Beer Cellar Project

mullerbrau 2013-03-12 02:15:03 UTC #1

A little bierporne for you guys. It all started with a small leak in my cement wall in the basement closet. One of the rod holes from the forms used to pour the wall 37 years ago started to leak. I had to remove the drywall, vapor barrier and insulation to get at it and plug with hydraulic cement. The wall was so cold that I decided to make it my new fermenting room and beer cellar for the big beers. I removed the studs and built a bottle storage L-shaped shelf system from MDF with my stacked dado on the table saw. Below is the finished project. It holds 22's on the bottom and top shelves and 12-16 oz bottles on the middle four rows. Capacity is 504 bottles if I stack two deep and close to 700 if I go 3 deep on the middle four rows. Also, the very top is great for holding 23 growlers. The temperature has been holding steady in the mid to upper 50's.

A YouTube video tour of the beer cellar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vagBZ2O6B1M

cliffordbrewing 2013-03-12 02:21:48 UTC #2

That's beautiful! Being west coast born and raised, my first thought was "that's going to make for a lot of clean up after a quake..." but I guess that's not much of a problem on your side of the country. You've got a fantastic selection of great brews on that wall.

gregscsu 2013-03-12 05:42:12 UTC #3

So, AWESOME.

I love how the moment if was finished you already had enough homebrew to fill it too.

baratone_brewer 2013-03-12 10:58:24 UTC #4

Very impressive! Great way to make the best out of a bad situation.

inhousebrew 2013-03-12 12:40:21 UTC #5

Wow! I would love to get to that point some day where I just have all that beer laying around. I'm starting to get there, in a more unorganized fashion, with homebrew but right now I buy a good beer I drink a good beer. Budgetary restraints.

mullerbrau 2013-03-12 16:35:03 UTC #6

Thanks guys. This was a very fun and rewarding project. Probably better than half of the beers shown are purchased. I like to do a lot of vertical tastings of big beers from one year to the next. Remember, I still have 21 kegs to fill the main needs of me and my friends. What kegs don't fit in the kegerator (6) and keezer (6) can sit in the beer cellar for bulk aging.
I think I will put my large fermenters in there for the first week or so of fermentation to help keep the temps at bay. Then I will move them back to the shelf in the closet under the stairs afterwards so they are easier to keg.

mrv 2013-03-13 03:45:07 UTC #7

That's great! Looks like you need to put some vault doors in for security.

mullerbrau 2013-03-13 12:44:00 UTC #8

I thought about glass doors. That would look cool.

bdaugherty 2013-03-18 03:22:41 UTC #9

Nice job Greg. I can show my wife this video and say look I'm not in as deep as this guy, he's remodeling his basement to store more beer. :cheers:

mullerbrau 2013-10-08 00:46:16 UTC #10

I thought I should share a little update I did last weekend. My wife really thought it would be cool if we got a glass sliding patio door to close off the beer cellar and it would also make a nice display. I ordered this vinyl door from Lowe's and the graphics from a local sign shop. I'm still shocked that she pushed me to cap it off this way. Anyway, I thought it would be a good post to finish with a few final pictures. (btw, Bierkeller is German for Beer Cellar)

stealthcruiser 2013-10-08 20:18:38 UTC #11

Looks great!

No concern about the ambient light getting to your beers?

mullerbrau 2013-10-08 21:37:35 UTC #12

Thanks! No concerns as all of the beers are in brown bottles.

nfctinken 2013-10-09 16:45:20 UTC #13

All I can say is, very nicely done!

mullerbrau 2013-10-09 21:37:53 UTC #14

Today was my lucky day. I stopped in at Champanes in Warren and they had 2013 Bell's Expedition and Third Coast Old ale coming off the truck. I snagged a case of each as well as some Oskar Blues Ten Fidy RIS and can't wait to see if it will fit in the Bierkeller. $151 lunch to a good cause. :cheers:

itspossible 2013-10-27 05:53:54 UTC #15

Nice operation.
I have a 55bt wine chest and only cellar wine as I am not the biggest "cellarable" beer fan**. But I have tasted many aged big beers that knock my socks off. I just haven't put the effort into aging many myself and don't brew many beers over 1.060. Once in a blue moon I make a style such as a tripel or RIS that is still "easy drinking" at 1.075+ but it is kegged or quick growler'd and drank within 6-12mo.

**At this time.
When time/ money permits or tastes change I will move towards a build similar to house all my "consumables" I have pondered even larger setups and find that yours is "just right" you can fit many wines and plenty beers and it is not a major cost/ labor undertaking. Thanks for the post/ photos the glass doors are classy.

mullerbrau 2013-10-27 16:29:56 UTC #16

Thanks. One finishing touch I did last weekend was to switch to dimmable LED lighting and a motion activated dimmer auto on/off. It remembers the last dimmed level and shuts the lights out 5 minutes after the room is vacant.

jaygtr 2013-11-09 16:34:54 UTC #17

If you have a few spare slots, it might be a good idea to just grab a couple commercial RIS or Barleywines and toss them in there for 6 months or a year. It's really amazing the difference a little time can make with a big beer.

mullerbrau 2013-12-01 18:36:27 UTC #18

One last upgrade if you can stand it. My son came home from Chicago for Thanksgiving and since he's a chip off the ole block, we needed a project. It seems that the edges of the white shelves were fighting the mutton bars in between the glass panels. We decided to remedy this by painting the shelves flat black. While we were at it, we made a complete inventory of all the beer in das Bierkeller. It is a shared Google document so I will provide a link here in case anybody is interested. There are currently 512 bottles of various sizes.

Mullerbrau Bierkeller Inventory
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AtC5Fh5FPEhOdGNNTFBxeWZSdXdXZ3N4VkpXbGR1UHc&usp=sharing

mrv 2013-12-02 01:28:21 UTC #19

That's a great (strong!) list, Greg. I see why your chair has dual cup holders.

How much temp rise did you have during the summer?

mullerbrau 2013-12-02 02:00:47 UTC #20

I've seen it get as high as 65F and as low as 48F. The temp changes very slow.