Were the stairs an afterthought?

It's been a while since my last post, so I thought I would make up with a long one!  A terrible cold tore through our family, and set us back a couple of weeks...it's nice to be back in the saddle again.

So my stairwell has a problem.  At least that's what the township inspector says (and all the codes books). You see, a stairwell to a finished basement is supposed to have head clearance of at least 6' 8".  I thought that meant that I had an 8" problem, but then I found out that they measure from any point along the toe of the stairs, even between the treads.  Its as if someone (a leprechaun?) rested a really thin imaginary board along the front edge of the stairs...any point along that board needs 6' 8" clearance.  So now I know I have a 12" problem.

How do I know that?  Well, like any good engineer (or maybe a procrastinator?), I modeled the problem in Google Sketchup.

Looking up the stairs from the side

Looking down the stairs

Notice those two steel I-beams?  Look closely...notice that portions of both beams have been cut away?  Its almost like the stairwell was an afterthought!

Remember that imaginary board?  The nice thing about Google Sketchup is that I can actually draw it!  Using Sketchup, I rested the board on the stair trends and then raised it 6' 8".  Since the board is imaginary, it cut through all the beams, headers, and joists that are in the way.  The result is a clear picture of the problem.  Green is the color in my imaginary world...

Part of the cantilevered beam and the first set of joists are in the way

Most of the header is also in the way

While analyzing this problem, we also noticed another one (doesn't it usually work out this way?).  The I-beam that ends at the bottom of the stairs (it runs the length of the basement) has a ~9' cantilever from the last support beam.  Apparently that isn't good either... 

Notice the 9' cantilever (on left side of picture)

And there are a few other problems:

• The cantilevered beam doesn't actually run the whole length of the basement...its actually two beams that butt up next to each other.  But they aren't welded or secured together!
• The support columns are not welded or bolted to the beams.  Instead, steal clips that are welded to the column are wrapped snugly around the beam.

And for those of you who prefer real-life pictures over the imaginary world of Sketchup drawings, these photos will bring us back to reality: 

The header and steel beam as we look down the stairwell

The cutouts in the two steel I-beams

What is a do-it-yourselfer supposed to do?  I'll present a couple ideas in my next post...