The way to Install a Stair Skirt Board to Existing Stairs



You’ll inherit a circumstance in which your home’s stair builder decided to jump the skirt — the protective one-by-12 that shields the wall in which it abuts the staircase — and assembled the treads and risers up to the stairwell’s wall. If so, you’re about to go to graduate school in scribing — the art of transferring a profile to a piece of wood. Work with a bit of scrap first and then on your last skirt board so it is possible to master this skill and get your staircase fit.

Produce a foot-long scribe stick out of a parcel of oak around 3/4 ins square. Hold it up to your box, and mark the tread height on it. Drill a pilot hole in the center of the tread height mark and add a brad in the hole. Sharpen the brad point on a grinder to create it into a scribe point.

Specify a scrap piece of one-by-12 board against the underside three measures, touching the floor. Put the side of the scribe rod, nearest the brad, against the lowest tread, blunt border on the floor, brad touching the skirt board. Pull the scribe rod steadily toward you to create a ” level line” against the skirt board. Stop pulling when you get to the corner of the board. Keep the stick erect. Make a light initial deeper and pass following moves to create a deep, narrow groove to guide your jigsaw blade after.

Make additional scribe lines on the very top of the second and third steps. Mark a light line to the wall which follows the top edge of the skirt board.

Eliminate the skirt board in the wall. Put it on a sawhorse. Extend the smallest scribe mark completely through the bottom of the skirt board using a straightedge and sprinkle it with a pencil so that you can see it. Cut the skirt along the marked line.

Pull the brad out of the scribe stick. Put the stick to a tread and mark the tread length from riser to nosing. Drill a new pilot hole and press the brad through the hole.

Scribe the profile of the nosing and the risers onto the skirt board, keeping the scribe stick horizontal. Your new lines will connect with the existing tread lines, creating a scribed profile of what you want to cut to create the skirt board. Pull the skirt away from the wall and set it on sawhorses. Darken and link the scribe marks by going across a scrap piece of nosing using a pencil. Cut out the skirt using a jigsaw.

Slide the skirt back to place and check that it appears to fit nicely.

Repeat the process you tested along with your dry run using a one-by-12 that measures the full length of your stairway. When you’ve got it cut, slide the last skirt into place. If you don’t have to sand or even recut any areas, drive the skirt house by tapping it along the base by means of a mallet and block.