Let me start buy saying its not bad to be in the market for a china piece some of us cant afford to blow several hundred dollars on high end stuff. I have noticed quite a few posts lately about bongs that turned out to be painted so I figured I would make a thread about what I have observed about painted and colored glass china tubes. Hopefully it will help those who are in the market for a budget tube like I was when I bought mine. So I will list a few pointers for spotting painted tubes and include a few pictures some mine some from others I have seen on here. Lets Start Off with my old tube. Take note the Joint is a dead match for color of the bottom. Also take note that the color of the glass isn't lighter as the base thins out. Look at the slide see how the tint fades where the join was welded on that means this part is actually colored glass. This tube which also has a colored joint was discovered by the owner to be painted. After taking about an hour with hot water and scrubbing with a Magic Eraser this shows you what was painted and what was not. I don't have a good picture to illustrate this but the first area I noticed where paint was peeling was on the base where is made contact with what ever surface it was on. Turn the tube over are there any voids in the color? Take a look at this tube the joint being clear and the tube being frosted tell me that its not painted and actually constructed from colored glass.