Getting ready to put down some 3/4" flooring on the stairs, and am planning on using the method described on this site.

Will be using PL400 as the adhesive, but was wondering how long I should wait before walking on the just laid step.

I've got 3 kids, so it might be hard to keep them off for long.

Overnight is best. But in reality, who can do that? If you tape the boards together well with blue tape, brad nail your nosing (that's the weak link), and place shims behind your last board so things don't shift around when you step on them, you might be ok. You don't want to move the flooring out of place by walking on it. That's the concern.

Well, sounds reasonable, Gary. I was wondering though, instead of face nailing the stairnose, which I really didn't want to do, I could glue a spline in the stairnose. Then blind nail it with 2" 15g nailer, and then put in the rest of the boards (of course with the tongue facing the back of the step). Would then face nail the last strip (hopefully underneath where the next riser would go).

It's a bit of a tight fit with the nailer on the splined stairnose (looks like the angle of the nail would go in at about 30 degrees instead of the optimal 45 degrees), but I think it should work.

Well Phil, sounds like you set on doing it backwards. When installing flooring on stairs, IF I"M GLUING IT DOWN, I'll install the nosing then install the next floorboard by engaging the tongue into the groove of the nosing. It's backwards from the idea of nailing. Gluing down flooring works best when you slip the tongue of the board you are installing into the groove of the already laid board. Follow me? It's reverse of the way you do it when nailing. The reason for brad nailing the nosing is to prevent it from moving as you're installing the boards behind it. So, you don't need any spline with this way of installing. Until the glue dries and cures, the boards are going to want to shift around. That is why you need to tape, shim and brad nail that nosing. Have you read this thoroughly?
http://www.hardwoodinstaller.com/hardwo ... suring.htm

When I do steps, I dry fit everything. Get all the boards tight, then face nail the back board next to the riser so the riser board covers my nails. Then I remove all the boards and nosing. I then blind nail that back board. Then I put two beads of glue on the other boards and place them, also blind nailing them. The stair nose then gets glued and face nailed. Two pops on the sides and two pops in the middle.

Colored wood filler to fill the top nailed stair nosings.

My DIY job is done, thank goodness The stairs were easily the toughest part of the job. Well, ripping up a thousand square feet of particleboard and laying CDX was no joy either . This is my own experience, and the pros here may well digress. On the steps, I used PL, not PL 400, as PL400 did not have the tack I wanted for such a high-traffic area. What we did was use a combo drill/plug cutter bit for the stair nose, with the hole drilled at a soft angle into the existing tread. When the screw was driven in, it pulled the nosing tight against the riser, which also had a small bead of PL on it This technique was recommended by Don Bollinger in his "Hardwood Floors" book. With the screws in place, and subsequent courses cut tight and glued, I had no movement at all. Stairs now feel like rock, whereas before they squeaked like a mice stampede. A word of caution, stairs ain't fun. I had a table saw with taper jig, stand-mounted belt sander and compound miter saw, and it still took a good 90 minutes per stair. My advice, and the pros may disagree, is to buy a very good stair jig, such as the Stairtool or Wheaton PL200. Learn how to back bevel with your miter saw. I can only say, thank goodness it's done.

I'm planning on doing a stair install the way floorguy describes. Is it possible to use the strap clamp (both at dry fit time and when I glue/nail), to clamp together *pre-finished* nosing with the planks behind? Want to make sure the nosing sits snug against the riser when I get there working up from the back.

Anad, how's it going? I really shouldn't add to this 5 year old post.....

I might venture to guess that FloorGuy may have found out that installing nosings last is a problem waiting to happen.