US3053262A - Double flue pipe - Google Patents

Description

Sept. 1l, 1962 G. L. FALK DOUBLE FLUE PIPE Filed Aug. 25, 1958 GEORGE L FALK ,mwmmfuw ATTORNEYS United States Patent Oiice 3,053,262 Patented Sept. 11, 1962 3,053,262 DOUBLE FLUE PIPE George L. Falk, 9 Wilkins Place, Brockton, Mass. Filed Aug. 25, 1958, Ser. No. 756,764 1 Claim. (Cl. 131-201) This invention relates to smoking pipes and provides a pipe of an improved double flue construction which prevents the saliva from wetting the smoking tobacco, and precludes the noisome taste and smell attendant thereon. The pipe of the invention is distinguished by a simple clean design and is constructed in but two parts, whereby its manipulation is easy and certain and it can he readily and uniformly manufactured at low cost.

A principal source of irritation, in pipe smoking, is the possibility and tendency for saliva to flow from the mouth down the smoke flue to the bowl, and wet the unburned tobacco at the bottom of the chamber. The wetting is progressive, the saliva rising by capillary action in the tobacco and producing what is commonly referred to as a wet heel. Characteristic of a wet heel are both a rotten taste and stinky smell, resulting from the interaction of the saliva and tobacco chemicals, and a choking of the pipe. These conditions are often mistakenly assigned by the smoked to a poor quality of pipe or an inferior grade of tobacco. And the smoker is likely to attempt to correct them by tamping or packing his tobacco which, while normally effective to improve a poor draw, serves only to worsen the wet heel choking, because wet tobacco packs tighter than dry.

Moreover a substantial proportion-it may be as much as half-of the tobacco is prevented from burning and hence is wasted. The wetting of the tobacco also necessitates frequent relightings of the pipe, which come as interruptions additionally inconveniencing and irritating the smoker.

The pipe of the invention eliminates this wet heel problem by means of an improved double flue construction whereby the saliva is effectively diverted from the smoke flue and conducted through a drain to a separate well, in and from which it may be separately stored and cleared. With this double flue, separate well construction the obnoxious taste and smell of the saliva-wet tobacco are eliminated, as are the necessity for relighting of and the waste of tobacco, in a wet smoke. Instead, all the tobacco in the bowl burns with natural flavor and smell and `to a dry ash, and upon such complete burning and after the ash is dumped it leaves a dry bowl.

The'invention will be 4better understood from a consideration of the following specification taken in conjunction with the accompanying .drawing in which:

FIG. 1 is a Icentral longitudinal vertical section of the pipe;

FIGS. 2-8 are transverse sections taken along lines 2--2, 3-3, 4 4, 5 5, 6-6, 7-7, and 8-8 respectively in FIG. 1;

FIG. 9 is a top plan view of the pipe; and

FIG. 10 is a fragmentary horizontal section of the shank and stem showing optional features.

In the preferred embodiment herein disclosed the pipe comprises a bowl member 10 of usual exterior conguration such as adapting it to be held in the hand, and interiorly recessed to provide an open tobacco chamber 11 which is generally upright when the bowl is so held, and which, with the bowl, may be fashioned in different sizes. The bowl member comprises further an annular projecting portion or shank 12 extending laterally and opposite the bottom of chamber 11, which shank 12 will be the same size, with the diiferent sized bowls. The

bowl member 10 may be fashioned wholly or in the region of chamber 11 of briar, meerschaum or like material suited to smoking use.

The other of the two pieces or parts making up my improved pipe is a rubber or plastic stem member 13 which engages at one end and extends flush and aligned with the shank 12, and tapers from there to its other or mouth end 14. For economy in production, the stem 13, like the shank 12, is of uniform proportion, in the different pipe models.

At their engaged ends the shank 12 and stem 13 have one or more mating annular steps or shoulders, preferably as herein the telescoping step-shoulder pairs 15, 15', 16, 16' recessed and projecting on the saine, and proportioned for slide-seating and tapered for the desired frictioning or rigid interftting of the parts when closed to the butted or assembled position shown.

The stem 13 is seen from FIGS. l and 9 to be attened and widened at the mouth end 14, and there t0 mount lateral flanges 17 adapted to engage behind the teeth. In accordance with the invention the mouth end 14 and its flanges 17 are made concave, or curved conformantly to the front of the jaws, and they are also offset, the upper from the lower, in the same manner as are the upper and lower teeth, whereby said front teeth may comfortably bite on or against the same.

The pipe bowl has a lower draw or smoke passage or ilue comprised of a bore 18 extending from the base of chamber 11 through shank 12, and a connecting bore 19 extending through the main body of stem 13. Intermediate its length the smoke flue is stepped down, in the direction of the mouth end, and to present top and bottom shoulders or dams 20, 21.

The bowl shank 12 is further recessed to provide a well 22 underlying ilue passage 18 and which may extend under chamber 11, as shown. The well 22 is connected to mouth end 14 through a drain or saliva flue 23 underlying flue passage 19 and :having at least itsbottom wall inclined downwardly toward the well in the no1-'mal position of pipe use. Saliva flue 23 opensinto well 22 at the top thereof and, for convenience of disassembly of the pipe and of emptying of the well the reduced end of the stem, as seen in FIG. 1 as shoulder portion 24 underlying ue 23, is utilized to close the well 22 recess thereat.

At the mouth end the stem has a lateral rectangularly sectional passage 25 which is wide at the end and narrows toward the bowl, FIGS. 7-9. This mouth end passage 25 communicates with the smoke and saliva passages 19, 23 through an intervening or separating chamber 26. The smoke and saliva flues 19, 23 enter chamber 26 spaced by a vertical wall or dam '27, and may be said to terminate top and bottom at inclined or dam surfaces 28, 29 at the opposite end of said chamber 26, and the upper of which is located inward of the lower as shown, FIGS. 1 and 9.

My improved pipe has an additional drain passage 30 located at an intermediate point in smoke ilue 18, 19, and opening downwardly or emptying to drain flue 23, and thence ultimately to well 22. This drain passage 30 is seen to underlie shoulder 20 and to be at the mouth end side of shoulder 21. Further, it is smaller than, say, onehalf the size of, drain flue 23, and is inclined away from well 22 at, say, 45 to said flue 23.

Under the invention the construction and arrangement of the two lpipe parts is such that all of the above described passages are cut through but one of such parts, and cannot leak as may passages formed by recessing one or both faces of opposing parts.

The pipe is fitted also with a small fresh air vent 31 opening through the top wall of shank 12 to smoke flue 18.

If desired, the joint between shank 12 and stem 13 may additionally be sealed by a ring or washer 32, FIG. 10, engaged between the butt end faces of the outer stepshoulder 15, 16, and of softer material than the bowl and stem members whereby it is compressed when the parts are telescoped together.

When the pipe is smoked saliva passing through the passage 25 and entering chamber 26 will flow down surface 29 to flue 23, and will normally be stored in well 22. Should the bowl be waved about in gesturing, or be otherwise tipped up isuiciently to cause uid to escape or ow reversely from the well 22 or ilue 23, it will even then be prevented from coming into contact with the tobacco in chamber 11 by reason of its separation from the smoke in chamber 26 and by reason of the described dams 27, 28, 29 serving to divert the fluid there from the smoke ue 18, 19 and also from the passage 25. Moreover, if any uid should somehow get into land travel down the smoke ue it will be halted by dam 21 which will cause it to drop through drain 30 to drain flue 23 by which it will be conveyed to well 22.

If saliva is known or assumed to be in either of the smoke or drain flues 18, 19, 23 or in the well 22 its deliberate removal can easily be accomplished by holding the pipe by the bowl and with the stem j13 down, and snapping the pipe in the similar fashion as a thermometer or medicine dropper, which will be observed to clear or expel the uid from the ues through the mouth end.

Particularly where as here the well is closed at one end by the butt of the stem member, it is an easy matter to clear the fluid from the Well when the pipe is disassembled for cleaning or the like. As above mentioned the well may be emptied even Awithout pulling the bowl and stem apart, and merely by snapping the pipe with the stem down. The described snapping of the pipe will force all the uid in well 22 to pass out the mouth end passage 25 through saliva ue '23, fluid flow also reversely through drain being prevented by the above mentioned angular inclination of the same.

It will be appreciated also that by reason of the indicated construction of the well as a closed end recess there yis no tendency to withdraw the uid from the well in drawing or putting on the pipe.

It will be understood that my invention is not limited to the particular embodiments thereof illustrated and described herein, and I set forth its scope in my following claim.

I claim:

A smoking pipe comprising a bowl member having a tobacco chamber and a projecting shank, said shank being recessed to dene a well underlying said chamber; a stem member having a mouth engaging bit at one end; mating tapered formations on said shank and the other stem end and rigidly intertting said members; said stem member being recessed to define a separating chamber; a central flue opening from one end of said chamber through said mouth engaging end, upper and lower flues opening from the other end of said separating chamber through said other stern end, the upper flue being a smoke flue communicating with isaid tobacco chamber and the lower flue being a drain ue communicating with said well; said separating chamber having also an end Wall darn opposite said central ue and spacing said smoke and drain flues a bottom wall dam adjacent said central flue, a top wall dam inward of said bottom wall dam; a step intermediate in said smoke flue, said step extending downwardly in the direction of the mouth engaging end and presenting top and bottom shouldens; and a drain passage between said smoke and drain flues, said drain passage opening at a point in said smoke ilue which is intermediate said top and bottom shoulders, and causing any fluid which has traveled down said smoke ue from said separating chamber to said point thereupon to empty into said well.

References Cited in the tile of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 769,546 Koch Sept. 6, 1904 987,822 Perry Mar. 28, 1911 1,099,574 Sargent .Tune 9, 1914 1,335,312 Abernathy Mar. 30, 1920 1,503,629 Blomster Aug. 5, 1924 1,796,778 Bradshaw Mar. 17, 1931 1,801,428 Hostetter Apr. 21, 1931 2,134,197 Miller Oct. 25, 1938 2,305,190 Pasut Dec. 15, 1942 2,355,652 Irvin Aug. 15, 1944 FOREIGN PATENTS 344,979 `France Nov. 18, 1904 749,988 France May 15, 1933 12,873 Great Britain 1904 10,746 Great Britain 1906 214,438 Great Britain Apr. 24, 1924

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