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For System fans, there is cause for rejoicing in this year’s new sterling Spigot System line, officially stamped with a Peterson (script) over SYSTEM and engineered with a System reservoir and P-Lip mouthpiece with graduated bore, the 3 requirements for any Peterson to be an authentic System.

I asked Conor Palmer if this meant that a spigot was finally being introduced officially into the System lineup, remarking that I didn’t see a SPIGOT stamp below or next to the SYSTEM stamp. I have been hoping Peterson was going to commit to a System Spigot since the appearance of some “picking stock” acrylic P-Lip System Spigots at the 2016 IPCPR.

Alas, no. The 2018 line is the successor to previous years’ spigot lines, the 2015 Nickel Spigot, the 2016 Roundstone Spigot and the 2017 Newgrange Spigot. Practically speaking, this means (if Peterson releases continue as they have over the past several years), that the System Spigot will be on the market until next year’s Spigot line appears.

It is nice to see the line with the hand-stamping, which includes the reverse side hand-stamped shape number.

The bowl’s inner  rim has been beveled, another indication of a mid to upper-grade Pete, giving it a classy look, as always. The gloss stain is officially dubbed “walnut,” but seems warmer to me, and looking at it with the naked eye in real life and natural light I’d call it mahogany red (Hex color #400303 for those so inclined) and one of the great things about the new line.

The vulcanite mouthpieces are both a blessing and a bit of a curse, at least to me. On the one hand, it’s great to have vulcanite. On the other, the current generation of vulcanite P-Lips are not comfortable and nearly impossible to clinch, especially in large sizes like the XL315 and 307 shown here. Conor and I actually had a long discussion about the degradation of the mouthpiece with its rounded top and lack of a clinching wall, and as usual with the good folks at Peterson, once it was understood that this was something that could be remedied and improved upon by using the available acrylic P-Lips (which are superb), Conor said that later in the year we should see the line with the improved acrylic mouthpiece. At that point, you’ll find me looking for this “big apple” 03, a Pete classic since 1979 (if I can hold out that long):

The hallmarks, as you can see (above), are clear and crisp. Notice the · before the 925 has been removed by the Goldsmiths of Dublin. I think this is something new in 2018, but I’ll have to go back and check to make sure. The hallmarking is placed on the bottom of the ferrule, centered quite nicely, with the Peterson’s script over DUBLIN stamps atop the ferrule, also quite nicely centered (shown below). The mount itself is not what I described on earlier sterling-mounts as a “Hinch mount”—a snub-nosed bullet shape—but a softly squared affair. For reasons known to the Assay office in Dublin, only two of the three hallmarks seem to be required on the spigot.

I know die-hard System freeks will be on the lookout for these, and those looking for a 9mm version are in luck this year, as the line is also available in 9mm. Price looks to be about $170 or so in the US.

Peterson chose a pretty decent cross-section of shapes, as you can see above, although I wish that instead of issuing both the extra-small shapes (the 314 and even tinier 317), they’d opted for the 312, which after the demise of the 309 has become one of my all-time favorites in recent years–it’s a Charles Peterson patent shape, of course, but it’s also just so incredibly versatile, handling any tobacco you can think of with ease and excellent smoking properties.

With thanks for Conor Palmer, as always,
and to Chas. Mundungus
and Smokingpipes.com

Subversive Tin Talk #3*
(download and spread the word: pipe-smoking is good thing)

*TIN TALK is a service of Petersonpipenotes:
“Stick it to the man.”