Fusion Stair Parts by Richard Burbidge

Having purchased my first property just over two years ago I have been slowly making improvements to the house whilst making it more modern and trying to progress my DIY skills. For some time I have been intending to make a start on the internal stairs in the house, although I must admit I have been putting it off for months. The main reason that I delayed making a start was that I wasn’t convinced that I had the necessary skills to undertake the project just yet. However, having pulled the carpet up and taken a closer look at the stairs, I found that most of them were sound and only a couple of them needed replacing. The biggest part of the job was going to be to fit the other stair parts. Fortunately I spoke to a joiner friend of mine about the project before I started on it and he pointed me in the direction of the Richard Burbidge website. He had recently used their Fusion stair parts range for a house that he has bought as a rental property and said that it was very easy stuff to plan and fit. Great news for me!

The Fusion concept

The idea of Richard Burbidge’s Fusion is that you can select different stair parts from the available range and they should all fit nicely together. So you can for example choose from stair posts and hand rails made from different timbers and metals, providing you with the finish that you require. However, each item is designed in a manner that will allow it to be fixed easily to the relevant stair parts. This is done through co-ordinating metal brackets, which enable stairs posts to be fixed to handrails without the need for carpentry joints. There are also flexible fixing brackets that allow easy installation of the balusters.

Making a plan

I liked the idea of this kind of approach so went and took a look at my friend’s property. I was very impressed with the overall quality of the stair parts that he had installed and the finish was superb. Of course as a joiner he has plenty of experience in this kind of work and I did wonder if I was going to be able to replicate the finish quality that he had achieved. The only problem that I had with my friend’s work was that I didn’t think that the choices he had made in terms of timber and colour of metal components would suit my property and I voiced my concerns. He then told me that there was a planning tool on the Richard Burbidge website that lets you go through a selection process, picking the options that you think will suit. At the end of the process you are presented with an actual photographic representation of the products that you have selected which enables you to find exactly the right option for you. I have used very other planning tools on company websites with varying success, but his tool was especially handy and after playing around for an hour or so I decided that I would go for a combination of pine and chrome stair parts.

Doing the fitting

Once I had bought the required parts I set aside a full weekend to undertake the installation. I have to say that the ease in which the pieces went together made things much simpler than I had expected. I didn’t have to worry about cutting anything or making good joints, which I could well have messed up on. In the end I had to go out and take care of something unexpected on the Saturday, so only spent about 5 hours of the day working on the stairs. This meant that I had to finish the job off on Sunday, but had I had the full day on Saturday then I may have got it all finished in one day. The overall finish of the project is very good and I was quite pleased with myself when I finished; but more importantly my fianc© was also impressed! Definitely a product that I would recommend – especially if you aren’t the best at DIY like me. The website is also very useful and gives you all the information and help you need to make your choices.