[RJpuffs]

A followup to my vulcanite chronicles ... "Herf long and perspire" ...

After several days of micron-thin nail polish coats (courtesy my 7 year old girl, who valiantly donated her American Girl best pink bottle to the cause), drying, fitting, sanding, re-coating, ad naseum - I finally smoked a whole bowl in the refurbed pipe.

Wow, what a difference. No doubt the boring out of the airhole helped airflow a lot, but the pipe smoked incredibly well. It already had a nice cake, one reason I wanted to save it. I chose the MacB Black Ambrosia - one of the hardest to load, light and keep lit. Usually a vicious tongue nipper, it smoked mellow and really well now. The original stem/bit used to give terrible gurgle and gunking, the new home-made one works incredibly well. No gurgle, BA is a very soggy baccy so periodic mopping with a pipe cleaner was obviously necessary, but most importantly it didn't gunk up like it did in the past. The nail polish has created a near perfect seal on the tenon, no vented plasma or drips. I also added a countersunk opening on the tip of the tenon and it may have worked to my advantage. The pipe was cool down to the very bottom of the bowl, I burnt this puppy down to fine ash - something this pipe never allowed in the past without heating fingers and tongue while gurgling dixie.

Happy happy joy joy!