Timber Stairway Constructed Durban

This wooden stairway build in Durban was a tricky one. The client was a committee representative on the body corporate for a small block of flats in Durban. There were about four units in the block and the existing metal fire escape had rusted to a point where it was dangerous. So first we needed to get rid of the steel structure. With a little assistance from my mates, we came in and chemical anchored stainless eyes into the wall on either sides above the metal platform you see from the pictures. From there we rigged up some climbing equipment to be safe and started cutting sections out of the steel structure and lowering them little by little to the ground. We needed to cut short sections because the steel was 10mm thick and we didnt want to damage the walls, windows or doors on the way down. We managed to get most of it down in a single working day with a small piece remaining for day two. We battled slightly in getting the main support off because the sewage pipes had been installed following the metal so we needed to cut the steel out around the pipes so as not to damage the pipes. In getting rid of it we inadvertently damaged a corner of the wall as the rawl bolts there were pretty big, rusted and pretty much part of the construction by now. We patched that using structural grout which was hard and sound enough to support our primary beam to.

With the metal gone, we set out to produce a timber stairway and landing that could act as a fire escape. The little landing area was easier enough and we canter levered it so as to help keep our posts out of the way below for parking. In these small blocks of flats in Durban space is very constrained so posts have to be kept well out the way of parking space. Considering we were canter levering it we needed to work with 30 x 140 joists of balau rather than our standard 30 x 102 joists.

The stringers for the stairs were also tricky as we had to follow the original line of the stringers because there was a door way beneath and we could only protrude to the end of the wall without obstructing the driveway. This resulted in our stringers being placed at 45 degrees which resulted in our risers being of equal length to our runs or treads. It is not ideal as it makes the stairs very steep but we had no option due to space and height. We were a total of about 4m in the air to the landing.

The treads went on alright, the balustrade too and we had to join the stringer on the outside with two independent posts to ground to support it as the timber we could get wasnt long enough to run the full length of the stringer.

We went back there a year or two later as one of the treads had popped a screw. Sometimes the timber moves more than one wants it to and breaks the screw off. We do however put additional back up screws in each piece we secure so they are safe in the event that one screw does break.