How to Get Bumps Out of Carpets



How to Get Bumps Out of Carpets

Over time, your carpet can develop lumps, bumps and wrinkles that are unattractive and potential tripping hazards. The bumps may appear when the carpet padding wears down enough to create slack in the carpet above or if the carpet was installed incorrectly. Humidity can also be a factor; not only can it affect the way the carpet and padding lay, but it can affect the wooden subfloor beneath the carpet. Regardless of the reason for your bumps, you can restretch your carpet to regain your flat, hazard-free floor.


 Related Articles


1 Remove all the furniture from the room where you need to get rid of bumps in your carpet.

2 Pull one corner of carpet out from under your baseboard using needle-nose pliers until you can grip the carpet with your fingers. Pull it away from one wall, popping it free from the tack strips. Continue pulling away from two other walls, leaving one wall of carpet connected. Don't separate seams when pulling the carpet from the tack strips.

3 Lay a piece of scrap wood such as a 2-by-4-inch piece of lumber along the center of the baseboard on the wall that still has carpet connected. Slide the back end of the power stretcher against the lumber to prevent damage to your baseboards. The power stretcher has an extendable bar to reach the other sides of the room and a gripper on the end with teeth to hold the carpet firmly while stretching. You control the stretch using a pressure handle on the top of the power stretcher.

4 Start stretching in the center of the wall directly across from the piece of lumber where the power stretcher rests. Press the head of the stretcher into the carpet about 12 inches from the wall, then press down on the handle to stretch the carpet. Press the carpet firmly onto the tack strip using the blunt back side of your carpet cutter.

5 Move the to side about 18 inches, then stretch the next section and press it into the tack strip. Once the first wall is finished, stretch each side wall using the same technique.

6 Place the knee kicker into areas too small for the power stretcher, such as corners. Press it into the carpet about 6 inches from the edge, then kneel behind it. Kick it with your knee to stretch the carpet, then press the edge of the carpet into the tack strips with the back of your carpet cutter.

7 Cut away excess carpet by running your carpet cutter along the baseboards. Tuck the edges under the baseboards with your fingers or the edge of your carpet cutter for a finished look.

Things You Will Need
  • Needle-nose pliers
  • Scrap lumber or 2-by-4 board
  • Power carpet stretcher, purchased or rented
  • Knee kicker
  • Carpet cutter
Tip
  • It should be difficult to press down on the power stretcher handle, but not overly hard. If it's easy to push down, you're not stretching the carpet tight enough and you need to adjust the tension dial on the stretcher. If you can barely push it down, the tension is too tight and needs to be loosened.
Warning
  • Tack strips are sharp, so wear gloves to pull carpet away from the strips or to push carpet down onto the strips.

Location: Raleigh, NC, USA

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Does vacuuming count as carpet cleaning?

Image
Vacuuming Does NOT Count As Carpet Cleaning... Seriously. We like to think we can keep our carpets clean on our own, thank you very much. We just need to vacuum every month or so and blot when there's a stain... right? Wrong. Most carpet cleaning companies recommend you to professionally clean your carpet every 12 to 24 months. Vacuuming is just not enough. Neither is cleaning carpets yourself. Hiring a professional carpet cleaner is the best way to get your carpet in a healthier condition. Indoor air quality can be eight to ten times worse than outdoor air quality, if you don't clean your flooring, clean your drapes and let air inside regularly. When millions of Americans suffer from indoor allergies , air quality is a huge issue. To keep the air in your home clean, it's important to follow a few carpet-cleaning rules. Namely: Call professionals to clean your carpet, more often than you think you should. We would recommend cleaning the
Read more

Robot Baby Shows How Crawling On Carpet Creates Cloud Of Filth

Image
Robot Baby Shows How Crawling On Carpet Creates Cloud Of Filth Bruce Y. Lee   ,   CONTRIBUTOR   Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. Babies crawling on carpets can stir up trouble. What's the difference between a Monster Truck and a baby? Monster trucks don't wear diapers. Otherwise, put a Monster Truck on a dirt path and a baby on a carpet, and both will stir up a cloud of dirt, filth, microorganisms, and other substances as they move. Isn't that cute? Next time you accuse infants of not doing any work, remember  the study recently published in the Environmental Science & Technology .  For the study, a team of researchers from Purdue University (Tianren Wu and Brandon E. Boor) and Finland (Martin Täubel, Rauno Holopainen, Anna-Kaisa Viitanen, Sinikka Vainiotalo, Timo Tuomi, Jorma Keskinen, Anne Hyvärinen, Kaarle Hämeri, and Sampo E. Saari) created a foil-wrapped, legless, crawling baby robot, which doesn't look disturbin
Read more

The Cause of Reappearing Carpet Stains

Image
You spill something on your carpet and it leaves a stain. You clean the stain and it disappears but a few days later, you notice a spot on your carpet. You take a closer look and the stain is back! What happened? How could it reappear? There are two possibilities reasons for the reappearance: soiling or wicking. Soiling Soiling occurs when residue is left behind on the carpet fibers from the carpet cleaner used to treat the original stain. If not completely rinsed and blotted, the residue becomes sticky and attracts dirt and soil to the same spot, which can cause look like the stain has returned. Wicking The other common cause of reappearing stains is something referred to as wicking. Wicking occurs when the substance that was spilled on the carpet has soaked through into the backing of the carpet (and sometimes even the under pad). When you clean the stain, you are cleaning the surface of the carpet. But then the spill that is trapped in the backing and/
Read more