Hey!

First of all I wanted to say, that I'm from Latvia, so I'm sorry for my english.

This is a quite detailed, step-by-step instructable about pipe making. I am not a professional, I just wanted to try my skills.

First step is to choose the wood for your pipe. In my case the most suitable was briar. I ordered wood and stems from ebay for good price, 10 pcs of briar wood and 5 pcs of ebonite stems for 40 EUR (55 USD).

There are many woods that are good for pipe making, for example cherry or wallnut e.t.c, so there are many choices.

Tools you'll need:

A power drill,
A saw. There are different kinds of saws, but I used just regular wood saw.
Some kind of grinder, or grinder wheel
Files
Sandpaper

Step 1: Getting Started

First step is to choose what kind of form your pipe will be, however in the process of making your plans might change.

I started with drilling all the necessary holes.

I used some regular duct tape to see how deep i have to drill.

The main problem with drilling is to drill the holes in right depth, otherwise the wood will be too thin and the pipe will burn out.

Step 2: Rough Sanding

After the stem is inserted (it also required some minor filing, to fit it into the wood) you can begin sanding process.

I used this power tool (don't know how it's called) for rough sanding.

It's the same problem like with driling, you have to be gentle. If wood on the sides is made too thin it will burn out.

Step 3: Adjusting Form

When it's roughly sanded, it's time to adjust the form of bowl and stem, and the hardest part, to get rid of gap between the stem and bowl.

Step 4: Final Sanding and Polishing

The last thing to do is to sand out all marks from rough sanding an polish the pipe.

In my case, I sanded out as much as I could, but I didn't polish it, simply because I don't have the wax that's required for polishing. Another possibility is to varnish coat it, but in that case the pipe is less natural and it's more risky because of the harmful fumes.

It was a fun project for me, I will surely make more pipes. This one is my second pipe. The first one also turned out quite well.

Thanks for reading!