The base of the dolly will be a piece of outdoor grade plywood I found in the garbage. Free is always better than paying for something! The basic plan is to attach another piece of wood to this plywood and cut that second piece of wood in a circle, leaving a lip along the edge of the dolly to hold the fermenter, then attach casters to the bottom. I found a bunch of casters in the garbage recently, which I've been on the lookout for!
The first step is to draw out the lip of the dolly. The lip will hold the fermenter in place on the dolly. I found the center of the board by measuring across both axises of the board. I then drove a nail to mark the center. I tied a string to the nail and a pencil to the other end of the string in order to make a basic compass. If you were making a table top you may want a more precise compass, but the jig described later will clean up any rough edges. The inside lip mark has a one inch wider diameter (1/2 inch on each side) than the bottom of the fermenter and the outside edge is about 6 inches wider than that (which gives a 3 inch lip around the outside edge).
And the result.
Next I applied glue to the space between the marks I just made, being careful not to get glue on the interior as that will make it difficult to remove that section later.
For the lip I'm using some scrap pine boards that I found in the trash. These were shelves in a broken bookshelf I believe. I clamped the boards...
.... and then bound the piece together with screws. I originally didn't want to use screws but the pine boards were warped and needed a little more help holding the piece together. This wont be a problem when I cut the piece because the screws are in the middle of the lip and the router bit will only pass on the inside and the outside of the track.
A while back I made a jig for my router to cut circular pieces of wood. The jig is essentially a long piece of thin plywood that attaches to the router in lieu of the faceplate. The jig is attached (with a nail or screw) to the center of the piece of wood to be cut and rotates around that center. To measure properly, make sure you measure to the correct side of the router bit. When cutting the outside edge of the lip, I'll need to measure to the inside edge of the bit. When cutting the inside edge of the lip, I'll need to measure to the outside edge of the bit. Be sure to use a flat cutting router bit to make these cuts.
Here is a picture of the set up, after one pass with the router. Because this piece is so thick, I'm going to make two passes cutting about 3/4" at a time. It would strain the router and possible damage the piece if I tried to cut too much on one pass.
And the outside cut is complete.
To cut the inside piece, I needed to make sure the depth of the router bit matched with width of the top board. Too shallow and the board won't be cut all the way through and too thick and I'll cut into the plywood base.
Making the inside cut with the jig, just like the outside cut.
With the cut made, I pried out the inside piece which came out easily. Notice also that I drilled holes for the casters at four equidistant points on the dolly. Because the height of the threads on the casters isn't as long as the dolly is thick, I drilled bigger holes to countersink the bolts. Conveniently, this will also keep the bolts out of the way when loading things onto the dolly.
I had enough materials left over to make a second smaller dolly for carboys!
The project wouldn't be complete without a nice paint job. First the priming...
Then the paint! This was a fun project. This dolly will certainly save a lot of effort moving around heavy brewing equipment. Plus all the supplies for this project were free- found in the trash on the streets of New York City near my apartment.
Next I applied glue to the space between the marks I just made, being careful not to get glue on the interior as that will make it difficult to remove that section later.
For the lip I'm using some scrap pine boards that I found in the trash. These were shelves in a broken bookshelf I believe. I clamped the boards...
.... and then bound the piece together with screws. I originally didn't want to use screws but the pine boards were warped and needed a little more help holding the piece together. This wont be a problem when I cut the piece because the screws are in the middle of the lip and the router bit will only pass on the inside and the outside of the track. A while back I made a jig for my router to cut circular pieces of wood. The jig is essentially a long piece of thin plywood that attaches to the router in lieu of the faceplate. The jig is attached (with a nail or screw) to the center of the piece of wood to be cut and rotates around that center. To measure properly, make sure you measure to the correct side of the router bit. When cutting the outside edge of the lip, I'll need to measure to the inside edge of the bit. When cutting the inside edge of the lip, I'll need to measure to the outside edge of the bit. Be sure to use a flat cutting router bit to make these cuts.
Here is a picture of the set up, after one pass with the router. Because this piece is so thick, I'm going to make two passes cutting about 3/4" at a time. It would strain the router and possible damage the piece if I tried to cut too much on one pass.
And the outside cut is complete.
To cut the inside piece, I needed to make sure the depth of the router bit matched with width of the top board. Too shallow and the board won't be cut all the way through and too thick and I'll cut into the plywood base.
Making the inside cut with the jig, just like the outside cut.
With the cut made, I pried out the inside piece which came out easily. Notice also that I drilled holes for the casters at four equidistant points on the dolly. Because the height of the threads on the casters isn't as long as the dolly is thick, I drilled bigger holes to countersink the bolts. Conveniently, this will also keep the bolts out of the way when loading things onto the dolly.
I had enough materials left over to make a second smaller dolly for carboys!
The project wouldn't be complete without a nice paint job. First the priming...
Then the paint! This was a fun project. This dolly will certainly save a lot of effort moving around heavy brewing equipment. Plus all the supplies for this project were free- found in the trash on the streets of New York City near my apartment.
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