welcome to the deck store online today we're going to be talking about stairs is the first in a three-part series and how to choose layout cut stair Spanish for your deck now of all there are many different methods of doing it this is just our method on how we are going to put stairs on your deck what stairs what are they they're utilitarian they're not required by code to be on your deck through merely a place of the entrance and exit for your desk if you want to get down in here yard stairs on the deck or a great option not necessary however on your deck they are a great exit off your deck for safety reasons if you need to get off your deck because your house is on fire or there's an emergency you can use that as a alternate exit to the front door there are limitations to stairs there are codes the IRC has a set code on the building of stairs and we'll go through that as well there's a rise a 7 a 3/4 inch rise maximum that means from where your foot steps to the next step that's considered your rise at seven and three-quarters of the maximum rise you can have honest then there's the run the run is the part of the stair that you're putting the steps on that's called the run the minimum length of that run can be 10 inches and that minimum run is from the nosing of the stair above it to the noting of the stair itself 10 inches ok and finally your stair as you want to make sure that you have a good layout when using your stairs coming down to any of your deck where you may have multiple staircases on multiple decks all that you want to make sure that your stairs are not cutting into your usable space everyday in this situation you see how the stairs are available to come down and turn and go right down you don't break up the deck at all however if we continue if we only have this other staircase that you see here you'd be cutting the deck in half by having the stairs there your traffic pattern cut your deck in half which cuts down on your musical space code also requires that stairs be illuminated and have a handrail as you can see here and you see all of our stairs of catalyzers code also requires that a 4 inch sphere must not pass through the rise of a stair so we use a full-sized deck board for that however you can use whatever as long as a core sphere cannot pass through your risers code also requires that you have no more than 3/8 inch difference between stairs okay so these are some of the tools you're going to be needing to cut your stair stringers you're going to need a framing square start with you're going to need your stair or square gauges you can see these we have these online if you use discount code square nuts we will offer free shipping with those if you want to buy those online we can offer those to you carpenters pencils you don't know your carpenter into you own a carpenter's pencil skill saw for the initial cuts of the stairs treads and then either a jig saw or a handsaw to finish the cut I'll be showing you later how we're going to be using all these tools to accomplish our task today thank you alright when choosing your lumber we here at the deck store we use a number one southern yellow pine number one or better southern yellow pine which is great for building it's a stronger lumber as opposed to the ponderosa pine which is also available here you'll see we do have some defects this looks like it got hit by the by the bow or the forklift and you think well let's not take that board but in fact we could use that because our stair might be right here we'll cut that part out same with knots we have a nap that looks like it's in a bad place we might still be able to use that board I would try to make it so that my stairs we'd cut that portion of the board out so let's be ecological about how we use our lumber and not just toss things back because there's a knot here there we also want to make sure that we have a good straight board and also there's not a lot of cupping straight being looking down the edge and also no cupping in your boards because that can cause some issues down the road when you're trying to install the stair spirits okay now we know what our length and our height is of our deck and so now we're going to go ahead and lay out our stair stringers now there are many different methods of doing this with next door prefer to use a six and a half by 10 inch run and rise six and a half inches high and we use that because you can use a deck board then as a riser ten inches because we can use two deck boards as a run and once again the code the IRC is no greater rise than seven and three-quarter and no shorter run than ten inches with no difference of three eighths of an inch so now I'm going to line up my framing square on the edge of the two by twelve I'm going to have six and a half line up with the edge here I'm going to take my square gauge and I'm going to install it on the inside not on the outside be easier to do it on the outside but when you get to drawing with your pencil you'll find it kits in the way and I'm going to come over I'm going to put my stair gauge here left side and you can see I've got six and a half and ten I'm going to go to the end and using my carpenter pencil I'm going to move it up about six and a half inches so that I get a full rides here because I'm doing this I'm making sure that this line is in line with the ten inches so that each board each run will be ten inches and you see this piece here we're going to be cutting out okay now we've got it laid out we got to subtract a couple of things first we're going to subtract an inch and a half for the backerboard that's going to go on the back of the stairs it's going to support it to the deck surface to the deck framing I'm going to follow that line remember this part of the leg of the framing square is inch and a half so that's going to be my guide that would represent the two by ten that's going to go away we're going to add a two by ten later and then this will get leg bolted into the framing on the deck so your deck surface will be up here six and a half inches you'll leg bolt through into that all right plus you'll have a stare strap coming from along this edge up this edge and nailing into the framing as well now we're going to go to the bottom of the stairs and we're going to subtract one inch because we are not landing on a deck for landing and around our rise with six and a half inches I'm going to subtract a net joy five and a half inch rides using the framing square as a straight edge again and we'll be subtracting the inch there so these are the pieces that will be cut out be using my skill saw to cut this line and then cut this line I'll then use my either my handsaw or my jigsaw to finish up this cut it's very important to not over cut seems like it would be really easy to go ahead and over cut that so that this piece just falls away but if you over cut you lose the strength of your 2 by 12 here you need all that strength of that 2 by 12 for your stairs so we can't do any over cutting so we'd go right up to our line and stop with our skill saw we come back with our jigsaw and finish up that cut say why don't we use a jigsaw the entire weight because the jigsaw we're going to cut nearly as straight as a circular saw well a lot easier to use cut it straight with the circle saw here straight with this circle side there and finish up with the jigsaw or a handsaw and that would be how we cut our stair stringers