Pipe Smoking Guide for Beginners : June 2015

Pipes the art of pipe smoking is slowly fading from this world which is a sad thing indeed. My name is Ted beginner who just took up pipe smoking a little over 9 months ago practically on a whim and now it has become my most favorite and relaxing hobby ever. I know what you all think that pipes are old school or for old people but why i ask should you let that stop you? It only seems hard because you need good advice on how to start and that whats this blog is all about. Now before we begin I must say that this blog is base on my personal experiences alone and advice from the magnificent chaps from the Bangkok Pipe Club. Pipes is a very personal experience and differs with each person however this blog can give you guidelines as you dive into the fantastic world of pipes.

Pipes is for everyone but its especially good for people who:

Want to quit ciggerettes
Cigars have become too expensive
You hate the cigerettes smell and taste like crap
Want to smoke something chemical free
To smoke something that could last an hour and not 5 minutes
Who wants to look cool and enjoy something relaxing

Choosing your Pipes

Briar Calabash Pipe own by Mr. James

There are tons of information to read about how to pick your first pipe and if you read it all you might understand half it which was how i felt when i first started out trying to buy my first pipe so in here i will simplify it all for you.

First thing you must consider is money. how much you have to spend on this but since no one wants to waste money in the case that you tried and in the end concluded that pipe smoking isn't for you you wouldn't have a $100 pipe sitting around collecting dust and because the price of a pipe made from good quality briar is tremendously higher than a basket pipe (which for every 10 has one or two decent smokers) or a low quality briar pipe. this is what i would suggest.

Buy a Corn Cob Pipe instead of buying its much more expensive cousin for several reason i shall illustrate below:

Note: the two main materials used to make into pipes are briar wood and the cob of a corn.

Corn Cob Pipe

1. An average corn cob pipe smokes alot better than a cheap briar pipe. You need to understand that the quality of the briar used to make the pipe greatly effects its smoking quality. So in a nutshell a quality briar could cost at least 40 - 60 dollars to make one pipe thus the finished pipe might cost two times that price if not more which might already be more than you would want to spend when you are not even sure you like smoking or not. A good corn cob cost only about 10 dollars and if you don't like it just throw it away no harm no foul.

2. It only cost 10 dollars its like going for a meal at Mc Donalds! There is a deal 10 pipes for 29.95 it might not look perfect but the smoking performance is just fine what a steal!!.

This is the website for corn cob pipe we had a vote and they say this is the best:
http://corncobpipe.com/10-pipe-grab-bag-of-smokable-seconds.html

3. Gives you a pure smoke that doesn't effect the taste of the tabacco at all like some briar pipes. You will taste fully the taste of the tabacco perfect for beginngers whos taste buds haven't fully developed yet.

Right now if you still want to buy a briar pipe from the get go we shall also explain the details for you here. There are 6 key points which are your preference of pipe aesthetics, quality of the briar wood, proper drilling of tobacco chamber and shaft from the chamber to shank, weight, balance and feel of the pipe and lastly the thickness of the stem on the end that you bite on. However these can be a bit too advanced for beginners so below are the brief guidelines.

Guidelines for Picking your first Briar Pipe

So how can we be sure that we are buying pipes? Well these are some beginner guidelines you can follow:

Aesthetics
First and foremost the most important question is!! Do you like it? Its that simple. try holding it, handling it, imagine you smoking it does it make you feel good? does it feel right? Pipes is all about personal preference, even if its made by a world famous pipe maker if you don't like how it looks, it all for nothing because if you don't like how it looks you won't smoke it.

Vava Pipes Briar Smooth Free Hand

Castello Natural Virgin Briar Pipe

Vava Apple Briar Pipe

Price
As i said a good quality briar costs a lot so if you find a pipe with the price of 2000 baht or less odds are its not going to provide you with a good smoking experience. Usually the bench mark price for a reliable brand is $100 or about 3000 baht if you see one of the brands i mentioned below with prices lower than that its a good deal!

Brands
Brands of pipes are another thing that can help you select a pipe. Good brands for beginners whos price isn't through the roof are Savinelli, Peterson, Stanwell and my personal favorite Vava pipes which are hand made right here in thailand by a danish pipe maker Mr. Fisher who makes absolutely beautiful pipes. These pipe brands you can trust to make good reliable pipes. A good first choice brands for beginners. Price can range from 2700 baht and up depending on shop promotions. So i say again folks 2700 is still a pretty penny to be shelling for a hobby you are not even sure you are going to like so if in doubt go with a cob you can't fail.

Pipe & Pipe equipment sales Websites are as follows:

I will keep updating this list as more comes along

Tongue Bite

Before we get into the types of tobacco available i need to get into the issue of tongue bite. Tongue bite is cause by the heat from inside the chamber heating the moisture from the tobacco until it turns to steam and burns your tongue when you smoke. That is the basic physics of causing tongue bite. So the major causes of tongue bite are:

Smoking Tobacco that is too wet.
Smoking too fast.
Packing the pipe too tight.

For the first couple weeks your tongue will be adapting to the heat from the pipe so tongue bite will happen in the first few weeks however there are choices that can help you get through it and enjoy pipe smoking from the start and not have to learn the hard way like I did.

The smoking too fast or pack you will adapt to in time however if the tobacco that you have selected can greatly effect how much tongue bite you get even seasoned smoking have problems with tongue bite with Super wet tobacco like Borkum Rift which is sold in every single tobacco shop in Thailand and the shop attendant who isn't a smoker will say it is the best because it is what he sells most of.

The first tobacco I bought was Borkum Rift Cherry A because I had next to zero information about the types and properties of tobacco and B because the shop attendant says its the most popular. Before I went in I didn't have people to guide me and most of the blogs I read are complicated so me back then didn't understand half of what is said. So for the first few weeks I had blinding tongue that persisted even after about a month has past and pipe smoking wasn't so enjoyable for me. I didn't use filters (i will further explain about filters in another section) you see so I received the full blow of steam from the wet tobacco. It got so bad I quit smoking for 2 months. Now take note that this is my personal experience and that pipe smoking varies from person to person. Some can smoke wet aromatics from the beginning and get minimal tongue bite but those are the lucky few. Most beginners quit because tongue bite persist for months because they chose the wrong tobacco to smoke combined with bad smoking technique.

In conclusion Heavy smell/flavoured aromatics are super wet and will cause more tongue bite especially for beginners. I say again Borkum Rift don't buy that brand after a month or so try MacBarren Vanilla or Caption Black Vanilla a friend of mine says they are good. Now continue to the next section where i explain about types of tobaccos including tobacco recommendations.

Choosing your Tobacco

First I must explain that each tobacco that you can buy has different levels of nicotine, room note, and the taste. Also there are three main types of Pipe Tobacco as follows:

Aromatics tobacco: These are types of tobacco that flavoured (casing) with smells like cherry, vanilla, or even chocolate. There are a ton of flavourings that can be put into tobacco and they would smell wonderful and very enticing for beginners but be warned they are not for beginners. The flavourings on these types of tobaccos causes the tobacco to be wetter than usual because of humectants like Propylene Glycol that is a substance that keep the tobacco from drying out and will cause unbearable tongue bite for beginners who already tend to smoke fast and hot. My Borkum Rift Cherry sat in my draw for 6 months and i just took it out today to find that its still a bit wet!! The pouch isn't even sealed so good luck trying to dry it out for a smoke.
English tobacco: These are blends of tobaccos are will taste and smell as you would expect tobacco would like earthy, meaty, woodsy, campfire kind of smell somewhat heavy. This type of tobacco you might not think to like at the beginning but trust me after about 4 or 5 months it will be all that you would want.
Virginia Tobacco: These blends of tobaccos would smell lighter that the english very grassy, hay, barnyard that kind of smell.

Conclusion and Suggestions

Usually the pattern people would go through is aromatics then English and Virginias together depending on which you like more and that not the wrong way to do it but what I would suggest is you should start with a light english like McClellen's Frog Morton Cellar or Peter Stokkebye Balkan Supreme. These are very light low nicotine english tobacco that are perfect for beginners. But sometimes the Frog Morton Cellar can come a tad too moist so if feel the moisture if you are squeezing the tobacco then pour it out of the tin and leave it out to dry for an hour or so then you are good to go.

These are links to buy these two tobaccos:

How wet your tobacco should be

Before we go on to the How to pack a pipe section you need to know about how wet your tobacco is supposed to be. If the tobacco is too dry it will crumble to dust in your hands which also makes filling the pipe evenly difficult also, burn fast, offer a harsh smoke, and most likely to lack the flavours that it was there originally. On the other hand too wet would result in a steamy, mute flavoured bowl and a messy goo at the bottom of the pipe given that you actually manage to get it light. For beginners this is all you need to know for now.

So what is the right amount of moisture in a tobacco you might ask well the perfect moisture level is different in each tobacco but there is a rule that we can go by as a general measure. Its easy to tell if tobacco is too dry it completely falls apart at the slightest touch and crumbles to dust however if too moist you can press the tobacco into a ball and it will remain that way. the optimum wetness in a tobacco is when it doesn't fall apart, it can take some force when handled and when pressed into a ball it springs right back into shape.

But in the end its all about touch and learn. Feel to see what level of wetness works for you and change accordingly. Too wet pour it out to dry for an hour or so. The too dry part we won't be getting into that just yet and you don't really need it now anyways unless you have some aged tobacco that dried out.

How to pack a pipe

Now the most common method noised around the web is the baby women and man method. You see the goal when packing a pipe is to create a consistency when packing so that there is no gaps or spots where the tobacco is too dense so you can get an even burn through out the bowl. Another thing that you need to know is that you can never reason pack your bowl too light because you can use your tamper and tamp it down anyways but if you pack it too tight the heat won't be able to escape and the pipe will heat up considerably plus your draw will be greatly restricted. When you draw on your pipe it should feel a bit lighter than when you suck water with a straw. Any harder than that you packed too tight but when you draw it shouldn't feel like you are just drawing air either thats when you know you pack too light. Trying drawing a few times before you light it just to check if its too tight or not.

Ill upload another video that will tell of my way of doing it but for the moment this guy knows how its done. But the key is that you adapt it to your liking as i do.

Cleaning the Pipe and leaving it to dry
Like all well made things a pipe can last you a lifetime if you care for it properly. So after you have smoked for a couple of times or if its the last smoke of the day. First you have to wait until your pipe cools and never pull the stem out of the pipe when it is still hot wait for at least an hour before you pull out the stem from the bowl for when the pipe is hot the stem expands so if you pull it out then you will crack your shank. Now most people don't like pull the stem out of the bowl very often and you don't have to if you can stick the pipe cleaner into the mouth piece all the way to the bowl but I like to give it a good cleaning at least once every day. Also if I stick the pipe cleaner into the tenon out the lip of the stem I feel its somehow cleaner because it pushes all that black stuff out at the mouth of the stem.
Here are the steps:

Let your pipe cool for an hour.
Run the pipe cleaner into the lip into the bowl of the pipe.
If the pipe cleaner cannot run into the bowl for some reason then remove the stem but be sure that the pipe is cooled or the shank will break!
Run the pipe cleaner in and out until its not black anymore this might use more than one pipe cleaner don't be stingy with it pipe cleaners are cheap but pipes are expensive (unless its a cob).
Twist the pipe cleaner into a U shape and rub the debris out of the walls of the bowl. (there is a better method using tissue that I will make a video of later).
Set the pipe done for 24 hours before smoking it again but for beginners with one pipe then waiting until the next day would suffice until you get more pipes.

Venues for Purchasing Pipe Goods
If your are in Thailand there are a few physical shops that you can go to. The two that are off note are:

Vapour House: This shop is at season square on the first floor call this number 086 669 3009 to get directions when you have reached Seacon and this is their website. http://www.vapourhouse.com
Bynity: This shop is in silom near Chong Nonsri Bts station but from there its still another 15 minute walk. They have a wide range of Peterson Pipes and tobaccos. This is their website: http://www.bnityint.com

For beginners I would suggest that you stay away from Ebay. For it is too easy for you to buy a ton of useless stuff that you don't actual need. Also even if most of the products on eBay are legit there are some that are scammers selling poor quality equipment.

International Website that ship to Thailand

These two websites have a massive range of pipe related products from tobaccos to pipe cleaner and pouches. You will have a great time browsing through. But be warned the exchange rate can be a bit bad. However the pros far out way the cons in using these venues. All you need is a credit card and you are good to go, the people in our club has been using these websites for years and never had any problems was credit card security.

Smoking Pipes.com: This website has everything that you can want related to pipes and they even have a blog that you can read too very informative. Here is the link: http://www.smokingpipes.com
4Noggins.com: This website is almost exactly the same as Smokingpipes.com however the website isn't as well presented and organised however you can find that their shipping is very flexible. The website is here: http://www.4noggins.com

Important Note

When ordering from overseas it is prudent to buy no more than $100 per shipment and no heavier than 500g. For further info on shipping fell free to message me.

Essential Pipe Accessories( This is the bare minimum that you need)

Czech Pipe Tool

Pipe Cleaner

10 Baht 7-11 Lighter

Expense Sum Up (The cheapest you have to spend)

Corn Cob Option: Corn Cob Pipe (600 Baht) + Frog Morton Cellar Tobacco (600 baht) + czech pipe tool (150 baht) + pipe cleaner (200 baht) + 7-11 Lighter (10 baht) = 1,560 baht
Briar Pipe Option: Peterson Briar Pipe (3000 baht) + Frog Morton Cellar Tobacco (600 baht) + czech pipe tool (150 baht) + pipe cleaner (200 baht) + 7-11 Lighter (10 baht) = 3,960 baht

Last Notes

If anyone has any question please feel free to ask in the comments below and I will do my best to answer back. Even if I don't know the answer I'm sure the people in Bangkok Pipe Club in Facebook will. Thanks for reading.

Other Reading Materials about Pipe Smoking

Pipe Smoking Guide for Beginners

Saturday 27 June 2015

How to start pipe smoking: A Beginner's Guide By Ted of Bangkok Pipe Club