A builder was creating a custom home in Maryland. He wanted a rustic modern iron railing for the from entrance, back entrance, and terrace railing. The architect had specified an iron railing design where all the pickets were drilled into the stone.
To best promote the architects design vision we recommended using a 5/8” round solid picket, a 2 ¼” wide caprail on a 1 ½” X ½” bar channel. We proposed the posts be 1 ½” sq. posts, but the architect did not like the cover shoe over the core-drilled hold. So, to solve this, we created the bottom 3” of the posts to flare out to 2” square. Then a 1 ¼” solid round was welded in from the bottom of the flared post providing a minimalist look to the iron railing post.
The front entrance railing had a unique feature where the vertical pickets did not come down all the way to masonry treads. Instead, the iron pickets were turned 90 degrees and then core-drilled horizontally into the masonry.
For the finish, we recommended a CIW-2135-I which provides an authentic Iron texture. The railing pretreatment started with a sandblast to white metal. Then phosphate wash, acid wash, then dipped into pure zinc at 835 degrees. We then “cooked” the project in the zinc until it reached the same temperature as the zinc, and it stops bubbling. Then we pull it out of the “kettle” to let the liquid zinc harden. We then clean up the prevalent imperfections. Next, we brush blast the project to promote inter-coat adhesion between the hot-dip galvanize and the powder-coat procedures.
The installation was a challenge as we had to core drill every picket individually and then epoxy each one into place. The effort was worth it though, as it really highlighted the architect’s design vision for this rustic modern Maryland home.
