who says you can't learn anything on these threads... thanks for the insight guys!

I used to smoke a pipe only occasionally when my "tasting system" was not working too well. St. Bruno tobacco will deliver flavor even when you have a cold. There were always problems with harshness and bite. I just didn't want to waste a good cigar on a stuffy nose. But six years ago, when the price of cigars skyrocketed, I bought about 300 sticks, at a price that was the highest I would pay, and vowed that I would learn to smoke a pipe! I succeeded. There are a few things that I learned.

Mainly, match the condition of the tobacco with the way you personally smoke. I'm a very slow smoker, a 6x42 corona will last me 50 minutes. I found that I like the tobacco to be drier than would be normal. This allows it to burn at the rate that I want to smoke. The fineness of the cut, how much it is rubbed out and how firm it's packed all contribute to the burn rate. Excess juice means the humidity in the tobacco is condensing rather than evaporating. The result is a fluid that leaches flavors from the unburned tobacco, like getting a small dose of Red Man, washes sludge into the smoke and delivers a dose of steam to your tongue. Ouch, that bites! And it’s probably being smoked hotter just to keep it going.

Other tips include allowing the pipe to dry out for six hours before resuse and following the false lighting regimen. That means overlighting the pipe in the beginning then tamping it down so that it is evenly packed on the top and goes out. After relighting, it will burn then burn down instead of up.

The good part is that pipe tobacco provides a much broader range of flavors than cigars do, albeit without the subtlety. More to the point of the original post, with pipe smoking it’s possible to learn the characteristics of individual tobaccos. Trying different Virginias then adding a dose of Perique is more instructive than smoking different Dominican cigars whose ingredients are not really disclosed. How do they make it taste of chocolate and leather and is that good?

The best part is that if something is not right about the tobacco, you can add more of what you like or take out what you don’t. SteveS wrote, sometime back, that Flor De Florez was lacking something. Yes they are. Flor De Florez are like pipe tobacco on a stick with false high notes. If it was actually pipe it could be fixed.

SteveS, how do you put paragraphs in the text?. After carefully formatting my last post for readability I found that all my efforts were removed.

I like my wife to smoke my pipe, but she prefers a good torpedo. LoL

tandem, use the "less than" bracket,br, then the greater than bracket to make paragraphs. sample with brackets for illustration 🇧🇷
>br>Barry

T

hanks

Grrr..PLEASE SEND US AN EDIT FUNCTION FOR CHRISTMAS.
<>
I Like a good pipe now and again. I used to smoke a pipe exclusively when I has a very boring graveyard job. Learned a lot about keeping a bowl going. Pipe cleaners were the rule to get rid of the gurgle. Usually came with a cold bowl and moist tobacco. The dryer stuff didn't gurgle. Steve gave an excellent idea for a neat blend.
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My old tobacco shop (long gone) had excellent blends. John hand made his own Briars and I have a few of them. Showed me how he heated amber stems in whale oil to get them soft to form them to fit the high end pipes he made.

Okay..I need a paragraph lesson as well. Sheesh.

tandem401 email me at Bikenic at Netscape dot com



I just learned myself.Jim

oops didn't read BMW post before I posted. LOL

Ok, I really need help on this one. Cigar tobacco is much stronger when you smoke it through a pipe. Why?

Here's my test. I'm smoking a medium strength cigar, a La Habanera, as I'm typing this. There are about four inches left. It's a nice smoke. Now I took a pipe that is just about the same ring gauge and stuck the unlit end into the pipe. So I'm just using the pipe as cigar holder and the cigar is still the same size. Now the smoke is strong and harsh. No kidding! But why?

Cause the tars have built up at the end and that is what is harsh. I chopped up a cigar that was broken and put it in my pipe. It burned very mild and produced a lot of smoke. It did not taste the way it would have as a cigar.
Try putting a longer cigar in the pipe and test it that way. Then you should have a "holder". You have to be wearing a lab coat and pocket protector to insure valid results. Have fun!

You pipe suggers are a sick bunch! LOL



Everybody knows hand-rolled is the only way to go! LOL

Remember, cigar tobacco graded from one end of the cigar to the other to equalize the quality of the smoke. This is to compansate for the tar and nicotine which accumulates towards the end of the cigar while being smoked. The wrapper and binder are "supposedly" well matched to the cigar to provide a reasonably predictible quality for the type of cigar being made. Pipe tobacco is normally of a uniform type. No wrapper or binder grade tobacco and the leaves are not normally de-veined. I don't think I would want to mush a cigar into my pipe. You can buy a half pound of pipe tobacco for the price of a good cigar.

I usually don't smoke pipes anymore, but it is the only tobacco smell my wife really doesn't gripe about.