Stairs: Spiral and straight, help me do the right thing.

I need to come up into the studio from the floor below. The rise is 9 feet. I can have whatever sized hole I need, but obviously i want it as small as possible. Gear can be brought in another way, I mainly want it to fit, barely, a single person wide. I'm thinking 32 inches wide max. For a straight run of steps I have a maximum of 13 feet from the deck to the floor. To explain my 13 feet... I found a piece of trim that was 13 feet long and placed it where the landing would be at the top to try and see how steep the angle is, and it came to exactly the perfect spot at the bottom. By looking at it, I cant tell. The only thing I can figure is making a mock up out of 2x4 pieces and seeing how steep it really is before commiting to the big stuff. Think it will be too steep? My other option is spiral stairs. Anyone know where I can find a place on the web explaining how to build these from wood? Any other suggestions I may not be thinking of are greatly appreciated. How about a little electric motor driven platform elevator? ha joking. Thanks.

Demoking - if you want replies I suggest you follow forum rules and state your true location in your profile. You could be in iceland for all we know.

Ummm, ok but I'm not quite sure where that comes into play here. I changed it. Is there a program that could sort of show me the elevation of the steps if I were to use a 13 ft stair run, rising 9 feet? Seems like it might be steep, but do-able. I just measured my dads stairs coming out of his garage into the house, and his is a 6 foot rise, with a 10 foot stair run, and its not steep at all. I know I'm going higher and longer, but it seems like it might be ok. The other problem is figuring out how big the hole will have to be to keep average people from busting thier heads on the way up. Thanks Paul

Paul - here's sketchup model of a spiral staircase over 9 ft. It makes it a 9" step - which is pretty steep. cheers john

Thanks, very cool of you. I have to update sketchup to the new version before it'll let me peek, so now the wait... read on... More info: I just leaned a 14 ft trim piece against the wall where the steps meet landing, and measured from the floor on up in 1ft increments. The rise is about 8 inches for every 1 foot of stringer run. Is that too steep? I'm not looking to meet any kind of building codes, I'm just looking for "its decent" or "its steep but doable" or "its a death trap/ladder" I might just have to build it out and see how they really are. Thats a huge waste of lumber, time and money if it doesnt work out though. I cant find any plans on the net for workable spiral steps. Thanks again!

Here's a standard staircase to your height. BTW - I'm just using standard sketchup models from the architecture package available at sketchup's site.. cheers john

DemoKing wrote:

The rise is about 8 inches for every 1 foot of stringer run. Is that too steep? I'm not looking to meet any kind of building codes, I'm just looking for "its decent" or "its steep but doable" or "its a death trap/ladder"!

According to this page...

Per most Building Codes, the rise should be between 5" and 7¾" with the ideal rise for a residence being 7", [and] the tread should be between 9¼" and 14". An intermediate tread is 12".

So, you don't think you care about code compliance, eh? :roll: Check out the "Permits, Codes, Licenses -- and WHY YOU SHOULD CARE!" sticky thread over in Studio Construction forum. If there is an alternate method of entry and exit to the room, and the stairs you will be building are only for convenience and aren't likely to be used often, then there's a chance that you would be allowed to build an unconventional set of stairs that would actually be classified as a ladder of sorts. You should seek consultation from your local building department to come up with a safe and legal plan. --Keith :mrgreen:

Cool stuff thanks. By "rise" I didnt mean actual per-step rise... there are no steps so I have no idea what that will be yet. I meant that when leaning a board against the place where the steps begin, and ending it really close to where they would end at the bottom and then measuring from the bottom to the top every 1 ft, it was rising 8inches more from the floor. In other words, the 1 ft mark was 8 inches, 2 ft was 16, 3 ft was 24, etc. I was trying to LOOK and see if the thing seemed steep but you just cant tell for sure. I just measured my dads basement steps, which come up 9 feet also, and beleive it or not, his rise exactly 8 inches every linear foot also. They are kind of steep but nothing too drastic. I think I'll be fine. As far as the building codes and whatnot... this adds more than 400 ft to my house thats already 1860 sq ft. That adds a significant chunk onto my property taxes if they find out about it. Dig? :) NO buildings code people for me.