How to Repair Barrels?

[Bee]

I have a barrel with a broken stave and it gives up a lot to the angels.
How would I replace that stave? What tools do I need?

[SW_Shiner]

How bad of a break? Would it be possible to fill the crack with bees wax?

[Saltbush Bill]

Id try and find a Cooper to fix it, replacing one stave is going to be tricky imo.
But then, nothing ventured , nothing gained.
There is a whole lot of stuff on Youtube about Coopering , some not so good,some excellent, there should be at least one that covers this subject.

[Yummyrum]

There was a topic on here recently about replacing a cracked stave in a barrel . Fella did it himself IIRC .

EDIT : this one by Powder Monkey

viewtopic.php?p=7819590#p7819590

[Powder Monkey]

Yummyrum posted the link from my experience. I’d encourage you to try taking it apart. Kinda frustrating but with good preparation and a plan it’s not too bad. What size barrel? Post a pic where it’s leaking as fixing it is somewhat dependent on location.

[Bee]

It's 10gal and it has 3 that are cracked, but this one looks the worst. Right in the middle. I've worked beeswax into it such that the last draw I took out of the barrel had a chunk of wax in it.

[Powder Monkey]

Oof. That looks like a big crack. In my n=2 experience I’d try taking the barrel apart and see if the crack is full or partial thickness. I’d see if I could work beeswax into the crack further than you could do unassembled. Then I’d reassemble and see if the leak is reduced. You’ve gained knowledge on how to take apart/put together the barrel and if it leaked worse you could cut it up for aging sticks etc.

What I learned was to label all the staves as well as the barrel head orientation. This helped minimize the differences with reassembly. Check out my thread for pics. It really was simple tools. Heavy hammer and I ground down a heavy screwdriver to a flat hoop pounder.

If that doesn’t work you could follow my lead for full stave replacement attempt. It’s doable, requires tools and a bit of finesse but I was a great learning experience for me.