Second Barrel Brew

Since I moved to DC about a year and half ago I've had the fortune to meet some really incredible homebrewers. I had a solid club living in Lawrence but the DC/VA/MD club meetings were always out of my way to get to so getting in touch with Mike (I believe first trying to find a La Folie clone recipe) has really helped my brewing through plentiful and frank advice on my process and finished beers. Through him I also met Nathan who is fortunate (and I mean this in a purely urban living situation) to own a house with plenty of basement space. An idea was cooked up through both of them to purchase a wine barrel in which to age a Flander's Red ale, and perhaps more beer thereafter. We've (inclusive of about 6-7 other brewers) since outgrown the wine barrel and moved to a Bourbon barrel.
After intense debate we started with a Wee Heavy at about 8-9% abv. to first age in the barrel. Any first generation beer in a barrel will take on the most character of the wood and previous beverage the fastest. We decided a Scotch ale would be the best style and one not as commercially produced as a Russian Imperial Stout or Barleywine.
We were then quite stuck on what to do next after we get this Scotch ale bottled/kegged with, (un)fortunately the barrel character quickly taking hold on the beer. After even further debate fueled by delicious beer at Rustico, we decided on a hybrid of an Adambier and a Doppelsticke Altbier: a smoked Sticke Alt. This beer will be fermented out and held by all brewers until July 11th when we all both bottle the Scotch ale and rack in the Alt.
The (mine, for efficiency sake) recipe for 5 gallons:

	Stats OG 1.076 FG 1.022 IBU 52 ABV 7.1% SRM 24	Specifics Boil Volume 7.5 gallons Batch Size 5.5 gallons Yeast 78% AA White Labs 011

Fermentables

% Weight	Weight (lbs)	Grain	Gravity Points	Color
77.6 %	13.00	German Munich	61.2	18.9
17.9 %	3.00	German Smoked	14.1	4.9
3.0 %	0.50	Belgian CaraMunich II	2.1	6.8
1.5 %	0.25	German Carafa II	1.0	27.3
	16.75		78.4

Hops

% Wt	Weight (oz)	Hop	Form	AA%	AAU	Boil Time	Utilization	IBU
100.0 %	1.25	Magnum	Whole/Plug	14.2	17.8	60	0.216	52.3
	1.25							52.3

5/27/09: Brewed today. Long runoff, not sure the cause. Getting the right amount of pre-boil to post boil volume. Need to measure out my pot and notch a copper pipe for volume. Chilling is becoming a hassle, I need to find a new pump. Wort is in the basement in a 20gal Rubbermaid with water and frozen water bottles to "control" temp and keep it in the low 60s.
6/20/09: Racked to secondary. Gravity around 1.023 (took sample a couple weeks ago). Still no plan for the barrel as our Wee Heavy has gone sour. Hopefully this doesn't have to sit around for another month before we get it into the barrel.
7/30/09: Finally bottled since we never got a new barrel. I've opened two bottles since and I can see this beer really needs some more time being so malt heavy.