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Do you cut stair stringers with a framing square or a speed square? My old boss and I almost fought over it.
I learned stairs from a guy named Dale up in Tacoma about 8 years ago, and he would not let anyone on his crew touch a framing square for stringers. He said a speed square clamped to the board is faster and just as true, so that is how I cut my first 40 or 50 sets of stairs. Then I moved to a bigger crew in Portland and the lead there, Marcus, pulled out his old aluminum framing square with those little brass stair buttons and gave me a look like I had just shown up with a Fisher Price hammer. His argument is the square spans the whole board so your rise and run stay dead on, and he swears speed squares get you close but you will chase an eighth of an inch over a long run. I will be honest, I have cut both ways and my speed square stairs always land fine, but Marcus's set from 6 months ago is the only set I have seen that dropped in with zero shimming under the landing. So what is it, is the framing square actually better or is that just old guy tradition talking? If you have cut more than a hundred sets, which one are you grabbing and why?
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rivera.jake21d ago
It's the same thing as tools in general, the old guys learned on the slow tool so they got good with it, and the new guys learn on the fast one and never build that eye. Framing square with the stair buttons forces you to think in full rise and run, not just a mark at a clip angle. Pick whichever one makes you check your math twice, because stairs are the one place on a house where being off by an eighth shows up forever.
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