A rustic barn door can be a wonderful addition to any home. These doors are a great conversation piece, and the touch of Americana they provide adds warmth to any room. Chances are, you took a look at barn door kits, or reclaimed barn doors and recoiled in horror at their huge price tags.
Building a barn door by yourself is more economical and can be done by anyone who has basic carpentry skills. We will be covering all the details of building a barn door today.
Supplies Youll Need
- Angle grinder with brush knot cup
- Router with rabbeting piece
- Tape measure
- Construction adhesive
- 1 wrought-head nail
- 1x6x20 cm no. 2 pine boards
- Quart stain in light gold
- Quart grey stain
- Quart dark walnut stain
- Clear poly, 1 lb (optional).
- Clean shop rags
- Paintbrush
- Barn door hardware kit
Step 1: Evaluate Your Space
First, take stock of the area you will be working in. Start by measuring the width of the barn door. You will need to add two inches to the measurement.
Next, determine how youll want your barn door to open. You will need to ensure that the door slides to the right if you want it to open to the left. Things like thermostats or light switches can put a serious damper on where you plan to put your barn door, so keep those in mind when evaluating how you want the door to open.
You won’t encounter any obstacles if you are lucky. But, if you find that its impossible to install the door as you initially planned, consider having the door open to the left instead of the right, or having a double door instead of a single door.
Step II: Buy The Hardware Kit
Before you begin building your barn door, make sure you secure all the hardware. This will help you determine the height of the door. You can find the instructions on how high you need your barn door to be in the kit. For assistance, contact the manufacturer if they don’t.
Step III: Preparing The Boards For The Barn Door
Once you have your measurements for the width and height of the door, you can begin preparing your boards.
Divide the barn door’s width by the width for each board to calculate the board size. You can adjust the width of each board based on your measurements until you get a uniform width.
Next, use a table saw to rip the boards to the proper width. After you have boards that are uniform in width, you can use your router or a table saw equipped with a dado knife to cut rabbets into each of the boards.
For all but two boards, cut rabbets on each opposite edge, so youll have two rabbets on each board. For the final two boards, cut one rabbet on each. These boards will form the barn door’s outer edges.
Finally, cut your two horizontal rails to the same width as the door.
Step IV: Installing The Barn In Your Barn Wood
Now, for the fun part. These basic pine boards that you got from the lumber yard will be transformed into reclaimed barnwood that is well over 100 years old.
This can be done using an angle grinder equipped with a brush knot coffee. You can start with scrap wood to see how the brush cup behaves when it is lowered to the wood.
Once you are ready to start, attach the first board to your sawhorse and nail it or clamp it. This attachment can cause serious distress to the wood so be careful and use a light hand. You can always add more distressing if necessary.
You will see a lot of sawdust from the knot cup, so it is important to wear safety gear.
Once youre happy with the level of distressing on each board, use an awl to make some random wormholes in a couple of the boards to drive home the rustic look were going for.
Step V: Staining And Painting The Wood
With your wood properly abraded and distressed, its time to stain it to give it a proper weathered look.
Were going to start by applying a light base coat of the light gold stain. You can use a paintbrush or rag for this, but you can also speed the process up by using a roller. Once youve applied the base coat to each board, allow them time to dry.
Next, were going to apply some dark stain. Apply the dark stain with a rag. You may need to apply a lot of stain in certain areas, but not enough in others. Use a second rag to randomly wipe off the stain. This will create streaks or areas that are particularly concentrated. You can make it look more authentic if you’re more random.
After the dark stain is dry, we will apply a thin layer of grey stain to the area in the same way as the dark stain. Be random, in some areas, add a little elbow grease as you wipe the stain off, in others, leave the stain be. You are more random the better.
To preserve the finished look, you can apply a thin layer of clear poly. This step can be skipped to get the best look.
Step VI: Assembling And Closing The Barn Door
Two 2x4s should be placed on each pair of sawhorses. Then, arrange your boards over the sawhorses. To act as spacers, place pennies between each board. To keep your vertical boards in place, screw two pieces from scrap wood between each 24.
Take each diagonal measurement and ensure that they match and that the boards are square. Adjust them until they match. You can now attach your horizontal rails with wrought-head nails or some type of construction adhesive. After the adhesive has dried, you can hammer the nails into place for the lower and upper horizontal rails.
Step VII: Attach The Hardware
To attach the hardware to your door, follow the instructions in the hardware kit. Next, attach the hardware to the wall.
Step VIII: Hang The Barn Door
With all your hardware now installed, youre ready to finish up the job and admire your work. Have a partner help you raise and hang the door, and test it. If the door feels a little tight, add some WD40 to the wheels of the hardware so that it operates more smoothly.
Final Word
Learning how to build a barn door is a fairly simple and very cost-effective way to get the beautiful look of a barn door inside your home. Once youve wrapped up this project, check out some of our other great projects, like this rustic barn-style mirror.
