Chapter 16: Stairs and Railings

Understand the key components of stairs and railings. Having a complete understanding of the components of stairs is important. You don't want to set about breaking the rules until you understand how best (and when) those rules can be broken.

Master It What are the essential parts of stairs?

Solution Baluster posts, balusters, and baluster panels along with handrail profiles are the essential parts of any railing. Nosings, stringers, and treads are the essential parts of stairs. Having a firm understanding of how these components react to their respective dialog boxes is critical.

Design beautiful custom stairs with the default toolset. Designing in a spreadsheet is hard. Step back and consider what you're trying to accomplish. If you'll look at the components that make up stairs, you'll see some interesting opportunities.

Master It How would you create a continuous tread that wasn't monolithic? What would you do if you wanted to create a custom stringer? Are balusters always vertical and used to support handrails? What if your particular stair just can't be modeled in the Stairs tool?

Solution Try using the nosing profile to complement the shape of your tread. And don't forget that a handrail profile can be used to create a custom stringer profile with little trouble. Although balusters often support handrails, this is not always the case. Balusters may also consist of the support element that will support the tread. A complex baluster family associated with the railing as the start post can create the most complex railing conditions quickly and easily. But if all else fails, remember there's still the Family Editor. Just model it the way you want it, and then put it in the project. It's probably more sculpture than stair at this point. Modeling it in the Family Editor means that you'll be able to move, elevate, rotate, and copy the results throughout the project. If you have to make changes (and you will), you'll simply open the component in the Family Editor.

Create elegant exceptions to the Stairs and Railing tools. From model patterns to geometric intricacy, there's a lot that can be created with the Railing tool. When this doesn't work, look to the Curtain Wall tool for “railings” that can contain space and allow “balusters” to be conveniently unlocked.

Master It Why would you not use a railing to manage repetitive relationships? What if you need to accurately distribute geometry along a path?

Solution Modeling these railings as components in the Family Editor is often faster than creating groups and then copying them throughout the project. Railings are also helpful for creating geometry that needs to be distributed along paths, even if the results aren't actually railings. Finally, don't use geometry when a model pattern will do. This will keep your project light.

Implement best practices. There are specific best practices when creating custom stairs and railings. Pay attention to nesting geometry, maintaining the right level of detail, and filtering schedules so the metadata ends up in the right place.

Master It Is it possible to create solutions that are too efficient? What's the big deal with detail levels? And finally, what's the most important thing to remember before creating an elegant workaround?

Solution You're not the only person working on the project! Design is a team sport, and any out-of-the-box exceptions to the rules need to be understood by the entire team. “Overmodeling” is often misunderstood to mean “too much geometry,” but geometry is critically important to understanding how your design is going to be assembled. So if you'll take the time to assign levels of detail to components, it'll help refresh views and printing. Finally, remember that the best solution is the one that is implementable. If your team doesn't understand your “custom hack,” then you're not playing a team sport, and the project will ultimately suffer.