Ceremonial Pipe Project
| I decided to make a ceremonial pipe as one of the many props I would like for my NERO character, which I have not PC'ed. I had no idea what I was doing, and wasn't sure where to start, so I went online first. There's not much on making pipes using antler (which is what I wanted to use for the bowl, so most of this I made up on my own. First I would like to say that, completed, the pipe is 'semi-functional'. By 'semi' I mean, it should work fine, except for the following warnings. 1) The bowl is made of antler. Smoking out of an antler bowl is of questionable safety from what I have read. 2) The bowl and stem cannot be separated for cleaning, as they are sealed with wax and strapped together with leather lashing. 3) The wax used to seal the stem and bowl might melt during smoking. First, I started with a handful of supplies - a free antler, the spindle from a chair I grabbed off the side of the road, bits of leather (one 6' lace I bought for $1 at a leatherwork store, the rest was scrap leather), a fur collar (real fur of some sort from a garage sale), and bees-wax (the most expensive thing here, since it came from a craft store). |
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| I already had sandpaper, which I used to take the stain off the chair spindle. I also smoothed and rounded the mouthpiece end, and used a utility knife to trim the larger end down a little. I had to buy a 12" 3/8" drill-bit as well for this, but at least I get to keep it around. I drilled through each end, and luckily met somewhere in the middle. It took a while to get it cleaned out nicely, but eventually it was good and smooth. A large drill press would make this much easier... The antler took some drilling as well. I read this can be very stinky, so I wore my respirator while I worked on this. I drilled a 3/4" bowl into the top, a 1/2" hole at an angle in the back to insert the stem into, and then used some tiny bit to make a hole between the two. I had to trim the end of the stem (like I said above) to make it fit well. Then (a couple of months later) I melted some bees-wax over a candle, poured it into the hole for the 1/2" hole, and shoved the stem into the liquid wax. I used the match stick to keep the small hole in the bowl from getting clogged with wax, and then used drilled out the wax that got into the stem (only took a minute). The bees-wax made a great seal, and helped hold the stem in place much better than I had hoped it would! |
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| You can see from the picture that I had actually already wrapped the center of the spindle with a 6' leather lace. I just made ugly knots on the ends to tie it on, and then used some more bees-wax (since I melted more than I needed) to keep it in place. The ugly knots are no big deal, because they get covered up later. Next I cut a long strip off a piece of scrap leather and used that to lash the stem and antler firmly together. You wouldn't want to do this with a real pipe, because it makes taking it apart for cleaning pretty much impossible (especially after I glue the fur on later!) I just tucked the ends in nice and tight, and a little more bees-wax to hold things where they were (I only melted a couple tablespoons worth, but it was much more than I needed!) |
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| To decorate it more, and cover up the ugly knots I tied in the leather, I cut up the strip of fur and hot glued it around the pipe. I would have liked a better way to attach it (maybe tying it on with more leather lace, which I may add anyway), but hot glue was the direction I took at this point. |
| The feathers are just a couple of goose feathers, wrapped with some thread and tied on with another piece of scrap leather. |
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| The stand is just a couple of pieces of wood off the bottom of a country-rocker I picked up off the road (not pretty, but hey, I'm no artist here) with a small set of antlers (with another piece of fur glued to it, so you don't have to look at the nasty piece of skull still connecting them) attached to it by drilling screws through the back of the wood. Nothing special, but it got the job done quick. |
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