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1. The Calabash Project
701TM -PITCHED
702TM -GIFTED
703TM -NFS
704TM: -NFS
706TM - NFS
707TM- PITCHED
708 -NFS
709TM
715TM
716TM
C 07270
C 14262
C 54611
C 63230
Folding your Pocketmod
Other News
Pipe 10: NOV06 -SOLD-
Pipe 11: DEC06 -NFS
Pipe 12: DEC06
Pipe 4: OCT06 -SOLD-
Pipe 5: NOV06 -SOLD-
Pipe 6: NOV06 -NFS
Pipe 7: NOV06 -SOLD-
Pipe 8: NOV06 -NFS
Pipe 9: NOV06 -SOLD-
Testimonials
Buy TM Pipes etc.
TM Pipes, The Shop
Contact
Thos. Martin
Shaping The Stummels
Monday, 3 March 2008
New Lathe
Mood:  lucky
Topic: Other News

Its a no-name but had a 3/4 hp motor v. the 1/2 hp of the name brand in the same price range. It also affords me the more clearance, 5 positions of the drivestock up to a full 180 degrees for outboard turning, and variable speeds with on the fly shifting via a lever instead of stopping the machine and switching the belt config. Rather than pick and average speed and leaving it there I can range from slow to fast. It also has the same size spindle as its competitor @ 1" with 8rht and the tailsock accepts #2 MT:

 


 

 


Posted by thos.martin at 4:35 PM EST
Permalink
Sunday, 2 March 2008
Concerning my Bethlehem Olives
Topic: Testimonials
"The pipes arrived today & they are lovely.  My wife thought that they were prettier than the __________." 

Posted by thos.martin at 9:12 AM EST
Permalink
Monday, 3 December 2007
The Aviator
Topic: Testimonials

I was smoking my "aviator" model yesterday and this morning I was
cleaning it and admiring the construction.
Yours is one of my two absolute favorites in my collection.


-R

Posted by thos.martin at 10:47 AM EST
Updated: Wednesday, 5 December 2007 7:48 AM EST
Permalink
Thursday, 20 September 2007
The End!

I have become more accomplished in the shop and feel its time to stop experimenting, and start making pipes!

Please check out my other sites:

Thank You,

Thomas Martin


Posted by thos.martin at 2:45 PM EDT
Updated: Thursday, 20 September 2007 5:35 PM EDT
Permalink
Friday, 27 July 2007

Now Playing: Shop Renovations Complete: a pictorial


 

 

 


Posted by thos.martin at 1:13 PM EDT
Permalink
Wednesday, 11 July 2007
Where's the Blog

Hi. I have been making pipes both Briar and Calabash, writing for the SHPC Newsletter and enjoying the club very much. I have also been working on a private pipe related project.

I am currently re-arranging the workshop to include: A display case, a retro fridge for baccy Storage (not to be refrigerated of course). And I am repurposing the lathe to be a fulltime shaping sanding wheel as I do not use it as a lathe. The centers, dead & live, are ancient an retor fitting them with the appropriate chucks seems impossible. Any advice (beyond getting a new lathe)

A new Band saw is on the horizon as well.

 I have also been busy with www.my-pipes.com where you might notice I've been quite active/vocal such that I am one of the top five contributors at the time of this entry. I am trying to "tone it down" though. Its a great pipe community. CHECK IT OUT!

REcieved an email today from my friends in S. Africa and am told to expect a letter from the farmers soon.....

I have a trip planned to visit the workshop of a prominant pipe maker on August 3rd. Very exciting.


Posted by thos.martin at 9:00 PM EDT
Updated: Friday, 27 July 2007 1:16 PM EDT
Permalink
Wednesday, 25 April 2007
I've not been Slacking...
Topic: Other News

Tripod has not allowed me to log on to the blog tool. (I am finally in thru a back door.)

I also spent the weekend at the Northeast Pipe Show in Albany, and am also finishing up on Michael Martine's pipe . . .


Posted by thos.martin at 2:58 PM EDT
Permalink
Thursday, 19 April 2007
Michael Martine's Pipe @ 4/19
Topic: 716TM


 


Posted by thos.martin at 8:51 PM EDT
Updated: Thursday, 19 April 2007 8:53 PM EDT
Permalink
Tuesday, 17 April 2007
auto-seams
Topic: 715TM

Auto-seams; like where the hood meets the qtr panel, or where the door meets the rocker panel. Etc Cetera. It was intentional. Its my pipe, I can do what I want, for example:

The draft hole is drilled as per sketch such that the bowl becomes more like the meerschaum cup in a calabash which draws from dead-center. This pipe smoked great, burbed perfectly even despite my sloppy packing technique, and stayed lit even when it seemed like all was lost. Just a gentle draw and presto, smoke.

I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel here but its all about learning, what works and doesn't work, and why. I also used this pipe to experiment with the black dress finish (try no. 5) and am satisfied with the results but not finished finishing this one yet. I am going to finish when (and if) my shop ever warms up. The carnuba wax should be easier to apply.

Goodnight Mr.s Calabash, where ever you are!


Posted by thos.martin at 5:57 PM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, 17 April 2007 6:17 PM EDT
Permalink
The Sci-fi Author (bent egg)
Topic: 716TM

The pipe has progressed since this pic. I bent the stem the stem and assessed it for symmetry... looking good. Looking real good. I need to take tonight off though. I usually take Mondays off but it was a holiday in Massachusetts so I actually got to spend more time in the shop. So.. I'm taking tonight (Tues.) off instead. The BLUE tape is just to protect the stem during shaping. Its basically down to sanding so I can take the stem off.

Not to worry about the stain seepage into the bowl- I ain't done...


Posted by thos.martin at 5:48 PM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, 17 April 2007 7:33 PM EDT
Permalink
Monday, 16 April 2007
On Michael Martine's Pipe
Topic: 716TM

The briar pictured (see prev. post) is no longer the pipe in process. A MAJOR flaw renderred it unusable, but it got me to thinking, that wasn't a sand pit, it was a rock, a crater, moon-rock, which put me in an alien mindset. I couldn't get the idea of an alien hatching from an egg out of my mind. The word "orb" dominated my processing of the wood.

PIPE 716TM will be a slightly (<1/16) bent Egg. The egg shape is demanding as it depends on symmetry. The hatching of his pipe...

PICS to follow.


Posted by thos.martin at 8:39 AM EDT
Permalink
Almost Finished
Topic: 715TM

PIPE 715TM, is just waiting to be finished. It is experimental and look it: angular if not art deco with a hint to modern automobile design, joinery obvious, shiny and black... decidedly industrial.

Pics to be posted later today...


Posted by thos.martin at 8:34 AM EDT
Permalink
Sunday, 15 April 2007
Michael Martine
Topic: 716TM

TMpipes and Michael Martine, SciFi & Fantasy Illustrator and author of speculative fiction, have decided to collaborate/trade. I am creating a pipe for him and he is doing and illustration of me, for me. I was searching for pipe pictures while doing a mock-up clasified ads for the Sherlock Holmes Pipe Club of Boston and came across his site. There was no turning back.

This is the illustration that caught my eye. Here are the pics I sent to him. In my hand is his fantasy pipe. Sketched on a piece of fine Italian briar:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Posted by thos.martin at 9:14 AM EDT
Updated: Monday, 16 April 2007 8:47 AM EDT
Permalink
Saturday, 14 April 2007
The Black Magic Pipe

 

This is the pipe I picked up on e-bay with a meerschaum and a calabash all for forty dollars. This was a project, it had no stem and needed to be refinished.

I'm still not sure whay kind of wood it is. I don't think its briar. You'd think by now I'd know briar from a hole in the wall.

The tobacco chamber appears to have been more hollowed out than drilled, at the bottom it curves and tapers in an almost impossible fashion. It's like a black root; magic.


Posted by thos.martin at 8:35 AM EDT
Updated: Sunday, 15 April 2007 9:14 AM EDT
Permalink
Thursday, 12 April 2007

Topic: 1. The Calabash Project

For years Jimmy Durante ended his radio and television shows with "Good night Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are." Does she really exist? Some, in Calabash North Carolina, say he was speaking to and about the owner of The Calabash Restaurant. Did she really exist?


Posted by thos.martin at 9:49 AM EDT
Updated: Thursday, 12 April 2007 5:43 PM EDT
Permalink
Wednesday, 11 April 2007
Briar Rose
Topic: 715TM

aka: Little Brier-Rose, 1812 (Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm), now commonly known as Sleeping Beauty...

"Briar Rose"
by Tristan Elwell

Jane Yolan (Tor/Starscape Editions, March '02)
 The 18th Annual Chesley Awards
Winner, Best Cover Illustrations, Paperback Books


OK, so I've lost days to a Bulging Disc/Occipatal Neuralgia either in pain, or asleep, or both. I miss the shop but mostly I just want to be a DAD again. I feel like I haven't "been there" for my son because I've beenmiserable, cranky, in pain, or asleep for hours and hours and hours... I want to make pipes!!!!

I've spent a little time in the shop, and apparently too much time based on the pain I'm in today. I am working on a symmetrical pipe and also my FITH try at a dress black finish.

I've learned: that eubachon blocks are harder to work with than plateaux because they lack grain and are more brittle. But, they are "pithy" and there fore more absorbent.

I am learning that smaller blocks aren't necceasirly easier too work with simply because there is less wood to remove. There is also less room for error which takes me to the pont of sanding (and shaping) with intention. Be mindful and your pipe will thank you for it.


Posted by thos.martin at 8:14 AM EDT
Updated: Wednesday, 11 April 2007 8:33 AM EDT
Permalink
Monday, 9 April 2007
what I know I need to know
Topic: Other News
To summarize what I'm now learning, and accepting that I need to learn:
  1. Without the lathe especially... I need to strive toward perfect symmettry BEFORE trying to make a statement with asymmetry. Put another way, you can't embrace asymmetry as an excuse for not being able to be symetrical. Put another way- sort of-, learn the trade before the tricks of the trade.
  2. I need to make more such that I can make more mistakes.
  3. Sand with intention, sand mindfully, stop sanding when you reach the pipe.
  4. (to conclude the first lesson and bring us back to number one) A good round starts good and square. *

* As told to me by a master carver, as told to him, and so-on and so-on and so-on.


Posted by thos.martin at 11:29 AM EDT
Permalink
Saturday, 7 April 2007
Save the Calabash!
Topic: 1. The Calabash Project

Read my article: Save The Calabash, in the Sherlock Holmes Pipe Club of Boston, April 078 Newsletter.


Posted by thos.martin at 11:35 AM EDT
Permalink
Thursday, 5 April 2007
Wrapsacks: To Protect & to Serve
Topic: Other News

Not your grandfather's pipesocks:



Read how you can help The Calabash Project, and Save the Calabash!



 


Posted by thos.martin at 8:22 AM EDT
Updated: Thursday, 5 April 2007 8:51 AM EDT
Permalink
Tuesday, 3 April 2007
C 14262- First US Calabash in Decades!
Topic: C 14262

 This is the first of few calabashes for this year as the gourds out of Africa are in limited supply. The bag is 6.25" x 10.25" if that gives you perspective. The lattice bowl is reformed meerschaum and the stem is nylon. A beech veneer has since been added to the end of the gourd. Nice.

 The bag (C 14262) is from Wrapsacks and is uniquely numbered and allows the history/future of this pipe, or at least the bag/sock to be chronicled. This is the future of the Calabash!

Read how you can help The Calabash Project, and Save the Calabash!

 

 


Posted by thos.martin at 6:01 AM EDT
Updated: Thursday, 5 April 2007 8:53 AM EDT
Permalink

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