my last large project in a full house remodel is tackling the front stairs. The full kitchen gut and 1300 sqfeet of hickory flooring was easy compared to the stairs!
currently there is a prefab style staircase that is carpeted now and needs to be hickory. A u shaped affar with 2 sides on the main floor (flat) and the 3rd side is the stairs. There are 3 posts that will be blue pine boxes made with lock miter joints slid over the existing 3.5x3.5 wood. The center sections are antique wrought iron. I have a good amount of s4s 1x4 and 1x6 blue stain pine stock that I got for a good deal to play with and have a small welder. I am having a bit of trouble deciding on:
1. How to build the hand rails
I would like to build these out of blue pine and have them float across the top of the iron. Steel tube with a wood box over it? longest section is about 8 feet (stairs side) and I want the handrail to be about 4 in. tall. I know this won't pass the 4 in sphere test, the antique iron wont either, don't go there.
2. The angled part of the stairs
The current plan is to incorporate short sections cut from the antique iron. I am thinking about cutting them in about 10 in sections (2 verticals each) matching the treads and welding them with new verticals in a step pattern to go up the stairs.
3. How to clad the stairs to match the hickory flooring in the rest of the house. This is one of the dadod skirt boards and held by tiny wedges squeeky 70s prefab deals. The open side is a short wall, not returned treads.
currently: use the hickory flooring and nosing on the treads. This requires cutting off the current "nosing" on the partical board treads and painting the skirts a dark brown to hide them, or tear it all out and re-frame with something useful for attaching wood flooring, skirt boards etc..., a TON of work. is there some kind of middle ground?
i will get a few pictures up tonight.