What Type of Nail or Screws Should I Use To Assemble A Staircase?
The most common nail used for assembling
stairs, believe it or not won't be a common nail.
Interior stairs are usually assembled with 16d green vinyl sinkers, ring
shanks, drive screws and in some cases common nails.
Common nails are a little larger and tend to crack and damage stair
stringers and other parts of the stairway. The only time I have ever
used common nails were when they were required by the structural
engineer.
Exterior stairs are usually assembled with zinc coated, galvanized or
stainless steel nails. My preference is a galvanized nail, because zinc
coated nails tend to corrode or rust a little faster and stainless steel
nails are expensive.
Try to avoid using interior nails on the exterior, because they will
corrode, stain and eventually deteriorate, even though you can use
exterior nails, for interior stairways.
You can use practically any type of screw imaginable to assemble an
interior stairway, but for the exterior, I suggest using the same
materials I already mentioned for exterior nailing.
A - 8d Galvanized Nail
B - 16d Green Vinyl Sinker Framing Nail
C - 16d Galvanized Nail
D - 8d Green Vinyl Sinker Framing Nail
E - Black Metal Screws ( Often used for installing
drywall)
F - 16d Galvanized Pneumatic Gun Nails
G - 7d Galvanized Nail
H - Zinc Coated Screw
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