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My wife and I just bought our first home together and I suspect I'll be seeking this community's collective wisdom pretty frequently.

We have one interior staircase and the previous owners installed a metal bannister. The handrail feels sturdy enough, but the lateral pieces beneath are inconsistently attached (I believe they're welded). Some welds cover the entire connection to the baluster, others have gaps. I'd like to fill the gaps but everything I was able to find online involved welding, which is not in my skillset (or available tools). I was thinking of sanding the entire area, using an epoxy to fill the gap, sanding the area again to smooth it out, and then priming/painting. Happy to hear any suggestions/course corrections. I'm also not super confident about how to match the texture of the existing paint coat.

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isherwood
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mementocorgi
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  • Matching paint/texture is the hardest DIY to do. If the welds are solid, then filling gaps is okay, but pictures do not look like what I would expect for good looks/work. – crip659 Mar 02 '24 at 00:19
  • I'm certainly not impressed, and the affixing of the bannister to the floor is even less appealing, but I'm not sure it's worth replacing at this point, either. – mementocorgi Mar 02 '24 at 00:35
  • It may well be that it is strong enough, despite the looks. perhaps follow @crip659's advice about shaking it. Looks are a different issue. You can fill in the gaps and repaint the whole thing if you want. – Rohit Gupta Mar 02 '24 at 04:44
  • Those welds are plenty strong so long as there's another weld on the opposite side of each connection to lock it against rotation. A 1/4" long by 1/16" fillet weld typically has about 200# of strength, and the IRC calls for 50# strength for the filler pieces. Without a weld on the opposite side, however, the connection flexes easily and can quickly fatigue the welds to an early failure (low cycle fatigue). – popham Mar 02 '24 at 07:28
  • Those welds are located for horizontal strength, and those bars don't really need much vertical strength. So we're talking an aesthetic issue here. – Huesmann Mar 03 '24 at 14:35
  • Aesthetics is my main issue - the inconsistency every few steps grabs my attention every time I use the staircase. – mementocorgi Mar 04 '24 at 00:58

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Just use ALEX caulk. Or you might scrounge around for a paintable black caulk instead.

If there is a very large gap (wider than 1/8"), then squirt some spray foam into the tube steel through the gap, wait for it to cure, and then cut the squeeze out to match the shape of the tube. Use a 2 part filler to clean up the foam's texture and caulk the joint at the tube's intersection with the post. Prime and paint.

popham
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