Tim Sproul
Member
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2007
- Messages
- 319
We had the floors in our house replaced - went from builder grade carpet to jatoba flooring throughout the house. I had posted many many months ago asking for advice on the newels and false treads and such. Well, here is the ongoing work so far.
The flooring installers didn't want to tackle the stairs, mostly because of this curved section and they didn't want to deal with removing the false treads and reinstalling the balusters, newels and handrails.
I didn't want to pay a stair guy to do the job - quotes ran from 8k to 15k!!!! That is just labor for 2 flights of stairs.
So now I'm on the job. I purchased unfinished jatoba treads from stairsupplies.com and found them to be worthwhile. Applied finish and started to install.
The wife didn't want a skirt board. Because of the returns, I used a story stick to get the measure of the tread. The tread was cut to rough length, leaving ~1/2 inch over length. I scribed the angle of the butt joint between the wall (where the skirtboard would normally be installed), using the mark transferred from the story stick to reference off of. I did attempt to cut the scribe with the PSB300. It was painfully slow (1 inch thick jatoba) and the scribes approximated straight lines so off to the Kapex. I don't think a non-slider would have been able to do the cut, even if it had the capacity to do 11 1/4 inches. I had to do about 5 passes. Good thing the Kapex is such a nice saw. The cut looked like a single pass cut, not a single ridge or fault to indicate multiple passes. Results:
Here's some more, if you can stand it.
For attaching the treads, I did "pocket holes" at the front, flooring adhesive between tread and OSB, and nailed it with a 16 gauge nailer underneath the riser. To drill the pocket holes in that tight space, I use a stubby brad point bit with the T15 and right angle head. Note that a 1/4 inch hex fits right in there without a chuck:
I predrilled into the tread using a 1/8 inch drill bit because the Kreg screws wouldn't bore into the jatoba in this situation.
Before I had started to install the treads, I used a laser line and some 1/4 mdf to make templates for where the baluster bores went. I subsequently remarked these locations using the template and a spring loaded punch (plug for Lee Valley).
The easy steps are done on this part of the stairway. I get up to around the ninth step and am faced with this.
So now I have to cut a notch into the tread as well as have the return on one end flush with the wall and on the other of the tread, have that butt joint flush with the wall. Time to make another template. This is from 1/2 inch mdf.
The template looks good. Move to the shop to mark out the waste, remove the majority via PSB300 and then finish with a 1 1/2 inch diameter router bit. I searched for a template bit with this diameter but couldn't find one. Luckily, Holbren Tools stocks just about every Whiteside bit and bearing. Ordered up a straight bit, bearing and lock collar and had it within 2 days via priority mail.
Here is the tread installed.
More to come later.
The flooring installers didn't want to tackle the stairs, mostly because of this curved section and they didn't want to deal with removing the false treads and reinstalling the balusters, newels and handrails.
I didn't want to pay a stair guy to do the job - quotes ran from 8k to 15k!!!! That is just labor for 2 flights of stairs.
So now I'm on the job. I purchased unfinished jatoba treads from stairsupplies.com and found them to be worthwhile. Applied finish and started to install.
The wife didn't want a skirt board. Because of the returns, I used a story stick to get the measure of the tread. The tread was cut to rough length, leaving ~1/2 inch over length. I scribed the angle of the butt joint between the wall (where the skirtboard would normally be installed), using the mark transferred from the story stick to reference off of. I did attempt to cut the scribe with the PSB300. It was painfully slow (1 inch thick jatoba) and the scribes approximated straight lines so off to the Kapex. I don't think a non-slider would have been able to do the cut, even if it had the capacity to do 11 1/4 inches. I had to do about 5 passes. Good thing the Kapex is such a nice saw. The cut looked like a single pass cut, not a single ridge or fault to indicate multiple passes. Results:
Here's some more, if you can stand it.
For attaching the treads, I did "pocket holes" at the front, flooring adhesive between tread and OSB, and nailed it with a 16 gauge nailer underneath the riser. To drill the pocket holes in that tight space, I use a stubby brad point bit with the T15 and right angle head. Note that a 1/4 inch hex fits right in there without a chuck:
I predrilled into the tread using a 1/8 inch drill bit because the Kreg screws wouldn't bore into the jatoba in this situation.
Before I had started to install the treads, I used a laser line and some 1/4 mdf to make templates for where the baluster bores went. I subsequently remarked these locations using the template and a spring loaded punch (plug for Lee Valley).
The easy steps are done on this part of the stairway. I get up to around the ninth step and am faced with this.
So now I have to cut a notch into the tread as well as have the return on one end flush with the wall and on the other of the tread, have that butt joint flush with the wall. Time to make another template. This is from 1/2 inch mdf.
The template looks good. Move to the shop to mark out the waste, remove the majority via PSB300 and then finish with a 1 1/2 inch diameter router bit. I searched for a template bit with this diameter but couldn't find one. Luckily, Holbren Tools stocks just about every Whiteside bit and bearing. Ordered up a straight bit, bearing and lock collar and had it within 2 days via priority mail.
Here is the tread installed.
More to come later.
