Post by Nevadablue on Nov 21, 2017 19:03:12 GMT -5
I had finished the stummel on a nice old meerschaum estate pipes that scrooge sent me and needed to finish the stem work. The stem was overclocked and I decided it was time to investigate. I unscrewed the stem from the shank and looked at the joint between the threaded tenon and the stem. I wondered if it was glued in. This tenon has a 'wasp waist' area with no threads, just in front of the stem. I grabbed that with a needle nose pliers and wiggled, thinking that if it was glued, it might come out. HA, it wiggled. So I turned, and it unscrewed. The stem end threads are smaller in diameter than the shank end and finer too. Behind the threads... lurked YUK. The threads go about twice as far as they need to and apparently the hole was drilled at threading diameter quite a bit farther. That whole space was full of YUK! Totally impossible to get out with normal pipe cleaners for sure. OMG, nasty. I dug and probed and scrubbed and finally got it clean. But, if you work on old meerschaums, look inside the stem if possible. I suspect many are like this. I will be looking at my others meerschaum stems too.
And, the ultrasonic cleaners will get moved out of storage. I suspect they will be handy for restoration work and for sure one of those machines would have been useful on this job. (I have a large one and a small one. The large one is from Harbor Freight and works very well for the things I have tried with it)
And, the ultrasonic cleaners will get moved out of storage. I suspect they will be handy for restoration work and for sure one of those machines would have been useful on this job. (I have a large one and a small one. The large one is from Harbor Freight and works very well for the things I have tried with it)
, here is the 'clogged artery' view. The camera didn't like it, but if you look closely, you can see the wall of the smoke path, beyond the dark tenon. I didn't remove the tenon, it was tight and the stem is timed now, so I left it alone. 
