Good day! I’ve an acquaintance who approached me about fabricating a stair railing for a spiral staircase. That’s way above my pay grade, but I’ve offered to post here in hopes that perhaps someone would be interested in the commission and/or knows someone my friend might contact.
See the pictures attached. The original contractor couldn’t finish the job (a relative,) and walked off the job. What I’ve seen of the work, the stairs are well and solidly constructed. The treads are roughly 36-42 inches long. The stair curls a full 180*. I’m “guessing” the total rise is about 12-14 feet. Traditional height stair rise… perhaps the pictures are complete enough to better estimate the rise.
The home is located in northwestern Ohio. The homeowner will, at this stage, seriously consider an all metal or all wood rail (and balusters,) or a combination thereof.
All input welcome.
Replies
I would think that any good finish carpenter in the area could do that. It's pretty standard stuff.
That is anything but typical and requires significant skill to complete.
I would be very surprised if a typical, even "good" trim carpenter could handle this, unless he had done other spiral or circular stairs. Even then, it could be difficult since the accuracy and radius of the helical stringer is unknown. It's never a good sign that the person who started the thing couldn't finish it. I've completed one such, and it required real creativity to make the handrail.
Given the narrowness of the stringer, the balusters will need to be attached on the side. The stringer will need to be the form for strip laminating the handrail. Gluing it up and then cleaning it up and refining it will be tricky, especially given its length. I have made several spiral staircases, and have a friend (now retired) who made several circular staircases. In standard architectural terminology, this is a circular staircase. Spiral staircases have a central post. I'll try to upload a picture of one I made.
A contractor walking off a job sends up red flags, family walking off just makes it worse.
Were it my home I would bring in an independent inspector or PE to go over both the drawings and the work and write a report that they are safe and properly built. Show the report to potential follow-ons to reduce their fear of liability.
When you next tell the story start with something less scary like, the original contractor was arrested for murder or deported for abusing kittens.
Ask at Fine Homebuilding :)
This is one of the few jobs in a house that I would not even know where to begin. I can make most things out of wood, but would not even attempt this without serious research - I'd definitely be looking for a specialist company as such will undoubtedly be cheaper in the longer run.
I used to balk at the hourly rate at my Citroen dealership when I owned a 2CV car (Awful thing but very cool) until I found out how many more hours the cheaper garage took to do the job...
Rob, this is exactly what I would have written.
Thank you to all. Your input's appreciated.