A Bentley Lovat Restoration

Photographed and written by

John M. Young

The next pipe in que for the workbench is this cute little Bentley Lovat. Once again I have chosen a pipe to restore that appears old, beat up, dirty and has little information concerning its origin story. Yay ( feel free to read with extra sarcasm). The pipe itself is good looking, well good looking if you use your “imagination”. Structurally it was sound with well centered drillings and nice proportions. The stamps are BENTLEY on the left shank and ALGERIAN BRIAR over FRANCE on the right.

Below are some photos taken of the Bently prior to working on it.

Trust me, there is a pretty little pipe there. In planning the restoration in my mind, I saw the usual cleaning and stem oxidation removal. I also say the filling of pits and blemishes and a contrast staining to bring out the naturally occurring grain. I will be sad to see the stem logo disappear but it was only painted on, not stamped and will not make it through a deoxidation process.

Background on Bently pipes

I turned first to pipedia.org for a search of Bentley. There is a short article on Bentley, “This is the production Brand of Hans Jonny “Former” Nielsen. When the U. S. pipe demand for quality handmade “freehand” pipes diminished, W.Ø. Larsen in Copenhagen sent their several workshop pipemakers home to work out of their house. Former who was the Larsen foreman at the time, eventually went to Germany and started the Bentley line of production pipes made on frasing machines, several at a time. Some years ago he returned to Denmark with this type of equipment and continues to make these production pipes in his current workshop in between making his famous handmade pipes.

Bentley could also be a name of a line of Kaywoodie seconds.” (Bentley – Pipedia)

The last sentence of the quote is most applicable to the Bentley that I have in hand. The aforementioned Bentleys sound like much higher quality pipes than this little lovat. Next I turned to a search of Kaywoodie, again in pipedia.org. I could find no mention of Bentley in a search of any Kaywoodie pages. Things that make you say “Hmmm.”

I then went to pipephile.eu to look for logos. This pipe had a circle logo containing a “B”. of the several circle B logos none of them matched. Search for Bently did meet with several suspects.

Very unlikely.

2. This one has potential. The BENTLEY stamping looks very similar to the stamp on the lovat but the stem logo is completely different.

3. Very unlikely.

4. Stamping here is lower case except for the “B”and the stem logo is missing the circle.

5. Unlikely. Country of manufacture (COM) is England. The Bentley lovat is france.

6. OK, so maybe it is a Kaywoodie second but, does Kaywoodie have any ties to French made pipes? According to the below, yes. They are both stamped Kaywoodie. This might not be the case if a pipe were a true second as “KAYWOODIE” would not necessarily be present on a second.

Conclusions: This Bently lovat is stamped BENTLEY, ALGERIAN BRIAR over FRANCE and it is a pipe. Thank you Captain Obvious. Seriously that is all I can say with certainty. It is a pipe, made in France from Algerian briar.

The Restoration

This restoration started with a clean denim piece then reaming of the tobacco chamber.

The reaming went well except that the chamber is drilled with a size that is just a smidge too tight for the PipNet #2 blade. The General triangular scraper was used then followed by the sanding with 220 sandpaper wrapped around a wood dowel.

The tobacco chamber was in great condition with no sign of any heat damage or careless scraping with sharp pointy knives. The rim on the other hand needed some attention from a sharp knife. I moistened it with saliva and scraped it with a sharp pocket knife.

After the scraping it looked much better and only showed a bit of rim darkening.

The stummel was taken to the sink for a scrubbing with undiluted Murphy’s Oil Soap and a medium stiff toothbrush. The soap was rinsed with warm water and the stummel dried with a cotton hand towel. Back at the workbench, I started picking the old fill material out of the pits.

Before repairing the pits I started cleaning the shank airway. The draft hole from the tobacco chamber was normal size then it widened considerably in the shank. My nylon shank brush was too thin to be very effective. I had to use two doubled over bristle pipe cleaners bent together to fashion a scrubbing tool. I poured 3-4 ml of ethyl alcohol into the chamber and allowed it to flow into the shank. I then used the two doubled over pipe cleaners to scrub the airway with the alcohol. Cotton swabs were then used to remove the remaining alcohol. This was repeated several times until the cotton swabs returned clean.

After the shank was cleaned I turned my attention to the stem. For such a short piece of rubber it certainly was dirty. Bristle pipe cleaners dipped in 95% ethyl alcohol were used to clean the airway of the stem.

The exterior of the stem was lightly sanded with a 400 grit sanding sponge then it was submerged into the Before and After Deoxidizing solution. I planned on leaving it in the solution for 2-4 hours.

This allowed plenty of time to fill the newly excavated pits. I used a fly tying bodkin to apply a small drop of brown cyanoacrylate (CA, super glue) to the pit. I then took a pinch of briar dust and pressed it into the CA filled pit. The briar dust combined with the CA and cured almost instantly. The new fill was then filed with a flat needle file flush with the surface of the stummel. A second small drop of CA was applied with the bodkin. While the CA was wet I sanded the area with a 400 grit sanding sponge. The briar dust from the sanding and the dust on the sponge combined with the CA to fill any remaining rough spots or slight depressions. The new fills appeared dark brown.

Oh yeah, I forgot to say that I covered the stamps with painters tape to protect the stamps from sanding.

The stummel was ready to have its grain accentuated. Due to budget cuts the same paper towels have remained on the dying station for a few restorations. Okay, maybe I’m just too lazy to lay down fresh clean ones. The plan was to use Fiebing’s Leather Dye to dye the stummel black. Sand away the dyed surface leaving the black dye on the softer grain where it had penetrated deeper. Then apply a light brown dye over the black adding a more yellow color to the non-blackened briar. The taped stamps would hopefully keep the black from giving the stamps an “Censored” bar appearance.

The black was wiped with cotton balls soaked in 99% isopropyl alcohol to remove the black dye from the surface.

The stummel was then taken to the workbench and sanded with a 320 sanding sponge to remove the outer layer of black dyed briar. After the sanding the stummel was again dyed but this time with light brown Fiebing’s Leather Dye.

After the light brown had dried I lightly sanded with a 400 sanding sponge. Below you can see the effect that I was hoping to achieve compared to the original surface.

The stummel was then sanded using the sequence of sanding sponges 600-3500. Between each sponge the stummel was wiped with a make-up pad wetted with alcohol. Oh yeah, I forgot to say that I reapplied the painters tape to protect the stamps.

Then the stummel was polished with micro-mesh pads from 4000-12000. Again between pads the stummel was wiped with a make-up pad wetted with alcohol.

The stummel then was coated in Before and After Restoration Balm and allowed to sit for 30 minutes.

I retrieved the stem from the deox, that is my term for the Before and After Deoxidizing solution. The excess solution was allowed to drip back into the jar. The stem was then rubbed vigorously with a coarse shop rab to remove remaining solution and help abrade oxidized vulcanite. A pipe cleaner was used to clear any deox solution from the airway. I then scrubbed the stem with Soft Scrub applied to make-up pads. Energetic scrubbing with the Soft Scrub removed the oxidized material.

Since this stem is so short there was very little room to work with the sanding sponges or the micro-mesh pads. I took the stem to the buffer and tried to polish it with a flannel wheel and red buffing compound. This worked but did not have the finish that the sponges and pads would have achieved.

30 minutes later the Restoration Balm was wiped from the stummel using an inside out cotton athletic sock.

All that remained was to give the pipe several coats of carnauba wax with the buffer.

This little Bentley lovat of unknown origins is nevertheless an adorable pipe. The briar took the dye as I hoped it would and now sports a lovely contrast dye that accentuates the grain. The stem, though short, cleaned up well and works well with the dark contrast of the briar. The draw is smooth and promises to be a delight to smoke.

The dimensions of this Bentley Lovat are:

Length: 4.95 in./ 125.73 mm.
Weight: 0.94 oz./ 27.00 g.
Bowl Height: 1.71 in./ 43.43 mm.
Chamber Depth: 1.50 in./ 38.10 mm.
Chamber Diameter: 0.79 in./ 20.01mm.
Outside Diameter: 1.17 in./ 29.72 mm.

I do hope that you have found something here useful to your own pipe care, maintenance or restorations. If you like this sort of thing, please click the like and subscribe buttons. Thank you for reading the ramblings of an old pipe lover.

Below are some photos of the finished Bentley Lovat.