Replacing 1950's staircase that has paneling instead of spindles

[Bobballs]

Hi,

My place has a late 1940 early 50's staircase it has no spindles but paneling were the spindles should be and no spindles behind the paneling. I was hoping to just remove the panels and put 32mm spindles keeping the existing base and had rail but when I have had a look it seems the grove on these is 22mm so 32mm won't fit and I can't find 22mm anywhere.

When I have measured the stair case as well the height between the base rail and hand rail is only 700mm as well which seems low.

Are 1940/50's staircase odd sizes then, all my doors seem to be metric sizes as well ? Would I get away with replacing both the hand and base rails and just putting in 32mm, or would I need to replace other bits ?

I'm trying to get an idea of what I am dealing with, I've had 2 carpenters around and both said they have never seen anything this size before and would need to strip it out to see what needs doing. Wondered if anyone else has dealt with this type of stair case ?

 

[foxhole]

I had a similar problem, had a few 22mm spindles and then panel, so cut 22mm square timber into spindles to fill in gaps. You could cut down base of larger spindles but would look wrong, quite simple to drop on a new base to take larger spindles.[You might have to add timber fillet below base if it's narrow.]