If you grow up playing with a slingshot you may never learn how far and fast (and deadly accurate) a lemon-sized stone can be hurled with a fiber sling. I gotta tell you, Goliath was probably big but his forehead wasn't. Same with fishing - you can have a lifetime of pleasure from a big cane pole, a bobber and 20# test line but it won't prepare you for the kick of a 5-pound smallmouth on ultralight gear.

If you grow up smoking a Falcon pipe you will lean by default that is it a cool-smoking, consistantly tobacco-revealing pipe. I came late to Falcons but, after hearing complaints about how they perform, I have gradually come to my own conclusions. The Falcons is a light, versatile and practically bulletproof pipe. If it is taken on its' own terms the pipe smokes cool and, thereby, will reveal the best of hotter smoking tobaccos. If you have tried and failed with a Falcon, so have I. There was a time when I thought it was a chronically hot-smoking, hard-to-clean novelty that couldn't compare with conventional briar pipes. Well, I was right and I was wrong.

Wrong: it is neither chronically hot smoking nor hard to clean
Right: it is novel and does not compare well to most conventional pipes

Here's what a Falcon sort-of compares well to: a smaller bowled pipe with a wide open draw and slightly thin walls. Here's what my favorite flake pipes are: smaller bowled pipes with open draw and relatively thin walls. While large, thick-walled pipes make up for a multitude of overpuffing sins, little flake pipes need to be finessed. A thin walled Pete tankard is a drop-dead fantastic flake pipe but you cannot bully it like a heavy briar or a large meer.

There is a trick to getting a perfect smoke from a Falcon. If you don't grow up with one, you might not figure out that it doesn't smoke like a typical pipe. In fact, after smoking a Falcon like most briars once or twice you will probably blister your fingers and put the thing in a drawer. The thing about a Falcon is that the open-draw airhole is virtually unpluggable. For some reason this means that, after hard compression of the tobacco by filling or tamp, the pipe still draws. If you pursue a familiar somewhat restricted draw you may get it - but the tobacco will nonetheless be compressed like a rock. Draw on that for a minute and you will have a very hot pipe - too hot to hold, actually.

Finesse a Falcon. Follow a typical fill with light, infrequent tamps only when needed. Allow the open draw to reward you with easy, copius smoke after a couple of quick sips and, maybe, a puff. There is magic in a Falcon if you take it on its' own terms. You cannot bully the pipe - you need to smoke it gently, slowly and easily to see it shine something besides cherry red. I assure you it will reveal the best of hot-smoking tobaccos, any tobaccos really, if you learn the simple nature of this slightly different pipe.
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A falcon is a bird, right?
I never could keep em lit, but I have smoked a couple. Apple and cherry wood works well.
:-)
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Just got two with three bowls off of the auction site. Still haven't gotten the cake reamed out of them, but Moo, you're making me anxious to try them out. Thanks for the write up!
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Keep the threads on the humidome and bowl(s) clean after each smoke and you will not end up with seal problems; wipe out the humidome after each smoke and a paper napkin screwed down into the bowls airway keeps the hole clean and clear for next smoke. The cleaning process only takes a minute and returns a pipe that you can smoke over and over in any day. You are, however, married to a few paper napkins or tissues in your pocket (and a place to pitch them).
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The Falcon is a brilliantly engineered pipe. They do require a bit of a different technique than briars, but it can be very rewarding. I only own a few different metal pipes and one of them is a Falcon, there's a reason they have outlasted most other metal pipes.
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That's it, precisely, in fewest words. Concur.
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Englishes just taste better in my Falcon than in my Chacom. Don't need another reason to stick with it than that
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