Pipes i have smoked today.

I smoked the Falcon twice.
Today's tobacco's  were Black Mallory,Wessex Gold brick And Erinmore Flake.

Pipe Packing

I have been experimenting with packing using the air gap method.
You make a packet of tobacco between your fingers and screw it in to the bowl
leaving a air gap under the tobacco.
It needs to be packed fairly tight but the draw has to not be too hard.
It's the balance of just the right amount of tobacco and pressure.
Folded flake tobacco works best but you can use rubbed tobacco.
I find rubbed tobacco to work best if its fluffy and sprinkle some crumbs on top
to help  get it going.
A pipe with a tapered bowl works best.
I use my freehand pipes mostly for this as they have a nicely tapered bowls.
Then you need to try and light the middle of the bowl so it burns towards the outside.
Anyone have any thoughts on this or other packing methods maybe you could post them.

Hobo Dave

The packet or pinch..
The tobacco is Wessex gold brick plug.

Burning from the center out.

Stanwell registration era Straight Grain

Mother and father in-law flying in about 30 minutes from now, so just a quick post. I'll try to get this one cleaned and polished for tomorrow!

Great Stanwell Straight Grain - Selected Briar shape 95 (chimney). The overall bowl height is just over 2", pretty big :) It's also a registration era pipe, so interesting all round. I'll add some captions to the jumble of photo's later as there are some interesting anomalies in the this pipe.