# Forum Home Renovation Stairs, Steps and Ramps  Steel of timber stair stringers?

## Draffa

For my house, I have to get a set of stairs made for the back verendah.  The vertical change is roughly 3000 (the exact mm will ultimately depend on the finished height of the earth under the verendah), and has a run of ~3000mm.  The wonderful coding on the Blocklayer site suggests 17 runs of 210 and 18 rises (max allowed in QLD, I think) of 166.7.  The real question is whether to make the stringers out of metal or wood.  I'm trying to keep the amount of steel in the house down to a minimum, but there's obviously limits.  Would wood stringers require a support halfway along (my Partners steel stringer stairs have 75mm steel posts halfway up, which is about the rise as mine), and which is more cost-effective (not going to rebate the steps into wood stringers, and prices seem to range from $600 - for ready-made stingers which are too short - to $900+ for steel)?

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## stevoh741

max riser in qld is 190mm but optimal is 175mm. For outdoor I wouldnt use any other than steel stringers. Timber stringers (especially the housed type) just trap water and rot over time. Get a number of steel quotes as the fabricators vary heaps. I use a lot of steel to build decks and I put out to quote one I built a couple of weeks ago to 5 different fabricators. The quotes came in varying from $3400 to $6600 for the same job. In this financial environment I was shocked at some of the bastards putting so much cream into their quotes. The downside for them is I'll never use them and I'll bad-mouth them to everyone.

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## ringtail

Steel is far more cost effective and will last forever. A *good quality hand made* timber flight of that size would be around the $ 8000. I would put posts in the middle or it will bounce for sure, steel or timber. A landing half way is the go. I like a smaller rise than 175, around the 165 to 170. Max rise is 190 nationally.

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## intertd6

240mm is the minimum going for a tread so your 3000 run is not going to fit if you have limited space, nothing wrong with timber external stairs if you can access a good durable species they will easily last 25 + years, the normal allowance for labour to build is 10hrs per meter of rise, for unhoused treads you could halve that.
regards inter

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## ringtail

> 240mm is the minimum going for a tread so your 3000 run is not going to fit if you have limited space, nothing wrong with timber external stairs if you can access a good durable species they will easily last 25 + years, the normal allowance for labour to build is 10hrs per meter of rise, for unhoused treads you could halve that.
> regards inter

  Agree, nothing wrong with timber but very expensive to have done properly. I reckon priming is the most important aspect for longevity and unfortunately a lot of guys dont or wont do it properly

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## woodchip

I wouldn't use any material other than Treated Pine for exterior stairs, hardwood is tough on tools for intricate & repetative work such as housing treads into stringers, & getting metal fabricators involved is cost prohibative & means a lot of running around for me, I could of half built the stairs in that time.
Agree a landing half way is the go, plus check as there may be a maximum number of rises before a landing is required anyway. 
cheers

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## stevoh741

> getting metal fabricators involved is cost prohibative & means a lot of running around for me

  Your living in a false economy mate. A local fabricator in Bris (Scott Metals - Products: Stair Stringers: Steel Supplies, Steel Fabrication, Building Products, Steel Products, Stair Stringers, Steel Posts and Beams, Steel Prices, Brisbane Steel Supplies, Brisbane Steel Fabrication, Reinforcing Supplies Brisbane, ) sells 12 step stringers HDG for $468. The running around for me is driving to the workshop and watching while they lift the stringers on to my ute then taking them home for a 1hr installation. based on Intertd6 10hrs per meter of rise, you would be looking at 10hrsx2.275m(rise) = 23hrs to construct. Last time I looked installers were charging around $60hr which equates to $1380 in labour plus timber costs and you're looking at 3 to 4 times the cost of a steel stringer that will last forever. Don't get me wrong I too like the look of timber but I have repaired soooo many timber stringer stairs in my time and IMO they just don't go the distance in full weather. Sure properly prime all rebates etc, but it is far and few between that I ever see timber external stairs built properly and to last.

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## denaria

I saw Scott Metals advertisement online, after we went to a fabricator in town for readymade stringers and informed us that the angle we wanted was illegal being more vertical than allowed, about 45degree. We smiled and left, knowing full well anything my partner welded up would be a deal more safer than climbing up to the flat concrete roof on a propped ladder as we're presently doing to patch and clean, and sometimes sleep on under the stars.

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## ringtail

> Your living in a false economy mate. A local fabricator in Bris (Scott Metals - Products: Stair Stringers: Steel Supplies, Steel Fabrication, Building Products, Steel Products, Stair Stringers, Steel Posts and Beams, Steel Prices, Brisbane Steel Supplies, Brisbane Steel Fabrication, Reinforcing Supplies Brisbane, ) sells 12 step stringers HDG for $468. The running around for me is driving to the workshop and watching while they lift the stringers on to my ute then taking them home for a 1hr installation. based on Intertd6 10hrs per meter of rise, you would be looking at 10hrsx2.275m(rise) = 23hrs to construct. Last time I looked installers were charging around $60hr which equates to $1380 in labour plus timber costs and you're looking at 3 to 4 times the cost of a steel stringer that will last forever. Don't get me wrong I too like the look of timber but I have repaired soooo many timber stringer stairs in my time and IMO they just don't go the distance in full weather. Sure properly prime all rebates etc, but it is far and few between that I ever see timber external stairs built properly and to last.

  Agree. I wouldn't even consider using pine for stairs. For me, treated pine is for retaining walls IMO and I certainly wouldn't disgrace a Queenslander ( or any other house) by putting treated pine anywhere near one in a structural application. But thats just me. Dont know what will happen when the good hardwood is gone. Mind you, at around $ 40 per lineal even the cost of treads alone makes the steel stringer option expensive in the overall picture but you get what you pay for.

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## Draffa

> A landing half way is the go.

  Hmm, I'm not sure that's going to be doable without putting more posts in (the existing post locations for the verendah and house would probably be useable for a mid-run support).  Something to think about.   

> 240mm is the minimum going for a tread so your 3000 run is not going to fit if you have limited space,

  The space wasn't limited, I was just scaling off the house plans.   

> nothing wrong with timber external stairs if you can access a good durable species they will easily last 25 + years

  Good to hear.  The stairs will be against the wall of a house, with a 3m roof over them, so they'll be pretty well protected from the weather.   

> the normal allowance for labour to build is 10hrs per meter of rise, for unhoused treads you could halve that.

  So perhaps 15 man-hours if I used brackets on wood stringers?   

> I wouldn't use any material other than Treated Pine for exterior stairs,

  As Ringtail says I wouldn't disgrace my house with treated pine.  :Biggrin:  
 If I punch into the Blocklayer site a run of 240, a rise of ~170, floor thickness 174, headroom 2300, that gives me a staircase that looks like it'll fit easily enough (i'll have to double-check the floor opening).  I had intended to get a fairly simple set of stairs, being 'open riser' in design (but with brackets instead of housing), but I've just remembered that I'd have to keep the rise to <125mm in that case, which would make the stairs substantially longer (changes the total run from 4320 to 5760, plus the size of a landing, because it's now got 25 rises).  I'd have to block off the openings between rises to restrain the length.
The Beams for the verendah are 175*75*2800.  If the stringers have a support in the middle (so <2800 span), and I were to construct with wood, surely they wouldn't need to be any bigger than that, even allowing for the dynamic forces of someone walking on them?

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## ringtail

125 mm rise ! bugger that, you'll be taking 2 at a time. If you have 3.0 mt in height, I would go with a rise of 167 mm ( or 166.6). This will give you 18 rises with 17 treads. If you use a 250 x 50 tread you will have 116 mm between the bottom of one tread and the top of the one below which is nice and legal ( max 125mm). Most of the steel stringers are a standard 175 mm rise which I reckon is a drama because with a 50 mm tread ( green) you are right on the limit of 125 mm gap. When the tread shrinks you are now illegal. Also most of the treads are not even 50 mm to start with, more like 45 - 48 mm. Try asking the steel fab guys like scotts about this and you just get blank looks. If they made their standard rise 170 mm it would be so much better. If you want anything other than 175 mm the cost is x 3 with a 3 week wait.

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## woodchip

Well I may have to stand corrected about the cost of steel stringers, when looking at the link provided to Scotts metal Fab', the HDG(which I would need within 1-2kms of ocean) stringers are quite well priced even with delivery & having to adjust height of the base/ground where they land. I'll consider them in future. I know our local fabricators would charge x2 or x3 times that price, & you increase the chances of stuff-ups & time over-runs when getting other trades involved. 
I normally organise the base first, ie concrete or pavers, then measure & custom make the stairs to suit. 
There are two types of treated pine, Rough sawn or "green"(only used in retaining walls & as cheap fence posts) available in 100x50, 150x50, 200x50 etc & then there's "rougher headed" treated pine, kiln dried available in 90x45, 140x45, 190x45, 240x45 etc.
Naturally, I dont think anyone would build stairs out of the rough sawn treated pine?? 
Draffa, If using timber, I wouldnt use brackets on such a large stair as yours, I reckon you'll end up with too many unsightly gaps, & dont forget to tie the stringers together with threaded rod(every third or fourth rise from memory). 
cheers

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## Draffa

Sorry, yeah, that should have been 125mm gap _between_ treads, which changes the calcs.

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## Draffa

> & dont forget to tie the stringers together with threaded rod(every third or fourth rise from memory).

  For all the threaded rod I'm soon to buy (rodding the house instead of strapping the studs to bearers and top plate.  Approved by Engineer and Certifier), I hope the big green shed gives me a discount.  :Biggrin:

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## stevoh741

I'd go somewhere decent for a discount  :Wink 1:

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## Gaza

> I hope the big green shed gives me a discount.

  that will be the day, you are dreaming about discount there

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## ringtail

Try A Woodshed at darra

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