I'm currently finishing off my son's very small bedroom. The floor boards were bad and gappy, so have laid down hardboard over them. I have now put down the underlay (using carpet tacks around the edge). I have to now just put down the carpet (the carpet was so small (L-shaped bedroom) that it was not eligible to be fitted free of charge by the company that I bought it off of). Somebody suggested carpet tacks a while ago to me, which I have used for the underlay (used hardboard nails to put the hardboard down), however, the carpet is royal blue and I've tried pushing a black tack through the carpet sample and obviously the black head shows on the surface of the carpet. Am I supposed to hammer these tacks in so they go down right into the fibre of the carpet (felt-backed and hard) and then try to move some fibres over the top of the tack head to conceal it, or do you just nail them in so that the carpet tack heads are still showing? Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you.
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sorted byTacks are quite old fashioned, do people still use them? They make holes in carpets (obviously).
You don't normally tack underlay down at all.
(edited)
Tack the carpet down as close to the wall as you possibly can.
Nail back the skirting board so the tacks are now hidden underneath it.
You could hire a knee kicker but for a small room just cut the carpet full to the skirting then tug in down behind the gripper with an electricians bolster or a wide blade screwdriver.
Awful advice.
Wow! Just wow!
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What if she doesn't want to buy the grippers? That sounds like a very practical idea lol
I think that I will have to try again - remove the tacks from the underlay, trim the underlay back so it goes up to the edges of the gripper rod (will double-side carpet tape be ok to stick the edges of the underlay down next to the gripper rods?). I'll pick up one of the bolsters to use, however, before I put down the hardboard there was hardly a gap at all where the bottom of the skirting boards met the old floor boards. You say, tuck the edges of the carpet into the skirting board, but I don't think there is a gap big enough to do that (especially now that I have put down the hardboard). Can I use glue or something to hold down the edges of the carpet once the carpet is fitted over the top of the gripper rods, and if so, do you have any idea what product that would be? Thank you.
You tuck the carpet between the gripper and skirting. Leave a 2cm gap between gripper and skirting. No need to glue underlay down at all.
Not sure if you made a mistake there but I was a carpet fitter for 20 years and never left more than a 1/4" or 6mm gap between gripper and skirting. A 2cm gap would not trap the carpet and would show a flat edge to the fit. This would also require a perfect cut.
Hello, I've gone and bought the carpet gripper rods now. I've read that you fix them with the nails pointing towards the wall/skirting, but when the carpet is lifted over the nails (using a carpet bolster to help), do I then have to tap the nails down a bit (hammering on top of the carpet to do this), or do I just go ahead and tuck the carpet in around the 6 mm gap? Thank you.
Hi, sorry only just seen this, don't flatten the nails, just tuck carpet down behind the gripper... work on one wall, preferably one of the longest.. work from the middle out one way then the other....then go to the opposite wall, scuff the carpet with your feet towards the wall (if you don't have a knee kicker) work from the middle out again and cut the carpet just a little full to give you a little to tuck in.
Once those side are complet complete the other walls the same way.
Good luck
Thank you for your advice, much appreciated.
No problem, anything else just let me know