Replacing an existing railing is not a complicated process but it does include additional contractors depending on the situation. For example if you have a railing installed in wood flooring – a contractor would need to remove the existing railing and then patch the wood area to ensure that it is ready for installation of the new railing. The issue or concern is that when we come in to install the new railing – the location of where the railing attaches to the floor may not completely coincide and you may end up with holes in the ground that are not needed. For that reason we tell all of our clients to call in a flooring expert to patch the area and have it ready for us to come in and install the finished product. We also need the railing removed to take proper measurements.
We are typically asked to provide an estimate, the contractor will remove the old railing, the flooring is then patched and then we will come in to do the measurements and anything else required for the project.
If you have a commercial railing installed outdoors or indoors it again depends on the flooring that the railing is installed into. If it was installed in concrete – an additional contractor needs to come in to fill the hole and we can come by and help remove the material.
A lot of times for many commercial clients and sometimes even residential – the existing railings were fabricated properly but the problem is the finish that was used. Unless a special powder coating process or galvanization process was used – the weather will destroy any wrought iron steel. All wrought iron needs to be properly coated to ensure it’s protection – otherwise you will get rust and then the product will begin to deteriorate. Once any deterioration occurs – the chance of having to replace the entire railing is very high because you can never tell how bad the damage really is. This is the reason why we stress the finish to all of our clients to understand that in the short run just painting may be a solution but for area with high traffic that are subject to intense weather – powder coating and galvanizing is the only solution we recommend.
Next time your looking to replace or install a brand new custom wrought iron railing or stairs – give us a call! We can get you an estimate quickly and all of our work is custom and we have over three decades of experience with over 4 generations of welding and fabrication experience.
