Ropp Sandblasted Canadienne
The above image is from the smokingpipes.com website. (The promptest shipping from any vendor from which I've ordered anything in the last two years.) I selected this particular instance from several others specifically because I found the swirling grain of the sandblasted bowl interesting. The pipe details:
I always smoke a pipe while working at the computer, and no longer clench any of my pipes. A larger bowl means a longer smoke for a single bowl, resulting in fewer repacks and less frequent need to clean it. The larger bowl diameter provides denser smoke per puff.
In my hand, this does not feel heavy, but much of its weight is situated 6 inches from the bit. My codger hands really appreciate the non-skid tread of a sandblasted surface.
Straight pipes (not just Canadian shape) were the standard pipe of TV dads in the family comedies of the 1950s and early 1960s. By about 1970, they were seen as stodgy. (And of course, smoking at all vanished from TV programs, starting after the initial 1966 Surgeon General's Report.) Younger pipe smokers, including myself, chose mostly bent, Victorian shapes for their new pipes. For decades of pipe smoking, the visual impression of a pipe was the focus of my pipe purchases. Now that I'm old and stodgy enough, and now that I smoke pure, un-cased tobaccos, I have slowly recognized the numerous advantages of a straight pipe. Over the past decade, I have removed metal condensers from any of my pipes that had them (just another gooey component to clean), since my tobacco blends now smoked dry. Without liquid accumulating in the shank and stem, there is no functional advantage to a bent pipe, or one with a drip well inside the shank. Since my face sprouts a combustible moustache front and center, a pipe that can be lit farther away from my nose is a good thing.
When I first began to smoke a pipe, in the early 1970s, an average "nice" pipe sold for about $20; a fancy one, maybe with a sterling band, might go as high as $60. (This was at a time when I could live on $300 a month!) A ~$75 pipe today—if it is well-made—is a bargain, since a pipe will likely last decades, and is considerably less expensive than today's average box of decent cigars.
This Ropp Sandblasted Canadienne is now my 5th Canadian pipe, and the longest of them.
Bob
The above image is from the smokingpipes.com website. (The promptest shipping from any vendor from which I've ordered anything in the last two years.) I selected this particular instance from several others specifically because I found the swirling grain of the sandblasted bowl interesting. The pipe details:
- Length: 6.84 in./173.74 mm.
- Weight: 1.21 oz./34.34 g.
- Bowl Height: 1.89 in./48.12 mm.
- Chamber Depth: 1.64 in./41.72 mm.
- Chamber Diameter: 0.83 in./21.05 mm.
- Outside Diameter: 1.42 in./36.09 mm.
- Stem Material: Vulcanite
- Filter: None
- Shape: Canadian
- Finish: Sandblast
- Material: Briar
- Country: France
- Price: $75
I always smoke a pipe while working at the computer, and no longer clench any of my pipes. A larger bowl means a longer smoke for a single bowl, resulting in fewer repacks and less frequent need to clean it. The larger bowl diameter provides denser smoke per puff.
In my hand, this does not feel heavy, but much of its weight is situated 6 inches from the bit. My codger hands really appreciate the non-skid tread of a sandblasted surface.
Straight pipes (not just Canadian shape) were the standard pipe of TV dads in the family comedies of the 1950s and early 1960s. By about 1970, they were seen as stodgy. (And of course, smoking at all vanished from TV programs, starting after the initial 1966 Surgeon General's Report.) Younger pipe smokers, including myself, chose mostly bent, Victorian shapes for their new pipes. For decades of pipe smoking, the visual impression of a pipe was the focus of my pipe purchases. Now that I'm old and stodgy enough, and now that I smoke pure, un-cased tobaccos, I have slowly recognized the numerous advantages of a straight pipe. Over the past decade, I have removed metal condensers from any of my pipes that had them (just another gooey component to clean), since my tobacco blends now smoked dry. Without liquid accumulating in the shank and stem, there is no functional advantage to a bent pipe, or one with a drip well inside the shank. Since my face sprouts a combustible moustache front and center, a pipe that can be lit farther away from my nose is a good thing.
When I first began to smoke a pipe, in the early 1970s, an average "nice" pipe sold for about $20; a fancy one, maybe with a sterling band, might go as high as $60. (This was at a time when I could live on $300 a month!) A ~$75 pipe today—if it is well-made—is a bargain, since a pipe will likely last decades, and is considerably less expensive than today's average box of decent cigars.
This Ropp Sandblasted Canadienne is now my 5th Canadian pipe, and the longest of them.
Bob
