Roll out the Barrel!

Wow, I forgot to include the bourbon barrel liquor cabinet on the carpentry page. Egads, such an oversight! It’s there now along with a link to the build history.

I also refreshed the text on the ‘Home Improvement‘ page. It’s a bit clearer with a few more details.

Some details on the liquor cabinet…

The first step was cutting the hole into the barrel. The barrel was too heavy to move to the workshop, so I placed it on cardboard and did the cutting adjacent to the cabinet’s current home (upstairs kitchen area). I bolted the bands on either side of the hole to make sure they’d stay in place. Then…. Ever use a circular saw to cut through oak on a rounded surface while the whole thing rocked? Yeah, that made me nervous, but the result was so worth it.

The inside of of the barrel smelled like a rickhouse; it was still wet with a few bungs floating about from earlier samplings. It was an amazing moment.

The staves shifted over time in the dry Colorado air, so I continued to add authentic-looking bolts through the bands into the staves over the weeks that followed. The lowest band slipped off and hit the floor during a party (embarrassing!), but I later bolted it down too (so that won’t happen again!). In hindsight I’d add a bolt to each band/stave junction from the start.

The shelf is made from two barrel heads (lids) with a lazy susan between them. I had to eventually re-flatten the shelves since the drying wood curved them, compromising the lazy susan and bottle placement. The heads were originally held together tongue-and-groove (nothing else), so I used wood glue and a metal plate on the bottom to hold them together (and flatten them out).

I originally put wheels on the barrel (in the photos), but the barrel was too top-heavy so that didn’t last long.

I used painted metal bands on the inside of the door to retain the curve. And I tried a variety of gate hinges ’til I got it right. I finished it off with round glass on the top and bottom (since the inside charing can still dirty the bottle otherwise).

I learned a lot! And the next cabinet would require a lot less experimentation, but who needs two? And sorry, they’re too heavy to ship! 😉