| Project by sphere | posted 1223 days ago | 3819 views | 4 times favorited | 21 comments |  |
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This is a first. A curved 90 degree turn, log stair case. This is in the home of Alice Walton, of Wal-Mart Walton…Sam’s daughter. In Arkansas. I built it for the log home manufacturer that is in Tn. I was in NC and made the stairs as far as I could go, then disassembled and shipped to Tn. for storage till the house was ready.
Then me and a buddy drove out and packed the truck and sent it to Ark. followed along and erected it and finished it ( the railings tie in) in 4 20 hour days…yes 4, 20 hour days.
You’ll see dovetails of cherry in the treads…these are how I anchored the treads to the carriages , there is a J bolt in the DT that passes into the carriage that is counter bored from below, and washers and AUTO VALVE springs, with a coupling nut ( a reg. nut would strip off what with the enormous spring pressure , about 800lbs P2Inch) to cinch it into the coped log carriage. This allows wood movement, but NO SQEAKS and no return to tighten any hardware seasonally..I invented that.
All the treads are 1/2 slices of a poplar log, that I 1/4’erd and added a wedge, so the treads were wide enough to be passable on the outside radius and narrow enough to make the inside radius turn.
All is code compliant except the hand rail baluster spacing, but when ya have 16 BILLION dollars to your family name…it’s amazing what codes can be overlooked.
All the tenoned and drilled hand rails are Mtn. laurel, and Dogwood, and Rhododendron from the Nat. Forest in NC. Harvested by yours truly. It stood without any support , but Alice liked the idea of humanesque legs under it…so we added some.
No, I would not ever, in a million years, do it over again.
-- Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Wood Works
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21 comments so far
a1Jim
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88945 posts in 1773 days
#1 posted 1223 days ago
WEE dogie those are some stairs I’m sure glad I didn’t have to build those. I like a challenge but any that involves heavy logs or 20 hour days. Your approach to these stairs Shows your years of fine craftsmanship and innovative thinking. Fantastic work my friend.
-- W James Brokenbourgh Custom furniture maker http://artisticwoodstudio.com/
sphere
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109 posts in 1227 days
#2 posted 1223 days ago
All I can say is it takes a LOT of head scratching to cope them treads and have the whole works come out within 3/8th in. all the way up!
Esp when the shop is 400 miles away from the house.
-- Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Wood Works
sphere
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109 posts in 1227 days
#3 posted 1223 days ago
Jim, if she didn’t LOVE them, I was gonna saw it all up and burn it in the front yard.
She made the original contractor tear out the stairs he installed, the “industry standard” for these home kits.
Needless to say, she did indeed love them and had me do some addition work in the house with the twigs and sticks.
Great woman…she even caught a striper in the river and asked if we wanted her to clean it and we cook it over the log lighter in the fireplace..LOL
we slept ( not much) in the house, and drank voluminous amounts of coffee.
-- Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Wood Works
patron
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12165 posts in 1537 days
#4 posted 1223 days ago
reqal swiss family walton (LOL) !
you do nice work there my man .
-- david - only thru kindness can this world be whole . If we don't succeed we run the risk of failure. Dan Quayle
CreekWoodworker
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408 posts in 1494 days
#5 posted 1223 days ago
Wow! That is amazing. Nice work.
-- Mike ...Success is often the result of taking a misstep in the right direction
Jimthecarver
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1052 posts in 1981 days
#6 posted 1223 days ago
What an undertaking, Fine Job!
-- Can't never could do anything, to try is to advance.
Jim Jakosh
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7621 posts in 1301 days
#7 posted 1223 days ago
That is way too cool! Truly a one of a kind and a work of art with natural wood!!!
NICE JOB !
-- Jim Jakosh.....Practical Wood Products...........Learn something new every day!!
WistysWoodWorkingWonders
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11516 posts in 1352 days
#8 posted 1223 days ago
holy crap… amazing…. lots of work done there for sure… good work and great dedication… 4×20 is an accomplishment all in its own…
-- New Project = New Tool... it's just the way it is, don't fight it... :)
Wade
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18 posts in 1240 days
#9 posted 1222 days ago
Looks like a MILLION bucks… Hopefully she paid you at least that much
-- " I do what the vioces in my head tell me to do...HAHA"
Puupaja
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297 posts in 1296 days
#10 posted 1222 days ago
Wow that´s really work with your hands, great stairs!!
-- http://www.facebook.com/pages/Puupaja/357028681017482
MsDebbieP
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18328 posts in 2356 days
#11 posted 1222 days ago
love it – love it!
the dovetails are beautiful.
it looks like a rope bridge. Stunning!
-- ~ Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)
Splinterman
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23056 posts in 1557 days
#12 posted 1222 days ago
Hey Sphere,
Really cool man.
Junji
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698 posts in 1577 days
#13 posted 1222 days ago
This is amazing, I really like it.
This would make the life in the house really fun, and happy. Wow, I really wanna do this someday!
Great job!!!
-- Junji Sugita from Japan, http://tetra.blog12.fc2.com/
hunter71
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1297 posts in 1382 days
#14 posted 1222 days ago
Being custom log home builders I appreciate the work [although I would never attempt it] We have done some open units but on the job. Making these from your shop and transporting them to a site. Just amazing. Custom log home plans are just that CUSTOM. Great job!!
-- A childs smile is payment enough.
Jamie
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172 posts in 1456 days
#15 posted 1222 days ago
Wow! Simply amazing a beautiful.
-- "Preach the gospel always. If necessary use words" -St Francis of Assisi
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