Passive cellar storage

A couple of questions for you knowledgeable folk. I just moved into a house (I was one of the lucky ones with good credit and nothing to sell who could take advantage of buying at the bottom of the market) and I have an underground basement (way underground--as in the ceiling is a good 8 feet below the surface) where I would love to start a passive cellar. The temperature down there ranges from about 55 degrees F to about 65 degrees in August. My question is with racking. My house is really old and the basement stairs are the original circular stairs. Meaning that I either have to use some type of racking that comes in small pieces or I have to build it in the basement because nothing large and pre-built is getting down those stairs! Any suggestions? Someone suggested strong PVC pipe built in a pyramid, but I'm not so sure about this option. Also (the fun part), now that I have a place to store wine, what should I buy? I'm 26, so I (hopefully!) will be around for awhile to let bottles age. Thanks for all your help!

First of all, congratulations on your home. Sounds like a great setup-ceiling 8 ft under grade is amazing.
Almost all racking sets from places like the Wine Enthusiast are typically sold to be assembled, with varying degrees of difficulty. I've used the Bordex and Black Tie Grid from WE, both are easy to assemble. The Black Tie has larger pieces (aboout 2.5 ft by 5 ft), but those are totally flat. I also built some wood bins for some odd spaces, much easier to built bins than individual bottle racks.
As to wines, what do you like (and have you tasted aged wines you like), and what's your budget?

Hi Lizbeth - In addition to this place, I frequent another website, similar to this one, but it focuses on wine making. They have a forum for cellar construction with lots of threads and posts. You may get some good ideas there: http://www.winepress.us/forums/index.php?showforum=13

don't forget the book 'How and Why to build a Wine Cellar', by (i think) Herbert Gold. Lots of good tips.

Hi Lizbeth,
Congratulations on your new home!
As for compact, easy to assemble, stackable and expandable wine racks, Ikea (if you’re lucky to have one nearby) has a nice selection.

Salute

Wow! 8 ft under. I'm jealous. As Dale said, most racking is sold to be assembled, so I had no trouble hauling down the six racks I've assembled in my cellar. Like Dale, I have a couple Black Ties from WE. I also have some others (126 bottle pine racks) that are a bit sturdier for our uneven basement floor.

Mark Lipton

I have a passive, underground cellar.

I store my wine in earthenware honeycombs as per this link: http://www.objectif-cave.com/Les_amenagements.awp

In fact, the one on the top left is a picture of my cellar.

This system is modular, easy to construct, easy to bring down the stairs, and is excellent for avoiding extremes of temperature.

Yours truly,
Alex R.

don't forget the book 'How and Why to build a Wine Cellar', by (i think) Herbert Gold. Lots of good tips.

Yes, Richard Gold.
With Lizbeth's description it sounds like she won't need to do any construction other than racking. I did actually build a room to shield from furnace, etc. Gold's book was helpful for figuring out vapor barriers, etc. He did have a chapter on building racking/bins.

Thank you for all the suggestions for my cellar! As for the type of wine to fill it with, I'm hoping to try a little bit of everything. Sadly, I've never had a bottle with more than 10 years on it, so finding wine that will age well is a priority. I love white wine, especially Riesling (I seriously almost cried when I realized I could get the better bottles of Trimbach in South Jersey). My red drinking is more seasonal--I'm a big fan of Cabernet and Malbec in January and Pinot Noir in the fall (I'm weird, I know ) As for style of wine, I'm a huge fan of ESJ (what I can find in PA and NJ anyways...hint hint!!), Trimbach, and a bunch of other producers that Moore Brothers carries that no one has every heard of. Thanks again for all your help!

Lizbeth, it seems to me that you are after a place to store wine, not a showplace cellar. If you are just after a simple inexpensive way to rack your wines, this can be accomplished easily and cheaply using plywood and drywall screws. You should be able to get the narrow pieces of plywood down the stairs after they are cut, and assemble the racks in situ. Design the size to take a dozen of the largest bottles you think you'll encounter, and you'll be able to get in maybe 14 bottles of more normal size. My decoration is limited to screwing box ends of old Bordeaux crates to the ends (the rest of the crates having done service as kindling)

I had a wide angle lens on one of my digitals and snapped a fast and dirty shot of my cellar (sorry about the shadowing at the bottom, I didn't have any batteries in my good separate flash unit).

The racks on the right are what I am talking about . They are double depth and can be filled from both sides and offer case storage on top. The rack you see takes 70 cases, but you can build whatever sie will fit your space, and do it single sided if that better suits your situation.

The other approach I took was using obsoleted milk cases (for the old glass bottles) and you can see them on the left. The advantage of those, if you can find some, is that they stack securely about 2 metres high, and if you ever need to move the cellar it is a doddle - flip them upright and carry them out. They add bit of history as mine have the names of now extinct dairies burned into the wood.

Please ignore the stack of wooden cases on the back wall (Bordeaux) and the growing mound of cardboard cases in the foreground. I am trying to reform!

Bill-
I love the milk case idea. I'm going to ask around to see if I can acquire some of these.

I got mine a long time ago from a small dairy that was converting to plastic crates. I think I paid about $2 a case

I bought all they had - I think around 70 cases, and for awhile I had an exclusively milk crate cellar. Then the pressure of wine stacking up made me create the plywood top add another 70 case capacity. Then I had to stack them between the asiles. Then I had to relegate 'lesser' wines to my wife's domain in the laundry room (still a sore spot I try not to bring up).

Here is a link to an online store I've used for an easily constructed rack for my passive, underground cellar: http://www.stacksandstacks.com/search/. Just give it the search term "wine racks."
I have the 110 bottle rack which is good for standard bordeaux or german bottles. There are also racks available on ebay which I've had great success with.

All the best as you discover your new world, Jim

Lizbeth - I started in the late-1980s by going to Ikea and seeing what they had. I then went to a lumber yard and bought lumber and made what I'd seen at Ikea.
What I have now, however, is shelving from a wine shop that either moved or went out of business in the last 1990s. What I'm trying to say is, you may want to ask around and see if a local shop is in the same position and may sell/give you some decent racking. Good luck!

Thanks again to all! I will post some photos once I get things set up and in order.

Lizbeth..one more comment..I too have a passive cellar and most of my racking came from Wine Enthusiast, as has been commented on previously..might be cheaper than Ikea..hard to say..I did buy some inexpensive Bordeaux and Burgundy wine glasses at an Ikea near you tho..the one just off Columbus ..Our daughter lives in Philly and we bought a fair amount of her furniture at Ikea..I thought I was going to get carpal tunnel syndrome assembling some of the stuff..I was not going to buy my daughter a wine rack so we really didn't pay any attention to any wine racks at Ikea.. I do remember the WE racking to be pretty easy to assemble

The other approach I took was using obsoleted milk cases (for the old glass bottles) and you can see them on the left. The advantage of those, if you can find some, is that they stack securely about 2 metres high, and if you ever need to move the cellar it is a doddle - flip them upright and carry them out. They add bit of history as mine have the names of now extinct dairies burned into the wood.

Bill, those are cool! When did you purchase your crates? I haven't seen any like these around here for ages. Growing up in the 60's and 70's, everything here was plastic already. I use a couple of the plastic crates, but they don't hold wines very well and DO NOT stack, but they help manage the clutter a little.

Mark

We had a dairy that stayed with the glass bottles as a matter of pride, being an artisanal operation. I believe they probably bought out the crates from other dairies across Canada as they closed or converted, because the names burned into the wood reflect dairies across all the Western states.

I think that this dairy (Avalon, for those that might know it) may have been forced to convert to new stye plastic crates due to cost of maintenance or perhaps health regs, and these lovely crates were stacked out back of the dairy when I went there on day. I made an offer and created 3 walls of my cellar.

Who knows, there may be barns full of these things stashed away soemwhere. The wires are located higher up so that a bottle is supported on it's side (except for Alsatian and the odd top heavy Italian). Modern plastic crates generally have no internal dividers, and wire crates have lower ones.