Patio Barrel
My garden has a bar so a barrel is a natural addition to the look. Thanks to my two children for buying it for me for Christmas and to my son for bringing it up to “concourse condition”. Whatever your purpose they add a point of interest and, if you follow these steps, can be functional too.
As with all projects it’s worth doing some planning beforehand..
Acquiring A Barrel
As you can imagine there are barrels and there are barrels. Garden centres sell half ones, either wooden or plastic, to be used as a planter - however you will need to shop around if you want to buy a complete one that will last. Mine was a genuine Jack Daniels barrel and still had 1½ litres of perfectly drinkable whiskey left in the bottom ! The staves are made of thick oak and had obviously been burnt before the whisky was stored in it to add to the flavour.
If you want to use the barrel for storage of things that you don’t want covered in black charred wood you will need to get a machine tool to do so. Perhaps a wire wheel but remember to wear a mask when doing this.
I wanted a shelf in mine so my son also bought that separately.
Over A Barrel
Last, but by no means least, is the top. I wanted a rim to stop glasses from easily being knocked off. I drilled four drain-holes to stop rain collecting.
However if you have a favourite bottle cap collection and/or other interesting artifacts like foreign money, unusual key rings, cigarette lighters etc then you can set these in resin in the top. It really adds panache.
I would just warn you to make sure that your barrel is seasoned before you do this because the wood is going to shrink and it may well crack the hardened resin.
Features
As you can see I have a door let into mine - plan this wisely because real barrels have staves of varying widths. As I’ve just mentioned they are likely to loosen over time and so the door, which may only have one or two fractional sections of hoop on the outside, will need to have extra strength added inside (central picture above).
Hoopla
When a cooper makes his barrels the hoops need to fit very tightly. Each riveted ring of steel is usually heated to a high temperature and dropped on from the end and pushed into place by a press. It then cools and tightens even more. If the oak staves have been made right the whole barrel seals. Great. In fact adding a water based liquid will make the wood swell and seal the staves even tighter.
Almost Symmetrical
Your barrel is most likely to be perfectly symmetrical in shape so that it rolls off the dray evenly. Except for two details.. At one end there will be a hole, usually bunged with a cork, for drawing off the brewers famous elixir and some wine barrels have another in the side that was used to fill the barrel when it was lying on its side. I suggest that you put the end hole downwards so that if it ever gets water in it will drain out. The hole is usually quite large so that you can have a cable supplying power or fairy lights entering there.
Finishing
The hoops are made of mild steel which will rust very quickly. Unless you intend taking them off (which I strongly discourage) you can only paint them on the outside. They will need priming and painting with a good quality outdoor metal paint. You must mask off the woodwork because the metal paint will stop any wood treatment from adhering. Once dry I then applied three coats of my favourite wood paint so that the barrel matches other items nearby. I used medium oak Fence Life by a well-known manufacturer.
Castors
This barrel weighs ~45kg. Even if you tilt it to roll it, to move it, you will scrape your slabs and the paint off the bottom of the barrel which will encourage rot. Therefore I invested in some sturdy black neoprene castors. These make the barrel a joy to position. Do ensure that they are as near to the edge as possible to mitigate the risk of the barrel being pushed over. I fitted three so that the barrel wouldn’t rock when not on a perfectly flat surface. If you are placing it on flat concrete then I’d suggest fitting four to give less distance between castors and therefore greater stability.
Here’s to your barrel of laughs !
You may want to add a shelf, a latch and/or a door handle or finger hole to open it. My son also supplied a pucker pub-style bottle opener !
Make It Useful
However I guess that not many of us are not going to be storing water based liquids in our barrels. In fact storing them outside, particularly in the summer sun, is going to dry the staves out and they will shrink. As the years pass that’s going to get worse although oak shrinks the least of all common woods. Therefore I strongly suggest that you buy some tasty little round headed screws and fix all of the staves in place before the whole thing starts to rattle and/or distort. The ones I used were black Japaned acquired from a company in Coventry.
Types Of Barrel
Extras
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