Hi,
The newel post in the picture is pretty loose. I removed the lower, rectangular piece of trim hoping to find a bolt to tighten but no luck. Any ideas on how I should tighten this newel post? I don’t see any indicaiton at the bottom of a plug that might hide a nut.
Thanks,
George
Replies
It's not a little wobbl, it's a lot wobbly. The railing is loose also so I should be able to hack saw the nails holding it to the newel and try turning it. If that doesn't work I may try to finish nail at the base and renail the railing. Hopefully that would stiffen it up. Is that an acceptable reapir or does it qualify as one of those "why the hell did they ever do that" repairs?
George
I'm definitely not an expert so hopefully you'll get some better advice. That said, I wouldn't count on finish nails to hold anything that has any sort of stress on it, and newell posts get a lot of stress.
If nothing better is suggested, you could try "toe nailing" it down with some screws -- the biggest you can get away with. Pre-drill, counter-bore & plug. That'd be a lot more secure than finish nails.
Unfortunately, many such posts are poorly installed, and there's not much you can do about them other than to remove and reinstall the post properly. A few finish nails might tighten it up for a day or two but they'd quickly work loose -- the forces applied at that joint are substantial.
There are basically two valid approaches:
1) Have some sort of threaded fastener in the joint that can be tightened as the wood shrinks.
2) Run a solid rod of some sort down into the framing 6-8 inches and up into the post a foot or so.
Anything else is just temporary.
Here's some hardware you could use.
http://www.ljstair.net/pdfs/12Tools_Hardware.pdf
Even several of those would be poor choices. Anything that only mounts to the tread is insufficient.
I believe the post is just sitting on top of the stair tread, hopefully with a bolt up through it. It's hard to tell with the carpet. I'll find out when I pull it. The last tenant had 4 boys so I'm sure the newel has seen it's share of sideways force as they came down the stairs and went around the bottom landing.
Look to see if there is a 1"
Look to see if there is a 1" plug on the bottom of the handrail within 2" of the newel. If so you can drill out the plug and remove the nut for the rail-bolt. The newel can now be freed from the handrail. Look to see how the newel is attached, it should be possible to remove the newel and carpet to add some blocking under the tread or run a shure-tite into the carriage.
If it is nailed together then who knows how the rest is attached.
So , when you removed the trim, you could see the bottom of the tread, and that was iall...nothing extending through it?
I pulled the carpet back from the riser and found that the total sum of attachemnt was three drywall screws through the riser into the newel. No wonder it was loose. A couple of lag bolts tightened it up nicely. Thanks for the advice.
George