Quote Originally Posted by bluenoser View Post
Straight or bent, other than appearance is there a difference in how they smoke? benefit from one or the other?
The biggest benefit I find from a bent pipe is its ease to clinch. Bent pipes have a great center of gravity and clench a lot easier than a straight pipe does. So if you are going to be using both your hands a lot or will be moving about a bunch, a bent pipe can be handy. On the other side, extreme pipe bends make it almost impossible to pass a pipe cleaner down to the bowl, so if it is gurgling you may have some issues.

I would say 99% of it comes down to aesthetics in the end though. I, for instance, much prefer a straight pipe to bent. I find a stout straight pipe to be far more masculine than a bent one. I would say my pipe collection is around 90% straight to 10% bent.