gift em'.

@Singed
I use pipe mortar in all of my cobs to fill the bottom of the bowl after I have removed the wooden piece that juts out into the bowl. I have also used it in briars to fill cracks in bowl sides. Its a more permanent solution than the keystones that EZ suggested. I would try his idea first. Even so, here is a YouTube video that elaborates on the pipe mortar if you or anybody else is interested.

Thanks, GM. :) I have used mortar in my cobs successfully in the past. Unfortunately, if I raised the floor of the bowl it would obstruct the draw. With cobs, the draw is well above the original floor of the pipe so a "false floor" doesn't obstruct the draw. That said, it is a good solution for all the reasons you pointed out.

I just finished my smoke in the Brigham Dublin as you posted, it went smoothly and clean-up was insignificant. No dottle, whatsoever. I may sacrifice ten minutes of a smoke for the space but the result far outweighs it. I can easily order more plugs when the time comes from Meerschaum Market, they still mail orders to Canada. I think we can call this issue "sorted".
 
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Finished simple breakfast of fried potatoes and over medium eggs with pepper jack cheese with white toast and strawberry jelly. Enjoying my last bowls of Straus Blue chip, which I recently found out is Mclelland bulk #2030, which is British Woods in the tin. I love the jar note and have been chasing a restock for years, not knowing it was a Mclelland product.

I decided that it's the jar note I am in love with, but I get just a similarly enjoyable smoke from other well crafted Englishes, so I finally gave up on the chase. I heard that KBV's Goblin mixture has a ketchup smell, so I might have a go with that if it is still around when I am making a buy.

Smoking it in a Longchamp leather covered billiard with a cream colored tapered stem. Sweet smokes y'all!
 

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