Auto news on Youtube May 6 2018

today I'm building a staircase with a custom handrail

but before we get to the build

let me get you up to speed about what needed to be done on the jobsite

before we can install the stairs and handrail

here's the before picture which the clients felt was a dated design

it was not going to go well with their new

Hickory flooring that they were installing at the top of the stairs

they wanted to update the style of the staircase to an open-ended tread

to do this I needed to modify the wall

so I drew the rise and run of the staircase on the drywall

I then took my sawzall and carefully cut out the shape

unfortunately the treads were dadod into the skirt board so I had to demo them

and cut new stringers

I only demod half the staircase so I'd have something

to stand on while I worked on the other side.

after the demo was done the corners

of the drywall were just flapping in the wind ready to snap off with a little pressure

to solve this I reframe the wall up in sections

then I slid them in between the stringers and drywall nailing them off to the existing studs

but before I demo'd anything I fabricated all the components back at the shop

while I can order custom sized treads the millwork shops in my area didn't offer the customizations I needed

to wrap around the existing walls

so I just fabricated my own

for the treads themselves it was your basic milling to thickness and gluing together operation

but for the nosing I milled up some eight

quarter stock and chucked a stair nose bit in the router

before I ran the stock through the router I clipped off the corners at the table saw

this helped reduce the load of the router especially using a huge stair nosing bit

It also considerably reduced the chatter and tear out on the Hickory which is prone

to having a lot of tear out when routing

then at the router table I used several

feather boards to help keep the stock tight to the fence and tight to the table

This resulted in a perfect bullnose that needed very little sanding

once all the pieces were bullnosed I cut the miters for the open-ended treads on

the table saw

for most of the treads it was your basic edge banding operation with mitered corners

but for the bottom tread I had to make a notch for the new post.

I first attached the center nosing with dominoes and glue

I then went back to the table saw and for safety I cut a mitre on a longer

piece of nosing and then cut the piece to length

I pre-glued the mitered corner before attaching it to the tread

this made installation a bit easier so all I had

to do was tac the return in place with some brads.

I milled the test block the

same width as the new post and did a quick test fit

to be sure I had a nice fit

it's much easier to adjust the edge banding before the glue fully sets

now on to making the new post. I ripped down some eight quarter stock and laminated

two pieces together.

Once the glue is dry I ran it through the planer until it was

down to the thickness I needed

to give the new post illusion that they have

floating panels I milled up some stock and ripped a miter down one edge

I sent up a stop block on the table-saw so I could quickly cut them all to the

same length then I glued the miters together to create the corners for the new post

These were long and skinny, to skinny to clamp,

I used some blue tape to hold them together while the glue dried.

once the glue has set up enough to take the tape off I used a card scraper to

remove the excess glue squeeze-out so the corners would fit tight to the post

Before installing the corners I pre finish the post themselves

this would be a lot easier before the corners are installed and also help prevent any raw

wood from showing along the edges if the wood shrank during seasonal movement

Then as an extra precaution I ran my block plane and down the sides

chamfering the corners to be sure the corner trim would sit tight to the post.

To install the trim I used a headless pin nailer. it was big enough to hold the

trim in place but small enough not to have to putty a bunch of holes

there are three rail elements to the post. One at the bottom one two-thirds up and one at the top

this design element came from the doors in the rest of the house

that had the same panel design

I started out by marking and cutting each piece as I work my way around and up the post

when installing the middle rail I used a spacer block to be sure they would all

be placed in the same spot and to save a bunch of time

not having to measure for each one

The last detail for the new post was to build the cap. There were a few test cuts

involved and a bit of math to get all four sides to meet in the middle at a

nice clean point

I didn't record it because at the time I thought it would

make for a boring video. If there are enough people interested maybe I'll go

back and recreate a video for the future but the operation itself is pretty

straightforward I used my shop made vertical sled to

clamp the workpiece and with the blade raised to the correct height and angle

When I made the cuts I cut the cross grain first as it's more likely to tear out and

then I cut with the grain second removing any tear out from the cross

grain cut

I reset the saw blade to 90 and then cut the decorative shoulders on the top side

the cap will be pinned in place with a brad nailer and a little glue and the

underside will be trimmed out with quarter roun.

I did the same order of operations here

I cut the cross screen first and then I cut with the grain to

cut off any tear-out that may have happened

while the stain and finish was drying on the new posts I moved on to prepping the

stock for the spindles I joined it planed and cut each spindle square there

are 20 spindles in this project plus some extra stock to create the little

cross braces between each spindel so this took some time

next was to cut the little angle of cross braces that were going between the spindles

since my table saw is old-school and doesn't have a proper riving knife

I clamped a shim just so it rubbed the back side of the blade

this way as I cut the little parts

they were pushed away from the blade preventing them from becoming a little kickback bullets

a stop block clamped to the miter gauge made the cuts accurate

and quickly repeatable

While I had the miter gauge set up at the right angle I

cut the tops of all the spindles this angle is going to go against the handrail

then I Re-squared the miter gauge to cut the lower cross braces that

are going between the spindles I set up a stop to make the cuts repeatable but I

took it one step further I set the red arm as the stop so the

metal bar would act as a hold down

this made it a little safer more comfortable

to cut the little parts

now it's time to cut the joinery I know a lot of people

poopoo the Domino because they think it's not real woodworking or it costs

too much or they just love to hate something but for a small custom shop

like mine when I need to get a job finished before the next mortgage

payment is due the Domino is the way to go

there was 72 of these little cross

braces so I think the Domino paid for itself that day

to set up my jig I screwed it down to the table and set up some angled stop blocks to hold the

workpiece in place and a stop block to my right to register the Domino against

this way the mortises would all be in the same place

for the spindles themselves I reset my jig so I'd have something to climb to

then I set a stop block to the left and right to register for both the upper and lower

cross braces

then for the very bottom cross braces I reconfigured the jig one last time to

cut the mortises on both sides

you may have noticed that these parts are

stained and finished. I wanted to pre finish the inside edges before

assembling this as it would be really difficult to stain and finish after they were assembled

to assemble the spindle units I screwed yet another jig to the

table the stop block as the top of the jig is cut at the same angles and rise

and run up the stairs to help me quickly align all the parts at the proper angle

now all there's left is to add Domino's clamps and glue

I clamped it in a way so I could simply lift the assembly off the jig set it aside and start clamping up

the next set

to attach the spindles to the treads I simply doweled them

so once the assembly was dry I routed out a slot in the bottom of the spindles

to receive the doubt to do this

I screwed a jig to the side of my assembly table

to connect the spindle assembly upside down so I could route out an

oblong hole in the bottom of each spindle the reason for the oblong hole is it

gave me a little wiggle room in case one of the dowels in the treads was off

once the glue is set all three dowels would be solid

The reason why I'm blowing

out the hole there is my spiral up cut bit was so dull it made more smoke than sawdust

so I'm using a spiral down cut just to get the job done and it is

driving the chips to the bottom of the hole

I should also mention that big chunk of walnut scrap is only there

to take up the extra space in the clamps

this makes it easier to clamp the workpiece without the bar sticking out in the way

once everything was installed I had one more detail to take care of and

that was the cove on the backside of the treads and risers

my local millwork shop

did not stock Cove and hickory and they charged in the $200 setup fee for a custom run

I only needed a few sticks so I was back at the shop to mill some up

Since Hickory is a splintery wood and a router will often tear out a big chunk of wood

instead of cut it. I did a similar operation as the stair nose to prevent

tear-out and reduce the load on the router

I used the dado blade to remove the bulk of the material then set up feather

boards on the router table to route out the cove

since thin pieces will chatter while milling I used a wider piece of wood than I

needed to make the cove. I'd then rip the cove free at the table saw

this let the router cut a cleaner Cove and is much safer to waste a little wood than to try

to route a little piece

I should mention for the handrail profile I did

have my local mill workshop custom cut it. That was large enough and complicated

enough to justify a custom run over my labor to mill it in-house

so here are some shots of the Finnish staircase and handrail

if you're going to take on a project like this I highly recommend you pick up a code book

in my 20-plus years of working in the trades I've had all kinds of people tell me

what the building codes are and more often than not they're wrong to one degree or another

you'll save yourself all kinds of headaches

if you get your information from the source

For more infomation >> Building a Custom Staircase and Handrail - Duration: 11:57.

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Build a Pipe Clamp Rack for Your Shop - Duration: 7:34.

hey folks I'm Dennis today I'm going to show you how to build a clamp rack for

your pipe clamps most of the time they end up propped up in the corner or

laying on a workbench something like that are in the floor thanks for

watching let's get started

this is a pretty simple drawing that I did in Sketchup just kind of an

end-view to show some of the dimensions of the general layout of the project I

had a couple of six inch wide drops left over from ripping some 3/4 plywood on

another project so I used them to build this clamp rack. first I cut two pieces

to 35 1/2 inches long on a miter saw and then I ripped them to 4 1/8

inches wide these are gonna be glued up together to make up the top plate for

the clamp rack I didn't want to use a single ply of 3/4 for the top plate

because I was concerned that over time the weight of the pipe clamps would

cause it to bow so that's why I'm using double thickness I glued these, clamped

them up and set them aside to dry overnight. for the sides I took a couple

of pieces of 4 1/8" wide 3/4 ply and I cut them to 7 7/16" long then

I made a mark 3/4 inches from the edge on the short side and just drew

a 45-degree line and cut that off just to make a nicer edge on the front edge

of the side pieces

I then took a piece of the six inch plywood and cut it to 35-1/2

inches long for the back plate so this panel is six inches wide by thirty

five and a half I apologize for my camera work here in a minute as I

unintentionally took the work just slightly outside of the view of the camera. I mark

each side for two screw holes into the top plate and two into the back plate

since top plates are double thickness I place the marks on the center of the

bottom layer so 1-1/8 inch down from the top edge of the side I didn't

want my screws to end up in the glue line of the top plate you could place

your screws so that one went into each layer of the top plate I also put a

couple of screws to go through the side into the back plate and then drilled all

those holes with a countersink bit. I took the clamps off my top

plate and then using my trisquare I set it to two and three-quarter inches

and scribe the line from one edge all the way down this is gonna help me

locate the center marks for the holes I'm gonna drill that will create the

slots for each pipe clamp so I wanted to end up with four slots at inch and a

quarter wide an inch and a quarter space for my 3/4 pipe clamps and twelve slots

at 1-inch wide with one inch spacing from a 1/2 inch pipe clamps so I laid

the Center marks out on that 2 and 3/4 inch line ascribed down the top plate to

accommodate the number and the size of slots that I wanted you can adjust this

to your needs based on how many pipe clamps you've got and what sizes you got

as you lay yours out just be sure to allow for proper spacing on each end of

the top plate as well as between each slot this will also affect the overall

width of your pipe clamp rack I marked which holes on my top plate were inch

and 1/4 and which ones were one-inch diameter so

I didn't mess up while I was drilling holes then using my inch and 1/4

Forstner bit I drilled the first four holes in the top plate centered on the

marks that I just made law was laying it out

I'll switch my bit to the one inch Forstner and drilled the other 12 holes

in the top plate

using my square again I marked lines from the edge of each hole to the front

edge of the top plate these will mark my cut lines to finish off the slots for

each pipe clamp I clamped a two by six to my miter saw fence so I could step

the top plate out this will make the bottom of the blade come close to the

bottom of the slots as I'm cutting them out

I cut each line and removed the waste to form individual slots for the clamps

can I switch my spacer block to the other side of my miter saw to finish off

my cuts

then I glue, brad, and screw the sides on to the back in the top plate I use

number eight by inch and five-eighths deck screws just because I have a lot of

them right before I did this I ran a bead of glue on the top edge of the back

plate and just put it together with no fastening on to the bottom of the top

plate then I attach the second side using the same method

then about every three or four slots I drilled countersunk holes from the top

plate into the back and I use number eight by two and a half inch deck screws

to fasten that together then I fastened it to the wall into a couple of studs

using some number fourteen screws and filled it up with my pipe clamps so

that's an easy way to build a clamp rack for your pipe clamps and get them out of

the corner off the floor and off your workbench thanks for watching my video I

appreciate it please give me a like below if you would subscribe to my

channel and hope to see you back soon thanks