Refurbishing Original Internal Stairs

My stairs are very creaky and one flight is starting to pull away from the wall. Has anyone had their staircase opened up from the bottom and reinforced from underneath? Anyone you would recommend ? Roughly how much did it cost? I’ve tried to get quotes from Soxco, All American Stair, and New York Wood Stairs but they are slow to return calls.

rene.soloserrato

in General Discussion 4 years and 5 months ago

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restorationcontractor | 4 years and 5 months ago

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It’s relatively simple work for an experienced carpenter. Once you remove the plaster from the underside of the staircase you install threaded rod with coupling nuts between the building wall and the outboard stringer to pull it back.
Hilti epoxy system to anchor them to the outside wall if its masonry, steel “hanger bolts” if it’s wood frame.
Remove existing wedges and clean out the rabbets, install new wedges.
Rescrew risers to stringers.
After securing the center support beam remove all old blocking and replace with new, the old stuff will be too dried out to use.
Add miscellaneous blocking between risers and treads.
Secure any loose spindles.
That’s pretty much it more or less., no reason not to save your staircase.

Without actually seeing it I would guess soup to nuts demo. and replaster probably around 6-10k per flight.

You will absolutely save on doing the demo. yourself, however don’t demo. the plaster until you are ready to do the work, it and the lath may be helping hold the stair together if it’s really loose.

If it’s really bad and just want to do a tempo rary fix you can cut pieces of slotted angle and install them between the treads and the stringer. We just did this on a brownstone that had been a hoarder house, unoccupied for 20 years in NYC. Unfortunately the roof had been leaking as well, house wound up being gutted, stairs were used as temporary construction staircase and they held up fine until they were removed.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Everbilt-2-25-in-x-1-5-in-x-72-in-Angle-Slotted-Offset-801347/204325578?source=shoppingads&locale=en-US&mtc=Shopping-B-F_D25H-G-D25H-25_4_BUILDERS_HARDWARE-Multi-NA-Feed-LIA-NA-NA-BuildersHardware_LIA&cm_mmc=Shopping-B-F_D25H-G-D25H-25_4_BUILDERS_HARDWARE-Multi-NA-Feed-LIA-NA-NA-BuildersHardware_LIA-71700000044822926-58700004636006010-92700060790923534&gclid=Cj0KCQiA1pyCBhCtARIsAHaY_5eLfl_j7TdfeqIc3ijVDvfraWG4qJl1U5pSoy1e172hVctIBgUegsoaAmAOEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

rene.soloserrato | 4 years and 5 months ago

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Thanks for the info!

cate | 4 years and 5 months ago

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I got quotes from a stair co 10 years ago and believe it was $2,000 or $3,000 per flight. Exactly what is involved depends on what type of stair you have (open or closed stringer if I remember correctly). The work was optional and we never did it because we wanted to keep our beautiful (though noisy) original treads. Also, here is the story of a homeowner who took a completely different approach: https://www.brownstoner.com/interiors-renovation/creaking-stairs-repair-tips-ideas-gopro-construction-metal-brackets-victorian-staircase/ Last, it may be a good idea to double check if the pulling away is because the house is settling, and if so, if the settling is still happening. (Settling — can mean the soil under the house is moving.) Good luck