Day Three Of The Staircase Repairs

We're now on day three of the complete staircase repair, what a transformation! Both good and bad; bad in that the lovely staircase i'm used to looking at has pretty much disappeared in certain sections as you'll see below, but good in the sense that rapid progress is being made.

Quite a bit of rubble has been generated, between the removal of rotten threads and lots of lathe and plaster from the under side of the stair flights:

The lower flight carriage pieces have been removed and replaced with a beefier hardwood:

With new tread support pieces:

One of the old carriage pieces:

The lower flight is now rock solid and straight once again!

The work above has been much more invasive:

Acrow supports are holding up the upper flights of stairs so that the stringers and internal supports can be pushed upwards and tied together:

The second floor landing has quite a complex array of internal support beams, which have all been treated against rot, hence the black colour:

Additional bolts and plates which enter the wall and provide additional strength:

More doubling up on support pieces:

This is the section of stairs where the right side flight had dropped way from the left side (below). Now that they are in their correct positions, they are being glued and tied together:

The large opening that was once here is now gone:

More updates to follow!

The Final Push - Work On The Staircase Begins

At long, long last work has begun on the stairs, the last large-scale job to be completed in the house.

I wanted to get some of the paint stripped back on the lower flight before Pat Lynch of Conservation Joinery began this morning, so I spent the weekend with the heatgun and scraper and set to work.

The balusters have so many layers of paint slapped on, so much detail is lost, so it was important to get this stripped back:

Stripping begins. Note the two larger balusters which were replaced at some point, as was the newel post at the bottom of the stairs. This will be replaced with the original monkey tail.

These thinner, finer detailed balusters are the originals (below) and i'll likely have them re-arranged so that all the originals are in a single row, with the larger copies in a less obvious location like on the turn of the stair rail:

An example of the massive amount of detail below.
Before:

After:

The stringer was also stripped back revealing the simple elegant detail:

Pat Lynch started work this morning on the staircase. Restoration work will be comprehensive and will encompass all four flights of stairs.

One of the main tasks will be tackling the ground floor flight, which is in very poor condition due to the high level of traffic it has received over the years. The carriage pieces which run up the center of the treads on the underside are sagging and provide little support and will have to be replaced. Many of the treads are also in very poor condition:

Here you can see the two carriage pieces which run upwards diagonally behind the steps:

The carriage pieces rest on a beam which in turn rests on a shallow rubble foundation:

The backside of the carriage pieces, with man of the tread supports missing:

The underside of the first floor landing:

Some of the lathe and plaster had to be removed to gain access to the underside of this 2nd floor landing, which requires serious attention and re-enforcement:

You can see to the right of this image where the staircase strigger has cracked as this flight has fallen away from the upper flight:

Again the same section approaching the third story, where the lower flight has fallen away:

As mentioned previously in this blog, this whole corner section of the house likely moved outwards  and away from inside section of the stairs many moons ago, pulling the outside flights with it. This section of stairs will have to be pulled back together and structurally reinforced which is no easy task:

Some of the skirting pulled away:

This section will have newly turned balusters reinstated:

Such a beautiful staircase for such a modest house, some real attention to detail and great craftmanship on show:

The first floor landing, with treads in reasonable condition:

Note aswell how much the stairs has dropped away from the skirting board. This whole flight will be lifted upwards:

Some items found inside the staircase, some great finds!