Wooden stair repair idea

[John Farrell]

We've just removed carpet from the stairs to refinish the hardwood underneath. The hardwood is in pretty good shape but is not tight. Access to the underneath is covered by wallboard. It looks like the kreg jig could be used to pull the hardwood pieces together and the holes plugged for finishing. The challenge is clamping the jig. Has anyone tried this successfully?

[James Waller]

Any images could help us. :)

[R. E. Woods]

The small hole above the 3 pocket holes will let you secure the jig to the stair by means of a screw

[John Farrell]

R. E. Woods - thank you. I am aware of the hole for holding down with a screw. I'm more interested to find out if anyone has fixed stair treads this way and what they learned in the process. Thanks again.

[James P. Cottingham]

What do you mean by "not tight?" Hardwood does need some room to expand and contract depending on humidity and temp. If the board are too tight together then they can split or crack. Same thing is true for table tops.

[John Farrell]

James, good question. These steps are about 40 years young. Each tread is made of three pieces of wood. As much as I can see, each piece is nailed to the stringer underneath - 1 in the middle and at each end - and to the riser in the back. The nails have pulled loose as the boards have expanded and contracted. The best repair might be to replace the nails with screws from underneath but the bottom is covered by wall board. Are you saying the pocket screws would be too tight and cause splitting and cracking of the wood? This is exactly the experience I was hoping to get.

[James P. Cottingham]

I've read that if you back off the screws by about 1/4 turn you won't have a big problem with the splits and cracks but I've never tested it.

[John Farrell]

James, thank you for your help. I've also researched how to stop squeaky wood floors and stairs. The This Old House web site has good advice. They suggest getting behind the stairs to fix the problems out of sight, if possible - I prefer not to do that because it creates a big dry wall repair. Their next suggestion is lifting the treads. The treads on my stairs are ended in cut outs in the stair molding - it looks nice but it must have been a done by a cabinet maker or master carpenter. It has very complicated cuts. Too bad they didn't do a better job attaching the treads to the stringers, although they were built almost 40 years ago so I shouldn't be too critical. After more careful examination, only one stair tread really needs more than minor adjustment, and the pocket screws seem to me to be the best option. Thanks again.