Bring Your Home Decor To The Next Level With A New Carpet
How to Install Carpet Without Hiring a Pro
So you've finally had it with your old, shaggy, faded, stained carpet. Good for you! By replacing it, you're making a wise investment that will significantly boost the value of your home. That is, unless you offset your home's appreciation by spending hundreds of dollars on a professional carpet installation. You can put that money back in your pocket by learning how to install carpet on your own. With a few simple tools and a bit of know-how, indoor and outdoor carpet installation is a do-it-yourself job that just about anyone can handle, as long as you're properly prepared and take your time.
Items You'll Need
In addition to carefully measured lengths of carpet, you'll need some tools and accessories to help you get the job done:
- Seam rollers or rolling pins
- Hammer
- Knee kicker
- Sharp utility knife
- Measuring tape
- Chalk line
- Stapler
- Tackless strips
You should also be mindful of personal safety and work with gloves, knee pads and safety glasses to make sure you don't strain or injure yourself. These items are readily available for purchase or rent through home improvement retailers or tool rental outlets.
Steps in Carpet Installation
To install carpet in a room, follow these steps:
- Remove the old carpet. Take the moldings off the floor, pull off the tackless trips holding the old carpet in place, then unroll the carpeting.
- Place the underpadding. Make sure you don't overlap the underpad—this will create an uneven surface.
- Lay the new carpeting. Give yourself extra carpet to play with; allow 4 to 6 inches of extra carpet to cut away when you reach the edges.
- Align your seams. Whenever possible, place your seams in areas that won't be noticeable once you've placed furniture in the room.
- Attach the carpet. Use the tackless strips and knee kicker to fuse the carpet to the floor.
To install outdoor carpet, the steps are very similar, except that you'll need specialized adhesives to make the carpet stick to the concrete or wooden surface. If you're looking to install carpet tile, make sure to work on a flat, even surface and to work from the center of the room out to the edges. Clear instructions are usually provided by the manufacturers of the carpet tiles themselves.
How to Install Carpet on Stairs
Installing carpet on stairs requires the use of some specialized techniques. First, you'll have to mark the center point of each step, and place tackless strips on each stair's tread and riser. Then, you will install lengths of carpet as usual, placing separate pieces on each tread and each riser. The final step is to carefully mask the seams to give the illusion of a single continual length of carpet that goes up the entire staircase.
If you have questions about how to install carpet runner on curving or spiral staircases, you can get tips from the pros at your local home improvement warehouse, or hire a professional just for the staircase installation while doing the rest of the carpeting yourself.
