Steel and Timber Geometric Stairs

Recently I was asked to quote a Jarrah Geometric Stair basically it is a straight flight followed by a set of winders followed by a s shaped geometric section sort of like two sections of spirals joined together. I knew that the price I would come up with wouldn't be cheap but sat down and nutted it out and came up with a figure in the region of $14000. The client was a bit surprised but I showed him some of my figuring anyway to cut a long story short he wanted to know if doing steel strings would make it much cheaper. Has anyone out there had to price anything like this in steel and timber before just so I can give him an idea of whether there would be much savings to be had. One of the problems is that he still wants timber ballustrade so I would still have to construct most of the jigging. Work is just so busy at the moment finding time to chat to steel fabricators has not been very forth coming.
It would be a fun job to do but seems like a lot of coin.
Thanks
Ben

Ben,
Sounds to me that there is a bit of time wasting going on. If he has not got a full set of plans for you to work off, then half way through he asks if it is cheaper with steel, but wants the timber look.........

Let the owner do the running round, he'll soon find out that most steel fabricators would want shop drawings to do something like this.

Don't get carried away with the "It would be a fun job to do". I have done heaps of jobs that "were good experience" but they very rarely came with good money.

In nearly 50 years in the game I have done heaps of stairs, steel timber, and concrete, and one spiral concrete, but none like what you describe. If you have plenty work already, why give yourself the hassle? Give it a miss.

Regards
Bill.
Hey Ben, off topic, last week I saw for the first time in Darwin, one of your mates. A cane toad. It seems we have been waiting for them for years, but they are finally here.
You didn't take any to Geraldton did you?