Making your own barrel

[Jimbo]

I can attest to the danger here just from cutting my JD staves longwise to make my 1x1 sticks. They're cupped and chamferred. Makes for a really squirrly cut up against a fence on a table saw

[jedneck]

Yup gotta watch them table saws. I got real lucky twice. We use hydroloc powered table saws at work and you can shove a 3 foot pine 2x6 through them fast enuf that they fly 10 feet across the room.
Cornhusker anybody that will ferment taters and yams can and will make a barrel. Fill one with yam juice.

[Appalachia-Shiner]

I was at the Buffalo Trace Distillery a couple weeks ago.
Home of Pappy Van Winkle
They are using Barrels which are Tongue in Groove for the Pappy Van Winkle. Not sure how long they have been doing it, but I was told they got tired of opening Pappy Barrels with only a couple gallons left in them.
They are trying to get less product loss due to leakage and evaporation.
Good Luck with the project.

[Truckinbutch]

MCH , I'm very impressed with your skills and tenacity .

[Halfbaked]

I have to agree with Butch

[MichiganCornhusker]

Tenacity... I like that. Like captain Ahab going after the white whale, that kind of tenacity, a sort of focused madness.
Honestly, I'm just going to enjoy the process to see how close I can come to something that will hold whiskey, and learn what I will along the way.
Nothing fancy has happened yet, just demo'ed the barrel, cleaned it up, and cut it into smaller pieces. The first real trick will be cutting each individual stave with its own unique set of bevels to make up a barrel the correct diameter.
I already have a fall back plan: Using one of the barrels as an insulating surround for a copper thumper I want to build for my potstill. It wouldn't need to be water tight for that, just look pretty.

[Truckinbutch]

Jeff , I can give you some hints on fitting joints and clues to a couple of simple 'old style' hand tools for cooperage . They are also pictured and defined in Elliot Wigginton's 'Foxfire Books'. Those staves are most effective if they only perfectly mate at the outside 1/4" or so when the barrel is assembled dry . That way , when they are soaked the edges compress to form the seal that will last until they dry out . Perfect dry fitted staves can , when they swell , develop enough outward pressure to cause a hoop to fail . A home made cooper's windlass and a croze will be your friends in conjunction with a draw knife .

[MichiganCornhusker]

Jeff , I can give you some hints on fitting joints and clues to a couple of simple 'old style' hand tools for cooperage . They are also pictured and defined in Elliot Wigginton's 'Foxfire Books'. Those staves are most effective if they only perfectly mate at the outside 1/4" or so when the barrel is assembled dry . That way , when they are soaked the edges compress to form the seal that will last until they dry out . Perfect dry fitted staves can , when they swell , develop enough outward pressure to cause a hoop to fail . A home made cooper's windlass and a croze will be your friends in conjunction with a draw knife .

Thanks, TB! You know, I always wanted a set of those books. What you say about the outside 1/4" makes sense with what I think I see on these staves as staining from the barrel contents. Looks like it was the outside edges that had the tight seal. I was hoping to achieve something like that by cutting the bevel angle back just a hair so that the outside edges would touch first and absorb most of the compression.

I was given a small used barrel, maybe 1 gallon, and I soaked the entire barrel submerged in a bucket of water for a week. It did exactly what you say, the swelling from the wood burst the middle hoops, and distorted the barrel.

I don't think there is any way I can do this in a traditional manner. I can't devote the time to develop those skills for what I'm doing. I'm hoping to cheat with some power tools and make something that might work. I have never been good at using hand tools or carving. It is a good idea to read up on the old school methods, though, to get an idea of what my goals should be. I'll check out the tools you mention for sure. I think the joint between the barrel heads and the groove at the ends of the staves will be my biggest challenge.

Thanks for the tips, please jump in along the way if anything else comes to mind!

[Truckinbutch]

Forming hoops are the first step if you are trying to duplicate a particular barrel size . Establish the od you want for top and bottom . Life would have been easier for you if you had scaled down the full barrel you had for a pattern to establish the tapers you needed to complete the circle . The 1 or two narrow staves are where you do your fitting to complete your circle . Modern barrel makers use cnc machines and steam presses to form staves .
Old time coopers rough tapered their staves or used patterns of their own making for uniformity . They assembled their barrels , sans top , and drew the top in with the cooper's windlass . These staves were not pre cupped . I think the tool used on the inside to make a smooth surface was called a skorp . The outside was rounded with a draw knife and final fitting before the top and last hoop were installed was done on the smaller staves . 3 dimensional compression and the consequent swelling from the introduction of moisture (soaking) completed the expansion and seal . The added compressive forces gained from the double taper enhanced the integrity of the barrel as opposed to straight staved cylinders reserved for cheaper goods .
>Transporters of goods were concerned with the integrity of their product , not the ease in which hired help could move it . Were cylindrical barrels as efficient in containing liquids as traditional double tapered barrels ; there would be no double tapered barrels .

[MichiganCornhusker]

Thanks for the Info TB. I did do some browsing last night and there are some fascinating videos on YouTube. I had to dig way down the pages but I saw some really interesting stuff and some highly skilled people working barrels.
The one thing they don't show is how they determine the shape of the flat stave, and how to put the right bevel on the edge in relation to the width of the stave. I saw a big ass machine that does it somehow, but no advice on how to do it in a crafty way. So I'm gonna wing it on this part.
Working with my CAD software, I can determine the right amount of bevel for a stave of a given width. My staves vary in width from just under 1" to 2-1/2" wide. The narrow staves need a bevel of about 4 degrees, and the widest ones need something more like 11-1/2 degrees on each edge. I have 81 staves for 3 barrels. I've gone through and sorted them from narrow to wide, and measured each small end. Using those dimensions, and the goal of a 12" dia barrel, I have come up with what I think are the correct bevels for each stave. I'm going to under cut all the bevels just a bit in the hopes that the outside edge of all the staves will take most of the compression as the barrel seals up. Looking forward to doing the cutting to discover if what I'm thinking will get me in a ballpark.

[MichiganCornhusker]

I cut all my staves down with the correct bevels on each edge. I got one barrel mocked up with some stretch film and it works out to exactly 12" O.D. when I make all the joints look as good as possible. Happy about that...
But, it doesn't really have a great barrel shape, more of an oak tube. I suspected this all along, but hoped that once I get a barrel together I would see a nice bulge. Not the case. The curve of the staves on a full size barrel doesn't translate to a smaller version. There is only about 1/4" of curve from middle of my smaller barrel and the end of a stave.
I took a circumference measurement at the end and at the middle of the barrel and I get a 1-1/2" difference. Hopefully that will be enough to make hoops that will work to compress the barrel together.

I still need to smooth out the edges of the staves, they are just rough cut on a table saw right now, but the joints don't look too bad. I'm not sure how much I can rely on the wood swelling to close gaps, so I'm going to make them as good as I can. If I end up needing to, I'll say it right now, I'm not above wrapping a bunch of Home Depot ratchet straps, as a permanent solution, around these things to get enough pressure to hold liquid. I'm not going to try to steam bend these suckers any more to get more of a curvature.

[Truckinbutch]

You have done well . Start banding from bottom to midline . Ratchet straps work well in in the place of a cooper's windlass . Use your croze to cut the lid groove And taper the rim of the lid to meet the top of the keg . Flat side up . Fitting the last band is going to be the biggest challenge . . The top is going to end up being the bottom and the last band is going to be the most difficult to fit . You will be amazed at how that dry wood swells when you soak if from inside and out with water .
>Another thought : with your woodworking skills , why not buy a cheap small keg and copy it's form to make your own ?

[MichiganCornhusker]

You have done well . Start banding from bottom to midline . Ratchet straps work well in in the place of a cooper's windlass . Use your croze to cut the lid groove And taper the rim of the lid to meet the top of the keg . Flat side up . Fitting the last band is going to be the biggest challenge . . The top is going to end up being the bottom and the last band is going to be the most difficult to fit . You will be amazed at how that dry wood swells when you soak if from inside and out with water .
>Another thought : with your woodworking skills , why not buy a cheap small keg and copy it's form to make your own ?

TB, I haven't made hoops yet. I did have a cheap keg that came apart from too much soaking in water. It was machined very much like the one I recharred and the full size bourbon barrel. I'm going to try to do something like I see going on with those.

One note, first: It was kindly brought to my attention that soapy water might not have been the best thing to clean the wood with. I scrubbed the mold and ash off the staves with a wire brush and some water with dish soap in it. I rinsed them off well, and since then I've cut about an 1/8" of each edge of each stave to get the new bevel I need for a smaller diameter barrel. I will also be sanding off the rest of the old char before assembling. With all that, and the fact that white oak is a closed grain wood, I'm not to worried about any soapy residue remaining in my barrel. BUT, I don't really think the soap was necessary either, so if I had it to do over I would just use water. I guess that mold just sorta freaked me out.

Tonight I tried to make some progress on the croze. I think that is what the groove at the ends of the staves is called. It's the notch that the barrel heads will seat into.

First, because I don't have any steel hoops made yet for the smaller size barrels, I made a plywood "hoop" by cutting out a circle slightly larger than the end of the barrel.
Then I hammered the plywood over the end of the barrel and held it in place with a few screws into the staves. I put one of these plywood clamp/forms on each end of the barrel.
Then i screwed a circular jig onto the top of the barrel and ran a router around it with a long straight bit to clean up a smooth surface inside the end of the barrel staves:

If you look close you can see how uneven the inside surface of the staves are:

Then I made another pass with a smaller router with a dado bit and created the croze.

All in all, I'm pretty happy so far with how it went. Making barrel heads the right size and shape to work with the croze will be the next, and probably hardest part. Still thinking about that one...

[Truckinbutch]

Beautiful work on your part Overkill when you consider the dynamics of wood expansion into voids . Angles tend to shove together to make seals when they get wet . A perfect machine fit is more likely to leak than a rough draw knife fit .

[ranger_ric]

Quite Impressive MCH...

[MichiganCornhusker]

Beautiful work on your part Overkill when you consider the dynamics of wood expansion into voids . Angles tend to shove together to make seals when they get wet . A perfect machine fit is more likely to leak than a rough draw knife fit .

Oh, I've left plenty of opportunities for the wood to swell up and do its part! I would have liked to do some angled cuts into the ends of the staves, but for this barrel I just used what I had at hand.
I wish I had the ability to handle a draw knife, or any kind of knife really. I just don't have that kind of finesse. I can't draw well, so I learned CAD, I can't paint a portrait, so I learned photography, I can't whittle, so I bought routers!
I have no illusions about reinventing the wheel here, my goal is simply barrel aged whiskey. My plywood "hoop" worked so well in fact, that I'm thinking about using them instead of steel. Would sure be a lot easier...

[Jimbo]

Barrel is lookin fantastic MC, almost done, hows that Yam juice comin along to fill that baby up?

[aquavita]

Tools - Time - Skill

Looking great.

[MichiganCornhusker]

Barrel is lookin fantastic MC, almost done, hows that Yam juice comin along to fill that baby up?

You know how many damn yams that would take??
Besides, I like my yam juice white.

[Jimbo]

You know how many damn yams that would take??

Scads of bags of damn yams?

[One leg up]

I have been thinking about making a barrel also. This is what my mind came up with.
Steam strips of oak into an arc of your choice with a jig. Then dry them out so the arc is there. Then make another sliding jig to run through the table saw at the appropriate angle then Band together. Presto. After its arced ,the cut is straight. And of course the size of barrel would be restricted by saw blade size. Please tell me where my mind went wrong.
I always separate my mind from me so I have someone to blame ....

[Jesse]

Hey! I'm not the only one doing something like this! Mine started as quarter-sawn oak boards, and was intended to be a gift for a good friend of mine at his wedding. Here's a couple shots of what I've done. Still a long way to go. This barrel is my second attempt, and it may take a third before I make one that holds liquid. Oh well, I enjoy the process...

I had to buy a band saw, planer/jointer, router, anvil, and some other miscellaneous stuff. Made a windlass (not pictured) with a cable winch, a router table jig for cutting the bevel on the head, and will probably have to make some more before I'm done. I'll add detail in another thread once I've got one done, but wanted to stoke the fires of interest here!

[MichiganCornhusker]

Your process sounds good to me, one leg up, pretty much how I'm trying to do mine. I had hoped the curve of a full size barrel stave would be enough, but you plan to steam bend will make a better looking shape. Pics!

Jesse, that is a totally legit barrel! How do you bevel the edges of the staves? Very cool.

[Jesse]

All of my staves are the same width, so require the same degree of bevel. For the first attempt, I used a tilt-head band saw to cut the outline and bevel in the same cut, then used a block plane to smooth the sides out. This method was far too imprecise when I did it, so the staves ended up being all different widths, and more importantly had their widest point at different spots along their length. When I went to form this one into a barrel shape, two-thirds of my staves cracked, despite taking a few hours to gently bend over a cresset (small fire in the center of the barrel to heat it and make it flexible).

For round two, I cut the outline with the band saw upright, and used a power jointer/planer to put the bevel on. I also modified my stave outline so that the curve was distributed along more of the length of the stave rather than concentrated near the center, as in my first barrel. Interesting side note- barrels for different purposes have different barrel shapes. If you compare a bourbon barrel to a Bordeaux barrel, the bourbon barrel is rounder when viewed from the side, with its curve well-distributed, whereas a Bordeaux barrel has more of the bend in the staves right in the middle. This one has gone more smoothly up until now, but it's still not perfect. I'm having a hard time pulling the very last of it together to get my final hoop on. I built a steam chamber with an electric boiler and a 55gal plastic drum, and while that helps a lot, I still haven't been able to bend the last bit.

If this one doesn't hold liquid, and it may not, I'm going to build a template jig for the router, and cut the outline and bevel on that. I also haven't quite figured out how I'm going to cut the chime, although I may have a go at doing it with the router like you did. Good work!

I read somewhere on here about making a slurry of white oak sawdust and water, and pouring that into cracks to help seal them up. After I can get my last hoop fitted I plan to do something like that. I'll keep you posted on how it works!

[jedneck]

MCH hows the barrel building coming along.
Jesse good looking work.

[MichiganCornhusker]

MCH hows the barrel building coming along.

Nothing new to report, jed. Unfortunately, I tend to get a hundred projects started and none finished.
I've also been working on a modular 2-keg rig that I could use for pot stilling, thumping, steaming, the whole works. Trying to incorporate as many of the great ideas I've seen on here in one machine.
And I'm trying to cobble together a little 2-plate flute from sheet copper that I had left over from building my pot still. Just something I could use to explore a little reflux stilling.
But, the biggest distraction has been work... lots of travel, lots of workin'. And, somehow, I need to squeeze in a batch of spruce tip beer because it is time!
But, I will be circling back the get a couple ends in the barrel and see if I can get it to hold whiskey soon.

[kmmuellr]

I've never brought a 7 year old thread back from the dead! Something new every day!

A friend (excellent woodworker and blacksmith) was over the other night and mentioned that he thought it would be cool to build a barrel after looking at one of mine in my cellar. I said you build it, and I'll fill it!

MCH, any updates on this? Jesse?

He's in California, and has access to a ton of what he called Black Oak. Says it'd be hard to get White Oak there unless it was from the lumber yard.

Any tips I can give him other than throwing this thread to him?

K