-Scoot!
Just the finest of materials, really official.
Hey, I'm Bea, and today I'm turning this oil drum
into two planters and a fire pit.
So sparks are going to fly.
I'm BEA, a designer and a DIY-er
with a passion for home improvement.
Whoa!
I just bought my first house
and it needs a lot of work.
A lot of vandalism. Rodents.
A stripper pole here. Rat stage here.
So it's time to put my skills to the test.
I love learning from the pros,
but sometimes I'm going to try things my way.
Join me for the adventure.
So I found this old oil tank on the property.
Do you need to push it from
the bottom all?
Oh.
[ Engine revving ]
I don't know who took it out of the ground, but it's out.
And instead of recycling it or throwing it away,
I want to put it to use.
So I immediately thought of planters
like the green kind of plants trellising over this thing,
a fire ring, and maybe another ring to hold firewood.
[ Taps oil tank ] Sounds sturdy enough.
You can kind of hear how hollow it is,
and it's not full of oil.
We did drain some of the oil out,
and you got to be careful with oil.
So we collected it in some containers
and actually were able to recycle it at a gas station.
-Your dad saved most of it with that diesel.
-Just the finest of materials, really official.
So the tools I need for this project -- an angle grinder,
extra blades, a powerful drill, some metal bits, oil, gloves,
plants, chalk line, tape measure,
and you can't forget safety gear.
So now I've got everything to make this DIY come to life.
Let's get into it.
There you go.
We've now got this blue chalk showing us where to cut.
All right, so we have to begin cutting.
Let's suit up with the safety gear.
So sparks are going to fly.
The heat from the sparks would never, like,
catch the oil on fire, right?
-No. -Okay, good.
-Yeah, diesel fuel is not really combustible
like that.
If it was gasoline,
maybe the fumes coming off of it.
-Yeah. It's not going to -- Okay.
Well, how am I doing?
-Doing good. -Okay.
♪♪
It's an oil sludge nightmare.
Definitely sounded a little more hollow than that.
-So we got a bit of clean up to do.
-A little bit of cleanup.
So this is like a solvent.
This is a stripper that's just going to help clean off
the inside of the ring, just so we make sure that,
like, no oil is leaching into the soil.
Okay, now that we've got our four pieces,
maybe you can see it.
Planter, fire wood ring,
fire pit ring, and another planter.
So I'm just throwing on a different kind of blade,
and this blade is going to just, like, sand down the edges.
So now that I have the planters cut,
I need to drill some drainage holes
so that water doesn't get stuck inside.
Now I'm going to work my way up to the right size hole,
but I'm going to start with this bit here.
I might just use a spot
that already has a little bit of a depression.
And there's not really a rhyme or reason
to where I'm placing these, just kind of evenly spacing them
around the bottom of this tank.
Whoa. You ought to be on top of this one.
So I drilled the first hole with the bit,
but it's taking too long, I think.
And so I want to try a different technique
using the angle grinder,
which was pretty quick to cut it.
I'm just going to get power out here.
There's no big secret around power tools.
It's just knowing and educating yourself
on how to use them properly
and then having the right safety gear,
you can do it with confidence, you can do it and use them
the right way to make something as crazy as this.
I'm the kind of person who goes in blind to a lot of things,
but I do think when you're using power tools,
it's really important to watch a tutorial,
especially when it's something that can be dangerous,
that you can cut yourself with.
No idea how much this weighs,
but I'm weak and I can pick it up, so...
Now that the tank is clean and we took out all the oil,
I'm going to drop in a layer of woodchips.
I stopped a tree trimmer on the side of the road
and I said, "Can I have those wood chips?"
And couple of hours later, he drove up to my house,
and was dumping them in the yard.
I'm just trying to get them so they'll sit right --
right on top, or right underneath
the lip of the planter.
I don't want them sitting above it
I just want them sitting right below it.
It's time to get these plants into the planter.
So I decided that I wanted to go with a perennial arrangement,
and that just means plants that come back every year.
The other criteria that I wanted for this planter was natives.
That means plants that are native to this area.
And then pollinators. I wanted plants that would
foster habitat and food for bees and butterflies.
I'd say she's looking abundant,
and looks like a bee and butterfly playground.
♪♪
We're left with our firewood ring and our fire pit.
So now we just have to get these things up there.
They are light enough -- oh, gosh -- to roll.
[ Grunting ]
I love this little spot on my property. There's only an acre,
but there's this little spot right above my house
and it just has the perfect view of the ridgeline.
And it's just, like, such a good elevation for a fire pit.
And there's this, like, natural break
in the trees for the smoke.
Yeah, we just need to -- like, right there.
Yeah, that'll look nice.
Can't carry it. Okay.
Do a little digging,
set this in, let's say, like, four inches,
enough to get that little spout underground.
So I've seen variations of these kind of firewood rings
to wrangle your firewood online,
and I just -- we had so much of this tank
that I figured it was an easy --
kind of an easy solution instead of,
as you can see, this giant pile of firewood.
So I'm just going to kind of level this out here,
and then I'll just secure it with two rocks.
Sweet.
And I just want just to build it up on the front
a little bit.
Firewood is best when it dries out,
so you can't cut a tree down and the same day,
expect to burn it.
It needs to sit and dry out.
I think that can take, you know, a year.
This is a tree that was dead.
So hopefully, it's dry enough to burn.
The last piece.
Gonna see how Liam's doing.
You dug.
Now you're using that board to smash it into place.
-Yeah.
-Would it help if I stood on it?
Probably. -Yeah.
I'm scared of this. -This board is about to break.
-Yeah. -Yup.
Let's build the fire.
I'm pretty happy with the way
that this transformation turned out.
I was able to take this giant piece of metal
and turn it into three things that are pretty useful to me.
This project was really rewarding for me
because during home renovation, you create a lot of waste.
And so this was a nice change of pace
to be able to take something that pretty much was trash
and turn it into something else.
It's a good reminder to really assess
the things that you're tossing
in case they can be used as something else.
Cheers. Oh, you don't have a marshmallow.
[ Both laugh ]
Now we just got to finish the house.
-[ Chuckles ] And just that.