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Thinking that topic will get someone's attention. 🍺

Ok, Some of you older members know me, I don't post much anymore, since I got out of the trading game. . .

But I am a long time cigar smoker, and tried the pipe once before and gave it up as it just didn't seem to be my thing. However, I've aged some now, and have lots of nice days in the Carolina's and now working from home, I'm going to give the ole briar a try again, partly as something to do and try, and partly because my taste in cigars is too expensive for all of the smoking time I have.

As such, wondering if any of you pipe smokin vets might have some suggestions for me to try and make this transition. My cigar likes tend to be LFD double ligero, WOAM, Liga Privada(don't know if my cigar likes will help here, but might point in a direction.) I know I didn't particularly like aromatics that were too sweet before. I like the tobacco taste. I also want something that will be fairly straight forward to learn to pack a bowl with, so thinking things like cake tobacco are better to save until later. .

Anyway, looking for ADVICE ONLY here. Some recommendations that I can go look for.

Half&Half or Velvet are pretty good imo and can be found about anywhere pipe tobacco is sold. Cheap as well, for getting back into the rhythm of packing and tamping etc. also get a corn cob pipe,I actually prefer a cob over a briar personally.

Also,
Cornell & Diehl Bayou Morning and Bayou Night are a couple of my favorites, the night is on the heavier side with the type of cigars you like. A few others are probably have a lot better suggestions than me though haha

Awesome! Thank you. Great group of suggestions and gives me a place to start.

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I second the corn cob. Once I tried them I never looked back; they're all I use now. Notably superior performance to briar IMHO and ultra-cheap, if it has problems eventually you toss it and buy another for $5-10, however most last a very long time (some can last decades, talk about bang for buck!). Cheap to make a 7-pipe (or however many) rotation too. I suggest only buying MM (Missouri Meerschaum) brand, to save yourself possible headaches otherwise. MM is the king, and has been making them for 151 years now. Don't bother with any other.

You also may be disappointed to learn that you've been unknowingly discarding small amounts of excellent pipe tobacco for your entire cigar smoking career. Stop doing that! See my post about it here:

http://www.cigarbid.com/Forum/c/posts/660346/Totally-delicious-free-pipe-tobacco-forever 

As for commercial pipe tobaccos, I used to be up on that, but not as much anymore. Listen to the other guys. My favorite, the McClelland Frog Morton line, is lost to history now (even though I still have several sealed 100g tins from years ago).
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I'm a fan of pretty much all of the Seattle Pipe Club's blends, but smoke mostly Plum Pudding.

Dunhill Nitecap was another favorite, but Dunhill got out of the business. Another company picked up the lines but I've not tried them yet.

You really need to know the style of tobacco that suits your fancy.It would appear most recommendations so far contain latakia and or orientals which you may enjoy but I am a fan of neither.My suggestion would be to look at Peter Stokkebye's bulk selections.Order a couple ounces each of various styles starting with some straight virginias,straight burly's,virginia burley mixes,virginia perique(vapers)mixes,virginia burley and perique mixes.You might throw in a couple light english blends for a little taste of that latakia,hell you may like it(my feelings are if I want to taste a fire pit I'll sit around one in the backyard).Anyway this should get you pointed in the right direction without breaking the bank or having tons of leftover baccy you don't enjoy.For these small offerings I recommend you pick up some 1/2 pint jars for storage.These little jars will prove invaluable later as you step up to tins.

Now onto pipes.......the MM cob(the best available right now is the Country Gentleman in my opinion with the Egg being my favorite but they're out of circulation at present)cost about $10 or less and worth every penny and then some.I've been smoking on most of mine for 8-10 years and they still smoke like champs.Anyway you need maybe 3......one for va's,burleys and vapers,one for anything with latakia or orientals and one if you decide to try aromatics.I would label the bottom of each one for it's use.Nothing ruins a good virginia/vaper like packing it into something that taste like a fire pit or a perfume factory.To make this more enjoyable if you decide to stick with it I'd get some Forever Stems,I have a dozen plus cobs with maybe 5 or 6 Forever Stems and only two I use regularly.

It may sound like it but none of this will break the bank,especially if you narrow down your taste profile in the beginning and advance into tinned tobacco from there.Briars are really pretty,I have a dozen and a half or so at a cost of probably $12-1500 and all they do is gather dust on a shelf in my man cave.I wish I had bought two and just quit but I kept thinking I would find one that smoked as well or better than a cob,NEVER HAPPENED.So remember this doesn't have to be expensive to be quite enjoyable.

If you need or want any further advice just PM me.I'm recovering from bypass surgery at home so I got little going on these days.


Ron

Thanks Ron. I love that approach. And it really doesn't sound all that expensive considering the cost of cigars I'm hoping to smoke in place of. Here's to hoping your recovery goes well and you are up and kicking again soon.

Jeremy if you want samples let me know.

Forever stems are great but Walker went out of business (retired) and nobody is making the stems now. I talked to Russ O about it and haven’t heard back on the subject.

Thanks for the offer Jamie, but for now I'm content to take this slow and just play my way through it. Before seeing this, I googled the forever stems and was disappointed to see that they had gone out of business.

Picked up a MM from the local this morning. Also picked up some Mac Beran Virginia #1 to start with trying a Virginia. Will have to have more time to spend asking the guy at the shop questions next time as all the bulks just had the various proprietary names and didn't really know what most were. Smoked my first bowl this afternoon. I enjoyed it pretty well. A little mild but overall smoked nice. I have some to learn about pace, seemed to be a fine line between smoking to fast where it got hot and not smoking fast enough that I was relighting(but relighting was easy so not the end of the world)

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Thanks to all who have given advice. This place is still as great as I remember.

The "Contact Me" page on Walker's website:

http://www.walkerbriarworks.com/html/contact_me.html 

...currently has the following text:

"Vermont Freehand is now selling stems for the MM Cobs."

The text "Vermont Freehand" is a clickable link that goes here:

https://vermontfreehand.com/forever-stems/ 

On this page you'll see two big clickable boxes, one for filtered MM cobs and one for non-filtered, with a list of models. Click one of the two boxes, and you'll see a lovely product page with a rainbow of differently-colored Forever Stems.

I added one to my cart successfully (but didn't actually buy it). So it looks like they're still being made and sold, just by a different vendor with the prior vendor's blessing (and a link across to them).
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I had forgot about VFH........my last stem came from them.I just checked them out also,looks like they still producing and shipping.


Thanks PM

You're welcome. Is the VFH one as good as the older Walker ones? Did quality stay high? If so, I'm gonna order me some. Thanks in advance!
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