Hi, this is Nick and John from Dust Projects.
Our motto is if we can do it you can!
This is a step by step tutorial type woodworking project about how to transform a wine barrel into a planter. You can use your own old wine barrel if you have one (in your backyard or garage), and repair/restore it to its new, clean, beautiful new life as a planter.
This project doesn't require any special tools or skills. Most of the tools used in this video are found in most households. Enjoy this DIY woodworking with your family especially now that is Christmas and have fun making a wine barrel to a planter. So let's get started with the step by step guide:
1) Mark where the opening for the flowers should be.
2) Secure with screws the metal rings.
3) Cut the metal rings so you have a clean opening for the flowers.
4) Make holes so the jigsaw can cut the wood plates.
5) Clean thoroughly the interior because later you will need to apply a water sealant.
6) Sand all the wood surfaces. This became a real challenge for us due to the very small spacing between the metal rings. At the end, we started using whatever we could find to finish the job. It turned out that the best solution for these small spaces was the angle grinder with a metal polishing disk on! Be very careful though, this tool sands heavily into the wood and if you don't use it lightly you will end up sanding a very large portion of the wood. Something else we noticed as we were using it, was that if we left it longer to one part of the wood the wood start to overheat and burn. So again, be very careful!
7) With the same metal polishing disk sand the metal rings till all the old corrosion is gone and then use a plastic-metal sander to polish the metal and remove any rough spots. It takes some time but its worth the result.
8) Paint time! Use a glossy wood varnish to come up with the best effect (we used beech tree glossy wood varnish). Make sure that you allow plenty of time for the first hand to dry and then apply a second hand and even a third if needed. For the metal rings, we used a mat finish metal varnish. This protects the metal rings from the elements and assures that your hard work cleaning and polishing the metal will remain unaffected for a long time.
8) Let the varnishes dry and then use a water sealant for the interior of the barrel. Apply a very thick coat as you will avoid any serious rotting problems in the future. Better safe than sorry!
9) Finally, create a suitable stand for the barrel. We used parts from its previous stand which was a double triangle base. We also added wheels so we can move it around.
That's it! You 're done!
Let us know if you have any questions and we hope that you will enjoy this project as much as we did!
