The constant traffic up and down wooden stairs in a busy household makes for heavy wear and tear on them which can translate to different forms of abuse like a worn or dull finish, loose spindles or a wobbly baluster. The longer you ignore the warning signs the worse the damage can become so find a downtime when traffic is light to remedy the wrongs and make the repairs. The work can be divided into repairing the stairs and finishing the wood doing it in that order.
The repair work can involve tightening loose stair treads and balusters with finishing nails and securing a newel post or handrail with lag or wood screws. For a cracked stair tread, use a heavy-body epoxy designed for wood to repair the joint and fill the crack. A good cleaning might be all that’s needed to rejuvenate a slightly damaged finish or for one that’s dirty. But on bare wood where the finish has worn away, you’ll need to sand and refinish the surfaces with a good quality polyurethane finish….