New Railing

So, we found out our old stair railing is NOT going to work. We cannot keep it as the bars are more than 4 inches apart (they're 6 in some places), and that does not keep with code. Since we're putting in new rug anyway, we figured we should probably have a proper railing built. The one we had before did not have any handrail going down the stairs... the bottom 5 stairs were completely exposed and open, and the other steps had these bars that went from stair to ceiling. The railing that went along the hallway to prevent people from 'hurling' over the edge onto the stairs below also had some 6inch spacings.


This is the railing that would be in the hall (above). Note the large gaps.
Below is a pic of an example of what those things barring the way from the top stairs to floor below look like.

Anyway, I looked into having a wooden one installed. We had two different guys come down to give a quote. The one company hasn't gotten back to us yet, and the private guy says he expects $750 in labour, plus whatever the cost of the materials. I designed my own and looked at material costs... which get to be around $1000! Cheapest route is using Aspen instead of oak, which brings it to around $700... just in wood. Never mind any brackets necessary. I plan on checking out other stores to price compare.

Perhaps I won't try to build myself after all. I really hope we'll get a quote from that other company soon. They specialize in woodwork, are located close to home, and seem very professional. The private guy... not so much. We'll see what the difference in price is.

I'm hoping to get this done soon. We had to push back our rug installation date from this friday to August first, and I'm kind of stuck as I can't put in any casings or baseboards till the rug is in. I still haven't painted them yet, but still. Here's hoping it wont cost too terribly much more...

Yeah... right.

Edit: We got the quote in... it'll cost $4000 for installation and materials!!!!!! Private guy will cost $2000... so dad and I are planning to do it ourselves. Sigh. Gotta finish before the 1st.