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It may well be true that smoking can damage your health, but if you collect pipes instead your health and your wallet could prosper.
The smoking pipe has, of course been with us for centuries. the american indians used it first and early forms of such pipes, carved from various stones that can be found in museums.
The principle and basic design of the pipe is so simple that it hardly seems possible for any wide variation, but in fact the pipe collector is well advised to specialize, because of the diversity available.
Meerschaum pipe smoking and Briar pipe smoking are among of the many variations of antique pipe smoking types. The clay smoking pipe and the intricately designed procelain German made smoking pipe are also among the popular ones.
Early smokers were discouraged by high taxes so the clay pipe bowl were smaller no more than 9.5mm less than half an inch in diameter. It is also angled forward more than the modern pipes, but over the years ,the bowl was made more upright until it was set at the right angle to the stem.
The very cheapest clay pipes were plain but most of the collectables are those with bowls made into shapes such as faces of humans or animals.
If you get to see a collection of clay pipes, you may notice that it consists of a bowl only. it is because the stems were brittle and break easily. Most clay pipes were dug or excavated so the remaining components are the bowls only. Stemless clay smoking pipe that is.
Ever since the pipes were first used they have been plagued with so many faults like wet bowls, in which the bottom part of the tobacco become soaked and the smoker gurgles when he takes a drag. Overdry bowls, when the dry smoke is so hot it burns the tongue or the wind causing the tobacco to burn much too quickly.
In an effort to eliminate these"faults" a whole army of inventores applied their expertise to produced literally hundreds of smoking pipes that were designed to take special filters, said to eliminate soggy bottom and a variety of "storm" guards to allow the tobacco to burn evenly.
You may be interested to know that innovations claiming to cure these faults are still being produced, leaving more examples for future collectors.
Remember for all your collecting ideas drop by Rare Antiques Collectibles and Memorabilia.
