glass and stainless steel balustrade

[JJJ]

Has anyone in the group fitted a glass balustrade?

I'm about to take down a partition wall at the top of the stairs, and put in a handrail/balustrade. I'd quite like to put in a stainless steel handrail with a reinforced glass panel below it (like you see in many shopping malls).

Can't find any suppliers however....

Anyone have any information?

also... the span of glass would be about 1.5m long by 850mm high - would this be ok for strength, or would I need an upright halfway along ?

TIA

Jim

[Brian Sharrock]

I very-very-very tentatively discussed this with a glazier ... it seems to be a _known_ if not _common_ practise with large-ish glaziers. They get the steel fabricator to fashion the handrail balustude and arrange for the supply of correctly sized and tempered glass plus all the connecting bits. They provide an installation service. 'My' glazier pointed me at several shops, library, etc. that he'd 'done'. AIUI, the fixing holes must be made _prior_ to the tempering process. It's not really a d-i-y job, unless you've access to lots of specialised kit such as tempering furnaces - but I'd suggest that you go inquire at a large glazier near you.

[JJJ]

I found a stainless steel supplier at

although the product range is a bit bewildering and there's no useful 'this is how you build a balustrade' guides.

I can muddle the bits together from here, but as to the glass - there's an enormous choice - is there a standard for a stairwell? what thickness 5mm,

10mm ?

Might be forced to call building control tomorrow.... arghhh...