What makes a professional carpet fitter?

If it was just a case of buying a carpet knife and hiring a knee kicker then we could all be great carpet fitters. Carpet fitting is a skilled profession that depends on practical experience and knowledge. Everyone knows practice makes perfect, so how can anyone who only does occasional carpet fitting be expected to do a good job. During training carpet fitters learn different methods of fitting carpets and when to use them. Which direction the pile of a carpet should face? Which accessories, including door bars, underlay and adhesives are most appropriate for this installation? You are paying your carpet fitter to bring all this experience into your home. You should expect your fitter to either have National Vocational Qualifications (NVQ) in floor laying or to be accredited as an Approved or Master fitter of the National Institute of Carpet and Floorlayers.

Can you see the join?

Eric Morcambe was always asking if anyone could see the join in Ernie’ hairline, luckily nobody could. With carpets a bad join will not only stick out like a sore thumb it will also be the first place that the carpet will start to wear. Ideally you want to avoid joins in carpets, but there are just some circumstances where you have to have them. Firstly most standard carpets come a maximum of 5m wide, so if your room is more than 5m in both directions you will need a join. The other reason to have joins is to minimise carpet waste, typically this happens with hall, stairs and landings. Your carpet fitter should discuss where he is going to locate the joins and whether the material you have chosen will join well. Some carpet products just do not make for  good join, however good your carpet fitter is.  So before you buy your carpet get advice from your carpet fitter or carpet retailer on the carpet and whether it will join well.

Before the Carpet Fitting Day

On the fitting day, the carpet fitters will need the room to be as clear as possible. You really should at the very minimum move all the small and precious stuff from the room. Carpet fitters can usually happy to work round big pieces of furniture, like the sofa or the bed. Carpet fitters usually work on an hourly rate so if they have to spend time moving your DVDs or statue collection they will charge.

What About the Old Flooring

If you are not able to uplift and get rid of your old flooring, you will need to ask your fitter to do this. Companies have to pay to dispose of old carpets & flooring safely and legally, so you should expect will have to pay for them to take it away. If you can take the flooring to your local tip, why not save a bit of money and do this.  TOP TIP: if you are just dumping your old carpets, don’t take it up in one piece, it will be heavy and difficult to put in the average car.  Cut it into smaller strips and then take it up and put in the car.  

Preparation! Preparation! Preparation!

The most important part of any job is the preparation. Any carpet fitted on a bad surface will look terrible. Even if your subfloor is perfect, the very least a fitter should do once the old carpet is removed is sweep up. Even the smallest piece of debris under a fitted carpet will soon stand out.

Mind the Gap

If you already have carpet fitted in most cases there will be sufficient clearance between the bottom of your door and the new carpet. However if you are having thicker underlay or carpet your doors will need to be eased. Depending on the type of door, your carpet fitter may be able to do this for a small charge. Make sure you discuss this in advance, you don’t want the carpet fitter to have left site and all the doors in your home have been taken off.  I once had to visit a house where the fitters had managed to close the front door but the poor customer could open it again because it was too tight.

Carpet Fitters Create Rubbish

You should expect your carpet fitter to take away all the rubbish generated during the fitting process, like the plastic wrappings, small remnants and off cuts of carpet or underlay. Sometimes there will be some bigger remnants of carpet that could be used as rugs /mats, if you want these let your fitter know. They may even be able to arrange for them to be bound.

Plan to be available

Unless you know your carpet fitter well, it’s a good idea to be at home on the day your carpet is installed or at the very least be available at the end of the phone for any questions. Children and animals seem to be fascinated by carpet fitters but it is not really safe for them to be around carpet knives and other tools so if possible try to keep them out of the way while the work is taking place.

At the end of the job

Before the carpet fitter leaves, walk through the installation together and check that you are happy with the work. Ideally you should do this check after the carpet has been vacuumed.

Everything Changes

A new carpet will shed and for the first few times you vacuum it your vacuum with be stuffed full of fluff. Don’t worry it is not falling apart. Regular vacuuming is one of the best things for keeping a carpet looking as good as new. Carpets can also stretch for the first few months after fitting. If you start to see wrinkles or ripples appear, then your fitter will need to stretch the carpet again. In most cases this will be done at no extra charge.  Contact your retailer as soon as they appear because if they are left too long it can create permanent damage to the pile of your lovely new carpet.

If you have any questions about carpets or carpet fitting please do not hesitate to contact me.  Please request one of my free carpet and flooring checklists to help everyone looking to buy new carpets.  Of course if you are looking for new carpets in our carpet fitting area, near Leicester, Northampton or Rugby and would like a home consultation (Free & No obligation) just contact me.

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Step 1: Estimating the carpet and accessories needed

If you are buying you new carpets from a shop or a carpet fitter they will measure up the rooms and work out, not only how much carpet you need but also, accessories such as underlay, gripper, adhesive, carpet tape and doorbars. Lots of online carpet retailers will give you guidance on how to measure rooms, the key things to remember are:

• Carpets come in fixed widths typically 3.66m (12 foot), 4m (13 foot) or 5m (16.25 feet).
• Make sure you measure into the alcoves, recesses and doorways
• Carpets are typically cut to the nearest 5cm(2 inches) so make sure you add an extra 5cm (2 inches) to your measurements and if there is a pattern don’t forget to allow for pattern matching.
• Work out which accessories you need and how much you need. Items like underlay, gripper and carpet tape often come in fixed pack sizes, for example underlay is typically sold in 15m2rolls, so you might end up buying much more than you need. For example if you room is 20m2 and you will have to buy 2 rolls of underlay and end up with 10m more than you need.

You could get this wrong in one of two ways, either you order too much or not enough. If you order too much carpet, this is not a disaster however you will have wasted some money. Inevitably you will have some of the accessories left because of the minimum pack sizes. If you don’t order enough carpet this is an absolute disaster, it will not fit the room and the company you bought the carpet from does not have to give a refund because the carpet has been cut especially for you. If your professional carpet fitter or retailer gets the sizes wrong they have to order another piece and bear the cost! In addition a carpet fitter should only charge you for the accessories, like underlay and gripper they actually use so this is a saving on do it yourself carpet fitting.

Step 2: Getting your new carpets and flooring delivered

If you are doing DIY carpet fitting, you will either need to collect your new carpets from the shop or you will need to arrange to have them delivered. Generally online carpet retailers and carpet shops will charge to deliver a carpet, (Carpetright charge for delivery even if you use their carpet fitters!) this is because they have to pay someone with a van or lorry to do this delivery. You will also need to be at home to accept the delivery. If you are buying online check the delivery terms and conditions, because some companies use very large lorries that cannot access small estates and country lanes. The other alternative is to collect the carpet from the shop or warehouse. Only do this if you have a vehicle that can take the rolled up carpet. Folding a carpet is one of the worst things you can do it, because it creates creases that sometimes cannot be removed in the carpet fitting process even by professional carpet fitters.

If the lorry cannot get to your house you may have to pay for a different delivery method. If you are collecting your carpet in a van it should work out fine. If you squash your new carpet into a car you may have ruined it before you even start fitting.

Step 3: Preparing the Room for New Carpets

All of the things you need to do to get a room ready for a new carpet can be done by any competent DIY’er and even if you do have your carpet fitting done professionally you can save some money by doing the preparation yourself. You need to remove as much of the furniture as you possibly can. You may not be able to remove larger items like wardrobes, beds or sofas, but you should remove all the contents and small items from the room, like books, ornaments or clothes from wardrobes for example.   You need to uplift and remove any old flooring, most carpet fitters will do this for you, but they will make a charge because of the time it takes. Carpet fitters will usually take your old carpet away and dispose of it safely, but as businesses, they have to pay to dispose of carpets. However this is another thing you can do yourself, you can either cut the old carpet and flooring up small, put it in the car and take it to your local tip.  The other alternative is to arrange with the council to pick up big items. In some places there is no charge for this.

If you are fit and able it is easy to uplift your old carpets and flooring and if you can get your old carpet to the tip or get it picked up by the council for Free this is definitely something you can do well and that will save you some money.

Step 4: The carpet fitting begins

There are lots of sites that tell you or show you (You Tube) how to fit carpets, so before you start have a look at them. The main pieces of specialist equipment you will need is a Carpet Kicker or Stretcher and a carpet bolster (this is used to tuck the carpet onto the gripper), these cost as little as £30 plus delivery. You should also by knee pads. If you have bad knees or a bad back stretching a carpet with a carpet kicker will make it even worse as it is very strenuous. Carpet fitters who do apprenticeships take two years to become NVQ qualified fitters so it may take more than a weekend to get used to the stretcher and cutting in the carpet. If everything goes to plan you will have a lovely fitted carpet, but before starting it is worth thinking about wrong and what will it cost if it does.

The main problems I have seen with  DIY carpet fitting include; damaging the new wallpaper/paint while getting the carpet completely flat; cutting the carpet too short in the doorway; making a wrong cut anywhere in the room; not stretching the carpet enough; putting the gripper too close or not close enough to skirting; cutting the skirting boards; not fixing the carpet to the gripper properly; putting doorbars in the wrong place;

The only thing that will ruin your new carpet completely is if you make a cut in the wrong place in the carpet which means the carpet is too small to fit the room or you have accidentally cut through two layers of carpet. In this case you will have wasted all your money.

Damaging your new wallpaper or paint work anywhere in the process is inconvenient as you will have to touch it up after you have finished fitting your carpet.

If you don’t stretch your carpet enough it will not look as good as it could, will have wrinkles and may wear out quicker. You can find out more about the problems a badly stretched carpet can cause here.

A badly fitted carpet will always look bad and you may have to look at it everyday for a number of years. So in conclusion should you do your own carpet fitting or employ a professional carpet fitter. A new carpet is one of the most expensive things you will buy when you decorate a room in your home, so you want it to look as good as possible and last for a long time.

The cost of getting the carpet estimating and fitting wrong is very high, so for the small extra cost is worth paying professional carpet fitters to do the estimating and carpet fitting. Anyone can do carpet laying but only a professional carpet fitter should be relied on for a well fitted carpet.  So I would recommend spending that little bit extra and get your carpets fitted by a professional local qualified carpet fitter.

Even if you are not looking for carpets in Leicestershire, Rugby, or the surrounding areas please visit our website and request Stewart’s Free flooring checklist, which will help you when you buy your next carpets or new flooring.

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We were fitting a lovely Karndean floor to the kitchen, utility and family room.  As part of this job we had to take up the old door bars and replace them.  When I uplifted the carpets in the door ways, I noticed that both the door bars and the gripper had been nailed into the sub-floor.   Where there is underfloor heating nothing should be nailed into the floor as these nails can go through the underfloor heating pipes.  A good carpet fitter should stick the gripper rods and also the door bars.  Some carpet fitters don’t do this because cutting gripper into small lengths sticking it and waiting for it to stick takes more time than nailing the 5′ lengths direct to the sub-floor.

Luckily for this customer the nails from the gripper rods and door bars does not seem to have penetrated the underfloor heating pipes.  However I would always recommend that gripper and door bars are stuck down for fixing carpet over underfloor heating or any kind of piping sunk into the sub-floor.  It takes slightly more time for the carpet fitter but a bust pipe in the sub-floor would result in an lot of mess and expense for both the carpet fitter and the householder.

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A couple of weeks ago I was asked to visit one of my customers who have had their hallway altered.  They wanted a new doormat and some new door thresholds after having some building work done.  As part of the building work the builder had laid a new wooden floor in this hallway, however there were number of small problems that spoilt the final finish, but the builder said a carpet fitters could fix these.  The problems were:

• The door thresholds; the builder had not fitted thresholds to the doorways, however we couldn’t fix this because the flooring was stuck to the sub-floor and he had not left a sufficient gap for a new threshold or door bar to be inserted.  This gap is too small to insert a door bar or threshold but wide enough to collect loads of small bits of dirt and rubbish.
• The fitting of the wooden flooring stopped where the builder needed to trim under door frames and working round the fiddly bits of the building.  You should expect your wooden floor to go under the door frames and to be fitted in all the nooks and crannies of a room.  Consequently the home owner has got to have a massive doormat to fill this gap.

I am a carpet fitter and floor layer not a builder, plumber, decorator or electrician, so if a job I am doing requires some preliminary work by any of these trades, for example fixing a radiator, asphalting a floor to prevent damp or moving some wires I would ask my customer to get someone in to do this before we start work.  So why do builders insist of fitting flooring.

This is not the first time I have seen problems created by the builder laying a floor.  Other examples include fitting wooden or laminate flooring before the floor is dry enough.  Wood is very sensitive to moisture and although the modern manufacturing processes mean it can cope with the normal changes you get in a home according to the seasons, anything above this will result in the wood expanding.  So if your sub-floor is not dry enough you floor will move and in 6-12 months after the installation your boards will start to bend and move.

The carpet fitting and floor laying is something that is always done at the end of any building or decorating project in your home.  However it makes a big difference to the look and feel of your home and can be one of the more expensive items, therefore it makes sense to get it right first time.  I would recommend you get advice and a quote for new carpets and flooring early in the project.  This will avoid making mistakes that cannot be rectified at a later date.  I am always happy to make a home visit to give advice and a quote for new carpets, flooring and carpet fitting with no obligation to my customers in the Leicester, Rugby, Northampton and surrounding areas.  If you live outside my catchment area for carpet fitting I recommend you visit the NICF (National Institute of Carpet and Floorlayers) who can recommend a carpet fitter local to you.

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If you have underfloor heating,  the floor covering plus any underlay must allow heat transfer.  How well a product allows heat to transfer is measured in tog ratings.  Unlike a duvet where you want a high tog rating, for underfloor heating you want your flooring coverings to have a low tog rating which means the heat can escape from the floor into the room.  Recent research by the Carpet Foundation in conjunction with the Underfloor Heating Manufacturers Association has found that the most carpets can be used with underfloor heating.  The exception is foam/felt backed carpet and some underlays.  So if you have underfloor heating make sure your carpet fitter knows this and selects the right underlay with a tog value of 1.0 or less.   The underlay we use with carpets where there is underfloor heating is Duralay Heatflow which has a tog value of 0.75.

If you would like an information sheet on underfloor heating underlay or other different flooring products please contact us.

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However most people want a rough idea whether they can afford a new carpet or flooring so I have put my thinking cap on and I have come up with the following table, which shows a vary rough estimate of the starting price for carpet cost, supplied and fitted various rooms, in various qualities of carpet, with and without underlay.

Prices right at September 2012

We always recommend using underlay in rooms or areas that get loads of wear, like lounges, halls, stairs and landings. This is because underlay prolongs the life of your carpets and makes them look good for longer. If you already have underlay this can be used provided it is not worn out. Don’t fit your new carpet on old underlay as it will make it wear out quicker!

This is just a rough guide. To get an accurate price get a local company to come round to measure up and give you a quote. Most companies including us (we supply and fit carpets Leicestershire, Rugby, Northampton and surrounding areas) will do this for free with no obligation.

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Does this mean that these people are looking for the very cheapest carpet or flooring even if it is not right from a visual or practical view point or is it just that customers want to make sure the get the best possible deal on the new carpets and flooring in their home.

I am assuming that customers don’t want the very cheapest of carpets but do want the best possible flooring for their budget.  So how can they be sure of getting that.  There are three key points to consider:

• Selecting the right quality of carpet for the amount of wear and tear and your lifestyle is very important, especially if you want your new carpet to last.  A bedroom quality carpet will be cheaper than heavy domestic carpet, but it will soon wear out if it is fitted on stairs.
• Don’t forget to include the cost of any accessories & fitting in the total costs.  Many companies give headline low prices on the carpet only to charge ridiculously high prices for the underlay, doorbars and other accessories.  When I key cheap carpets into Google the first company that comes up is Carpetright and they sell their carpets at low prices but their accessories at high prices!  The remaining companies just sell you the products via the internet, so you will need to find a local fitter to lay your carpet.
• Finally if you want your new carpet to look good from day one and wear well you need to get it fitted properly.    Choosing the right carpet is only half of the decision.   A badly fitted carpet will always look like a cheap carpet irrespective of how much you pay.

In conclusion, if you are looking for new carpets or flooring decide if you are looking for a cheap carpet or a good value for money carpet.  If it is the later then contact a local independant retailer to price for the new carpets and compare it with a big company like Carpetright or buying online and I think you will be surprised how competative it is.  What’s more with the local company you will have a person who will take responsibility for the whole job from planning, fitting and after sales care.

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In this case the owner should have got the company fitting this carpet back within weeks, (if not days) to come back and stretch the carpets, in my opinion the carpets were never stretched tight enough in the first places.  A carpet is meant to be stretched tight. Very tight! Once a loose carpet begins to form a ripple it needs a carpet stretching. As you walk on a carpet ripple it moves up and down far more than it should. As the loose carpet moves up and down it loosens up even more.  Soon the waves and ripples are so big, you need to get your surf board out just to cross the room.

So how can you prevent carpet stretching and when should you get a carpet fitter in to stretch your carpet.  What you need to know is why carpets stretch and what if anything you can do to prevent this.

There are 5 reasons why carpets stretch of which 3 are completely preventable and one which neither you or your fitter can do anything about.

The two reasons where you can do nothing to prevent your carpet stretching are:

• Carpet construction – some products due to their construction will stretch after they are installed, typically these are the better quality woven products like Aximinsters and Wiltons.   All you need to do, is the minute you notice any minor ripples or wrinkles is to call the person who sold you your carpet and get them to come and stretch it.   All reputable companies will come and do this for no charge.  Typcially this stretching will happen in the first few months after the carpet is installed.
• Carpet Cleaning – some carpets stretch (or even worse shrink) after carpet cleaning.  The products I notice stretching the most after cleaning are typically Belgian Wiltons.  Use a reputable carpet cleaner and get him to advise on whether this is likely to happen before you decide to get it cleaned.

The three reasons that carpets stretch that are completely preventable are:

1. Bad carpet fitting – the reason the carpets in the flat I visited were so bad is that they were never stretched properly when they carpets were initially installed.  On the day your carpet is fitted, it should be tight, there should be no ripples, wrinkles or bagging.  If it is not then get your carpet fitters to stretch it again.  Do not let them kid you that the wrinkles or bagging will disappear after a few days.  The only way to get rid of a ripple in a carpet is stretching!
2. Dragging furniture across a carpet – if you drag a heavy piece of furniture across a room it will pull on the carpet and stretch it.  So if you need to move your furniture get someone to help so you can lift it.  Even the regular movement of fairly light weight furniture can cause these problems.  One of the common problems I see is in rooms with wheely office chairs.  These are not heavy pieces of furniture but the regular moving backwards and forwards will stretch and damage your flooring.  This problem can be avoided in rooms with office chairs or regular use by wheel chair users by installing the carpets on a double stick system which prevents all movement of the product.
3. Bottoms of doors dragging on the carpet – if your door does not clear the carpet it will cause constant dragging on the carpet.  When your carpet retailer comes to quote for new flooring, make sure you ask him if he will ease the doors if the new carpet is thicker than your current flooring.  We do trim most types of doors for our customers for a small charge.  There are a few doors that you will need to get a specialist carpenter to trim.  Whatever you do, do not put a door back on until it does clear the carpet as this is a very quick way to ruin your lovely new flooring.   The worst case I saw was a company that took the front door off to fit the new hallway carpet, once they had finished, put the door back on and shut it with brute force.  When the customer came back they couldn’t get the front door open because of the new flooring.  They kept trying to get in and eventually the carpet rucked up and they just couldn’t get the door open.  They rang the company and they said that door trimming was not in the price.  They had to get a carpenter to take the door off from the outside and fold the carpet back until the door could be trimmed.

So my advice is if you see any slight wrinkles or creases in your carpets, get a local carpet fitter to come and stretch your carpets before it becomes a permanent problem.   If it is a relatively new carpet (less than 6 months) then get the company who sold you the carpet to come and do this.

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The first thing a good flooring company should do inspect the floor the new carpet or vinyl is to be fitted on and if it is uneven explain the affect it will have on the look of your new flooring and advise on what floor prepation should be done to solve this problem.

The second thing that all good floor fitters should do before installing a new floor is to sweep the floor. In fact one of the first things we teach our new carpet fitters and floor layers at Stewart Groom Carpets and Flooring is how to sweep up properly.

By doing this problems with carpet fitting lumps and bumps like the one shown on this video can be avoided. This is a clear lesson in how not to fit carpets.

 

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