Building and Learning

Building a balcony railing system.

These are the newel post with and without the water based tint.  The water based tint causes the wood to bumped up so you have to sand.  if you use non-water based natural stain you should not have any problem.  My wife liked the water based tint's color better than the natural stain.

Here are the finished posts and one hand rail.  Notice how the post are all the same shade.  The original darker color lightened up.

 You also need floor plate.

Here you can see the baluster.  We used balusters with the square bottom and tops.

 Next the carpet is removed using the box cutter.  Also remove the floor insulation.

Find the floor joyces into which you will screw in the upright post bolts.  You drill a half inch wide hole 5 inches into the joyce.  You must find the center of the joyce.  I taped the area where the base of the newel post will be with blue painters tape.

 Now the posts are installed.  After tightening down the post bolts, I also used metal plates at the base of each post.

 The top hand rail is installed after you put in the rail to post lag screw and nut.  The old way with the lag screw and nut is difficult to tighten but it is possible.  There are newer ways to accomplish attaching railing to post.  Plus for the newel post to the floor which appear much easier.

 Next the balusters will be installed.  A 3/4 inch hole is drilled in the oak floor plate deep enough to hold the wooden pin that is glued into the bottom of the baluster.  My wife is an expert on measuring and placing accurating.  She does a great job in placing the balusters.

Here is the wood glue in the drilled out 3/4 inch hole.

This is the completed right angle part of the balcony railing system to provide stability to the entire balcony rail.

Here the corner moldering has been installed to cover the metal floor plates.

 The balcony railing.

 To set up the wall hungup is where I had to improvise because I could not find out to do it.  I used a spacer to trace the shape of the railing on the wall.  This allows me to find the center of the railing to install the lad screw.

This is the underside of the hand rail.  After drilling the two required holes for the lag screw and tightening nut, I also cut a slot so that I could drop the rail down over the lag screw before tightening the nut.

This is the wall plate that is installed over the lag screw.

Then the rail is put into place and tightened down.

 Here my wife is setting up the measurements of the width between the balusters to maintain a speed of no more than 4 inches at the widest spot between any two balusters.

 Blue painters tape is used to mark all the measurements.

 The process continues.

Here's is where my wife artistic eye and measurement skills help correct a problem I created when I place the wall mount for the hand rail.  She figured a method measurements so that the placement of the hand rail and balusters on the oak floor plate looked correct.  She made an optical illusion so that everything looked correct to the eye.  She is awesome.  

The finished project.  The gate I made years ago when a couch blocked balcony edge.  I will make a new gate to match the oak balcony railing.