Quote:
Originally Posted by schnell987
OK, I'll go first....
1) Is it really necessary to rest the pipe for a day or two to let it "dry out" before using it again? If you don't do this, what will happen?
2) Do you need to have a separate pipe(s) for aromatic tobaccos or can you scrape the bowl to get the ash off and then smoke the Virginia or English tobaccos without the aromatic flavor bleeding over?
Thanks in advance for your input. 
Kevin |
Great questions, Kevin - I have no idea.
Next.
jk.
Dry time. No real dry time for cobs or meers - just let them cool down between scraping/tapping and a refill. Excellent road pipes; one will do for a week. Briar holds moisture and, smoke after smoke, it'll maybe get swampy down there. The swamp gets soggier and soggier, bowl after bowl, and makes for a wet, (steam) hot smoke. Old guys say one pipe gets one smome per week; other old guys say smoke a pipe a couple of times in a day and put it up for a while; and everyones grandfather only had one beat-to-snot old Dr. Grabow they carried eveywhere and smoked 11-teen times/day. I'm an old guy and I don't remember what I had for breakfast yesterday but I do remember how many smokes a certain briar needed before it last got put up to dry out. You can't rely on a bunch of effin' old guys - smoke your briar a few times and look down into it with a flashlight - you can tell when it's wet by looking (or by smoking). I'll smoke dryish tobac 1-3 times/day in the same pipe and come back to it after a while. Mostly 1-2. Three in a day means I got desperate for some reason.
Ghosting. Bet your ass pipes ghost but when you're new to pipes it's hard to tell what's what. Tell you what - what do you care what anyone else thinks? Smoke what you like in whatever pipe you want. Sooner or later you'll figure out what ghosts in what pipes (and what doesn't). Or - basically consider a meer for anything, any time. A cob is good for aromatics, virginnies and burlies. A briar? Once you get latakia stink in most briars it'll dash a wonderful, piquant, nuanced virginia/perique all to pieces. Different folks have different ideas about what is good and bad for briar - I start a (new to me) briar on virginia or virginia burley. After 20-30 1/2 bowl smokes, if it drools or gets too hot I'll decide, ok, "Now you're an english or burley blended pipe."
If you take a favored virginia pipe to aromatics and then back to virginia, you'll figure out the ghost soon enough. WTH? Ghost can be banished with salt and Everclear in 24 hours. In the end, no bad ghosts - only learning experiences.