Effects of nearby walls: Spirals in stairwells often involve more walls than spirals to a loft. Most of the time you need to be concerned with walls or obstructions within 36" of the spiral (figure 4). Residential building codes usually require a clear walking space of 36" between walls or other obstructions.
Figure 4.
Example of top and bottom floor plans for spiral in a stairwell
Walls to be added, removed:
Often, particularly with remodeling jobs, the stairwell has not been cut
in the top floor when the spiral is ordered. Existing walls may be torn
down to make room for the stair. Future walls may also be planned for
construction after the spiral has been installed (figure 5). We will need
to know of all walls or obstructions on both floors, and their positions
relative to the spiral. Precision Pine will help you as much as you need
to develop a correct description.
Figure 5.
Example of floor plans where walls will be added and taken away
The customer's sketches of the spiral in figure 5 might look like
this:
