Brewroom Build!

Hey guys, glad I am finally able to post this. After a long wait the construction on the brewroom (note: this is not a brewery indoors, just a place that fermentation and storage of equipment and bottles will be held) has begun and is taking shape in leaps and bounds.

This all started when we got the idea that we were going to use the spare bedroom in the basement "for something." We toyed with the idea of having it as a work room with tools and everything, but it was only 80sq ft. Not large enough at all to build much of anything. We thought maybe we'd make a wall rack and have some wine there on hand. Nah... too expensive to buy commercial wine. So one day I told my brother (we live together) that I thought we should make it my brewroom to get all of my equipment out of my bedroom and the kitchen. And with that little seed planted, it was off to the races!

I had a stroke of luck last week Friday, had a meeting to go to at 9am-noon and I was off for the rest of the day, which was nice because I also had Saturday and Sunday off (not a common occurance for the company I work for). But the real kicker was I also did not have to work Monday. Wow, nearly a 4 day weekend and an almost empty Home Depot credit card? Oh man this is going to be epic I thought.

We already have a Hobbit door entrance to the Mancave in the basement, which is a 6' round entrance way into the downstairs living room where we have a huge "L" couch, a 65" DLP TV hooked to X-Box 360 and my Computer (ever cruised the internet on a 65" monitor? Its the best thing ever!) Fish tanks, plans for the bar, etc. This room is THE hangout in the house. I rarely if ever sit upstairs watching TV anymore. So, with this in mind, we had to make the brewroom just as special, but how do you top a 6' Round door frame in coolness factor or even match it? Well, you put a Diagonal wall up with Sconces on either side of the doorway and devise a really cool stone (maybe) wall covering that greets you as you face the entrance to the brewroom.


Round Door way- note in the background the spare bedroom as it was.




What follows is as best as I can document the build. For now I have just a few shots of the progress using my cellphone camera. Both of our other Digicams shorted out, so this will have to do until I steal my girlfriends digicam

Pics here shortly.

Thats a cool doorway. It kinda reminds me of a submarine.

More pics to follow.

The doorway was the Pièce de résistance. Great drunken idea if you ask me.

Looking good, I wish I had an extra room to devote to beer!

Man, I would have a hidden doorway for that business.

you need to make a door that looks like the top to an oak barrel. That would be sweet. :rockin:

Ill bet you were watching "Lord of the rings" when you came up with this.. Looks cool!

I Would Kill To Have That Door In My House!

FSR, We are open to ideas. We were thinking roughsawn wood for the door with bark and stuff still hanging off it.

Berserker, trust me, it was not difficult to make that door frame. I swear to you it cost me $30 in wood and $150 in C-clamps and Spring clamps. I could detail the process of building the frame for anyone interested. I do have pictures of that. PM if interested.

On and lol that everyone is more interested in the round door to the mancave than they are of my brew room!

Looks like a hobbit door from down on the shire.

It is a Hobbit door

Maybe this is not the exact place to ask this but, I have a question about the fermentation chamber I plan to build in the brew room. I plan to get one of those mini fridges to regulate the temp in the ferm-chamber. Nothing like doing lagers or anything, maybe mid 60's or so to stay away from esters, but thats beside the point. Lets say I have 2-3 batches fermenting in there, and there is a lot of CO2 gas emitted. Would I or should I even worry about the amount of CO2 generated in such a small room building up to dangerous levels?

RedIrocZ-28 said:

It is a Hobbit door

Maybe this is not the exact place to ask this but, I have a question about the fermentation chamber I plan to build in the brew room. I plan to get one of those mini fridges to regulate the temp in the ferm-chamber. Nothing like doing lagers or anything, maybe mid 60's or so to stay away from esters, but thats beside the point. Lets say I have 2-3 batches fermenting in there, and there is a lot of CO2 gas emitted. Would I or should I even worry about the amount of CO2 generated in such a small room building up to dangerous levels?

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The room is not air tight and "new air" will be introduced every time you walk in. It will be fine.

Yeah, thats what I thought really, but I wanted to make sure. I would have done a test myself with a trash bag sealed over an airlock and then calculated the CO2 volume vs. the airspace within the room but I seriously can't brew anymore for like a few more weeks. Completely out of fermenters! Thats a good thing right? Once everything is bottled I'll have north of 12 cases of beer on hand.

Dude... just post the round doorway pictures/ process here. It's your thread about your build... and the round doorway is a big part of it!

xxdcmast said:

Thats a cool doorway. It kinda reminds me of a submarine.

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You have obviously never lived on a submarine . Make it 3 feet in diameter, put a watertight door on it, and paint everything grey. Then it would remind me of a submarine.

RedIrocZ-28 said:

Yeah, thats what I thought really, but I wanted to make sure. I would have done a test myself with a trash bag sealed over an airlock and then calculated the CO2 volume vs. the airspace within the room but I seriously can't brew anymore for like a few more weeks. Completely out of fermenters! Thats a good thing right? Once everything is bottled I'll have north of 12 cases of beer on hand.

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Sweet bring some to my place next Saturday (first Saturday of April) I'll be brewing and you're more then welcome to show up.

That round door is sweet!

FSR402 said:

Sweet bring some to my place next Saturday (first Saturday of April) I'll be brewing and you're more then welcome to show up.

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where would that be exactly? since i offered to at least come and watch

Yea that round doorway is awesome, and I agree making a door like a barrel would be even more awesome.

FSR, I work retail cellular sales, which means I have no idea when I will be working from one week to the next. If I can, I would really like to come see your setup and hang out for a bit. I'll look for your other post to see time.


Ok, the round doorway pics, I'll have to dig them out. But remember, the round doorway is the mancave entrance, the brewroom is across the way. I was going to get pictures last night but the GF and I had an issue we needed to hash out.

Pics in a sec!



You begin by making a template to work with. I chose 2 sheets of 3/4" plywood joined together at the seam to make a full 8'x8' workspace. I then traced a circle with a Diameter of 6', using a radius of 3' (obviously). It took me the better part of a half hour to cut out the form I would use for the round door frame. I took the utmost care in following the line so the circle would be as perfect as I could make it. (This showed through inthe final product. It is only 1/4" out of round across its 6' span.)

Here you see the 6' circle, with holes drilled in it to use for the C-clamps and the boards attached to the underside so there was a place to lay the ply's of plywood as they were consecutively wrapped around the form.

You then begin by bending the first 2 layers of plywood strips around the form. You must do 2 because you have to put glue in between them and clamp them down to the form as you go.






First 2 rows completed.

Begin building up the layers, here I think layer 3 was started.


more layers



more still

Dad checking the clamps and for any gaps that would need to be filled with glue and re-clamped




Amlost done with the 7 layer thickness



Finished

free standing in its new home




Construction of the bracing begins






Here is Josh, admiring. Almost done with the braces and then drywall time.



Thanks for following along.

Can you tell we are all a bunch of happy people that drink a lot? Thats my dad and my friend Mike.

Definitely conceived under drink. It looks awesome!

Oh, trust me, the brewrooms diagonal wall was conceived under drink too. I really want to get pics up of the brewroom but I have had some things to deal with lately. Plus working retail hours is not conducive to getting anything done during the week.

That has got to be one of the coolest things I've ever seen! Can't wait to see it when it's complete........so jealous.

VERY COOL!


+1 on building a cool "barrel-style" door

Green door. Gold knob, centered.

How about a bank vault styled door.

Thats what I plan on doing. My brother on the other hand just yesterday expressed his thoughts on "not even doing the door now, we don't need it."

I was like, uhh... I have been planning the door for a year, what kind of wood, where to get authentic looking hinges, the knob, the latch mechanism... and then he springs this on me? I think I'll build it anyway.

But thats beside the point! This is not even a part of my brewroom!!! The brewroom is on the other side of the hall. And I need to decide whether or not I am going to get a fermchamber that will be housing a 15gal conical and 4-5 other carboys/buckets or not. I wonder if one of those little mini fridges would be able to do the job, keeping that much space at about 65*?? Anyone?

I would think mini-fridges and/or a big freezer would do what you need.

Ok good. Now, on to the final part of my brewroom build thats not been explored yet. I was thinking that I will want to do some brews indoors come winter time again, but I am not plumbing gas lines into a bedroom for a stove, Soooo.... I was thinking of doing a brew kettle with a coil in it to boil wort like the guys building a HERMS.

It will be nice because there will not be a gas flame burning for over an hour, heating the hell out of my 90sq ft brewroom. Now I just have to research the best way of building this setup.

I would take a look at The Pol's electric boil conversion thread. The PID/SSR setup is pretty easy and inexpensive.

diatonic said:

You have obviously never lived on a submarine . Make it 3 feet in diameter, put a watertight door on it, and paint everything grey. Then it would remind me of a submarine.

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I used to live on one... yup... nothing like a submarine because it doesn't have a screen door

RedIrocZ-28 - Thanks for posting up the door making in progress, very nice. I think just buying that many clamps would break my piggy bank.
Please keep the pictures coming, it is really great to see.

Awesome awesome awesome. I might steal the laminating idea for some supports around my house.

Damn, that's awesome.

Unbelievable! Also thanks for the extra pics on the door design/assembly I do think an oak barrel top would be primo for the door. I was over in germany and remember checking out the hundreds of gallons wooden casks out, they had top diameters in the neighborhood of 12-20 ft though Those germans do love their beer.

One day very soon we will be doing a door much like you see in the Shire, which is of course just like an Oak barrel top.

There will be photo updates tonight, I got the GF to bring her camera over last night and I took a bunch of pics of the progress. It will look like quite a leap because work progresses quite quickly around there when I have a couple days off. The electrical is done, the walls are all drywalled and mudded, all that needs to be done is sanding and paint! Then its on to the little things like deciding what beer I will brew first and put in my ferm-chamber.