Carpets

[overlander matt]

A bit of a random topic - not really period property related but given the knowledge and experience of the contributors here, I thought I would ask. What should you look for when buying carpet? It's a subject I know very little about and generally I've ended up with carpet that has not worn very well after rubbing a few samples in the carpet shop! Has anyone got any tips for buying carpet?

We'll be laying them on floor boards - I believe it is common to line the floors with hardboard sheets before fitting the underlay. I've often heard it said in the carpet showroom that you should buy the best underlay you can afford. Does anyone know a good brand/type to go for?

Any suggestions would be most welcome. Thanks!

Matt

[Feltwell]

Depends in part at least on how much abuse you think it will get!

When we moved in we knew that lots of building work would be going on over time, plus 3 kids to inflict wear and tear, so we asked a local carpet fitter what was fairly neutral, cheap and hardwearing to do the stairs and all the landings and bedrooms with. What he sold us is just starting to look a bit sad now 13 years on, but it's had a lot of stick and it really wasn't very expensive. I'm glad we didn't go for anything more pricey.

Hardboard over floorboards - depends how uneven they are, we haven't got hardboard and it's been OK.

[paulc]

Definitely use underlay. In the lounge, I put down 5mm wood fibre boards from wall to wall and then fitted the gripper rods with screws. The nails provided wouldn't have been long enough.. This was then followed with 11mm foam underlay which on reflection, was probably too much 9mm would have been enough. Carpet feels very good under bare foot, and the combination of fibre boards & underlay have cut the draughts up between the floorboards to zero. With the fire going, it is nice & toasty in there during the winter.

[plasticpigeon]

I have cheap synthetic carpets in the bedrooms and they seem to get dirty quickly, and when I used a carpet cleaning machine one one of them it smelled pretty musty, so I used shake and vac and it eventually smelled alright again. The woolen carpet downstairs doesn't seen to get dirty so quickly and never smells bad, so I would recommend wool if you can afford it.

[Bogart]

Would totally agree that the underlay can make of break a carpet. A good, expensive, carpet needs the best underlay available.

[a twig]

We took a similar approach to Feltwell, in low traffic areas (spare room, back staircase) we had nice stuff, deep pile and decent underlay. It is lovely.

Rest of the house we have toddlers etc, so went for a hard wearing mid range carpet with shorter pile so easier to clean - came in around £15 per sq m. For the entire house though we went for thickest and best underlay we could afford, haven't regretted it.

All of our carpets are underlay straight onto floorboards, out of the 13 rooms there's only one where some of the floorboard gaps etc mean that in hindsight we should have boarded first.

Only other thing is stay away from the chain stores (carpet right etc), all in our experience have been over priced and generally provided poor service. Try and find a local based place to you, we got our daughters room carpeted for £100 inc fitting because there was an off-cut that our local place was desperate to shift, unsurprisingly they have kept our custom ever since.

[overlander matt]

Thanks for the advice. I must admit I have been to Carpet Right in the past and the outcome was ultimately disappointing. We have a bit more hunting around to do... I did wonder whether it was worth getting the underlay online but the bulky nature of it probably suggests it's not cost effective.

[paulc]

Last lot of underlay I purchased was through an ebay seller. Much cheaper than the mainstream carpet suppliers. Worth comparing the prices and making your own decision.