Crates?

[screwybrewy]

Hi folks. Anyone know where to get hold of bottle crates to fit standard bottles like you get from the local brew shop? Either that or simple plans to make my own cheaply? Cheers.

[lord groan]

I looked for but never found free/cheap stackable bottle crates. Milk crates are great but are too short to stack with 500ml/pint bottles in. I ended up reworking other peoples drawings for homemade wooden crates, I eventually ended up with a crate that takes 12 bottles and is tall enough to take wine bottles and still stack. If built with care they interlock when stacked, the base of one sits inside the ends of the uprights on the one below it. As for cheap, I designed mine to use broken up pallets which I get free from a unit on a local industrial estate. The tricky bit is breaking them down and denailing without splitting the lengths of wood. The drawing below uses 120cm lengths from standard pallets


Forgive the rubbish drawings, but hopefully the idea is clear enough, a finished crate is below!

All screwed together and wood glue blobbed between flat surfaces for extra strength
Hope this helps!

Oh and I recently found that the thick card dividers in boxes of "Austins", which stop bottles rattling together, fit perfectly inside these crates. Aldi sell austins - some sort of Pimms substitute I think.

[screwybrewy]

Hi. That's brilliant, thanks so much. I'm off pallet scrumping. SB.

[Ben711200]

There's always lots of pallets around work.. Idea 'borrowed'!

Cheers,

Ben

[dean_wales]

See my thread here...

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=58395

[screwybrewy]

Nice one chaps. As soon as I've liberated a pallet, I'm on to this.

[lord groan]

Happy to share my dodgy plans,
If you are going to make these please double check the measurements - they fit my bottles but better safe than sorry.
As for taking pallets apart, they are utter pigs to break up, as quoted elsewhere the nails are designed not to let go, I eventually found that pushing claw hammer prongs between the plank and the corner block and levering the plank up was the best way to go, but it took a 2nd hammer to drive the 1st one in. Mind you if you do split the ends, just use a few extra lengths to get the required pieces. Or maybe just saw the nailed ends off and save yourself the grief?
As you can see from mine - they aren't pretty, very rough and ready but they work, and for a womble like me recycling scrap timber into something useful makes it worthwhile
cheers

[beerlover1983]

http://youtu.be/ZtPmUZ-k3aI

just found this and it works a treat

[bryanferry]

Thanks for the link to the crate plans Dean, had myself a creative afternoon,



Just another 3 to build and varnish/stain.

[cellone]

Thanks for the link to the crate plans Dean, had myself a creative afternoon,



Just another 3 to build and varnish/stain.

I want to see some hand holes cut into them and more work on making them inter-lock before they're finished.

[bryanferry]

You're a hard task master Cellone. Not sure on how best to do the interlocking. However I might do some handholes on the short ends if I can ever find my hole saw set.

[Goosey]

If you extend the legs like this...



wouldn't they slot into the gap at the top?

Same the other end of course.

[bryanferry]

Cheers Goosey, that would have been the easiest way to let it interlock but I've already cut the 12 sections out and screwed 8 ends together....

Now all three are built and to save adding extra wood I think I'll go with some metal dowel pins (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dowel-Pins-Ha ... 1173277866). It'll mean drilling a hole in the top and bottom of each corner and then slot the pin in when I need to stack them up. I'll just take the pins out when taking a crate on a road trip.

[cellone]

You're a hard task master Cellone. Not sure on how best to do the interlocking. However I might do some handholes on the short ends if I can ever find my hole saw set.

Borrow Ditch's jigsaw.

[bryanferry]

Finally got round to adding hand holes and blackboard paint. Very happy with the way these turned out. Used hard wax oil to seal the insides (in case of bottle bombs). Thank you to lord groan and dean_wales for the plans.