Hi all, I finally got Greg (my DH) to write down how to start making the spiral staircase that was based on the german instructions.

The things you will need:

3/32" drill bit

5/64" drill bit

Fosters Mini Dowels

Jewelry Craft Wood Beads

Craft Glue (he used Arleene's)

Carpet Tape

X-acto knife and a few extra blades

1/16" x 12 x 3 piece of basswood

12" ruler

Once you have all the items listed above goto your house (or roombox) where you want the staircase to go take the ruler and measure from floor to ceiling and write it down. Then take that measurement and divide it by .75 (this is the height of the bead), this will give you the number of stair treads you will have to make.

Example: my measurement for the harrison was 8.25", I divided this by .75 and got 11. That is how many steps he needed.

To make a base to hold the staircase, get the basswood and cut a 3" x 3" square. Now find the center using the ruler by lining up the opposing corners and draw a line, you should end up with this.

Notice the hole in the middle, take your 5/64" drill bit and drill where the lines intersect, this is where the center dowel will go.

Now take a dowel, a bead and the base, run your 5/64" drill bit through the bead to clean out any debris. Put a little glue on the dowel about 1/2" from the end and slide on the bead in a twisting fashion until about 1/16" of the dowel is sticking out the bottom. Put a dab of glue on the dowel and push into the hole in the base, you may have to twist it a little to get it in, then push the bead down until it meets the base and let it dry.

Here's the step, he traced it onto a piece of scrap balsa wood with some carbon paper, and cut it out so he had a reusable template.

Here are the dimensions, the side facing the right is 2 1/2" long, the top is 1 1/8" and the bottom is 5/16".

The two holes at the top of the pic are 5/64" and the one at the bottom is 3/32".

Once you get done cutting the stair treads and getting them ready you can move on the the assembly of staircase.

So now you can get everything ready for the really fun part of assembling everything in part 2 :angry: .