Carpeted stairs in the house show your aesthetic side and personality. If you have carpet on the stairs of your house, you probably know how hard it actually is to maintain the carpet and keep it clean. It might get loose over time or even damaged by pets. And that can ruin the look completely and take away from the beauty of your house as well.
So, what’s the best step you can take in that scenario? If the damage is too minor, it’s not the best option to go for a full replacement. That’s going to take a lot of money to do that. It would be best to go for quick fixes before you do anything else.
To help you with that, let’s go over everything you need to know on how to fix carpet on stairs, which is going to make your life so much easier and help to save money as well.
Fixing Loose Carpet
As time goes, you’ll see that the carpet on your stairs will start to get loose for heavy traffic. It’s undoubtedly one of the most irritating problems that you have to face. Also, it can be very dangerous for you as well as it has a risk of you sliding off of the loose carpet. That can cause some serious injuries, and you definitely want to avoid these at all costs.
If you have loose carpet on the stairs, it makes the interior look very clumsy. It mostly happens due to heavy traffic or improper installation of the carpet in the first place. Now, you might ask how to fix loose carpet on stairs or if it’s possible to repair it by yourself. Luckily, you can fix it all by yourself in most cases. Let’s go over how to fix loose carpet all by yourself that you can follow through easily.
Hooking to Tack Strips
The best way to fix the loose carpet on your staircase is to hook the carpet back to the tack strips. However, you’d need some basic tools and equipment to do that. These are nothing fancy and you’ll be able to pick these up from any local hardware store. But if you are having trouble finding, you can always look up online.
First of all, you’d have to stretch the loose carpet first to be able to do that. For that, you can use a carpet stretcher to get a good stretch, and then you can easily put the whole thing together. Yet, you can probably tell that it’s a quick but temporary fix. But it’s undoubtedly the first thing you need to do if you encounter loose carpet.
Stapling the Carpet
After stretching the loose carpet and hooking it back to the tack strips, you can staple the carpet to lock it in place. As you can tell, loose carpet can cause nasty injuries that you want to avoid at all costs. And in most cases, just reattaching the carpet back on the tack stripes won’t be enough to give you maximum protection.
You must staple the carpet to lock the whole thing in place so that it doesn’t move or slip. You need to make sure that the staircase carpet has multiple points that secure the carpet in place. Otherwise, the whole thing will be too risky for you and your family members.
Hire Professional Repair Services
The best way to repair a loose carpet is by hiring professional services. They will help you get the permanent result rather than the quick and temporary fixes shown above. They are much more proficient in their job and they can ensure the best safety in that scenario.
However, you must go with a well-renowned service that knows how to do their job. Clumsy and beginner hands will not be able to handle such tasks, and it’s going to leave space for accidents in the future. Also, make sure to pick the right budget plan for that task as well. In most cases, you won’t need to replace the whole staircase carpet, and you are better off reattaching it into place. So, make sure to consider these things before hiring the professionals to fix the loose carpet of the staircase.
If You Want, Read More About How to Clean Carpet on Stairs – A Detailed Guide
Repairing Carpet Damaged by Pets
One of the most common reasons your carpet gets damaged is the pets in the house. Pets like cats or dogs have pretty sharp nails and claws. And that can easily put some severe damage to your staircase carpet. And if you have seen it, you know that it looks terrible. It can ruin the look of your stairs and it’s not something you want ruining the beauty of your house interior.So, is there any way to fix it without having to replace the whole carpet? Well, you’ll find such damages typically in a single stair, which makes it easy to repair. So, before you choose the full replacement option, it’s always better to try at least some of the methods shown down below and see if some of it works for you.
1. Tape
This is a quick and easy fix for the smaller issues that your pet might create. For instance, if it pokes a single area of the carpet for a long time, the seam of the area can get loose, and that’s going to cause a split. You can use hot melt tape on the carpet to fix such tiny slits or flaps.
Hot melt tapes are made for carpets, and they contain glue that’s heat activated. You can get it from any local hardware store or from online. They are super cheap and come in handy in so many tasks related to fixing the carpet in your house. To make it work, you need to cut an identical size of tape with the seam and slip it under both pieces of the carpet. Now you can use a warmed iron to put some heat on the carpet and the tape as well. And that’s going to activate the tape and secure the split together smoothly. Finally, you can fluff the fibers of the carpet over the area to make the seam even more unnoticeable to the naked eyes.
2. Patch
Using patches is the single most effective way to fix small sized holes in the carpet. If you can do it properly, it’s going to be very seeming less and almost impossible to notice. However, getting the right match with your carpet fabric is not the easiest task in the world. The slightest imperfection in the color blend can ruin the whole thing. So, you need to get the color perfect beforehand.
Now what’s the right method on how to patch carpet on stairs that’s not going to look clumsy? Use a knife to cut off a patch and make sure that it’s a bit larger than the hole that you are going to repair. Try to make it circular as it’s going to stick better for not having any edges. After you got the piece, you can use it as a guide to cut down the damaged area. Make sure to be smooth and slow with the motion. Then take the piece out from there. Once you are done, use a strip of hot melt tape and put it under the carpet.
Now you can just use a hot iron to seal it in place and it’s going to give you a perfectly fine carpet once again. Also, use a stiff brush to get some fabrics on top of the area. That’s going to work perfectly to hide any inconsistency or unevenness that you may have.
3. Staples
This is the best way to put the carpet back into place if your pet has messed it up. You can’t use a hot melt tape or a patch to reattach the carpet to the staircase. However, to do this, you need a staple gun that can shoot staples with a 3/4-inch leg and 1/4-inch crown, which is a minimum requirement. That’s going to ensure that it locks the carpet in place.
You have to stretch the carpet, and then, you can use the staple gun to seal it in place. Make sure to wear protective gear, such as safety glasses while you do it. Once you are done, you can use a stiff brush to get some fabrics on top to cover the whole thing.
4. Stair Nose
If you own cats, you might face the problem of it attacking the carpeted bullnose or the rounded front edges and ruining the whole thing. Taking the carpet out from the bullnose is going to be the best option for you in that case. You can use a knife and straightedge to cut the edges of the carpet to work with it. You may touch the seam at the attachment point of the bullnose and the stair tread. And that would be a guideline that you can follow to get a perfectly even cut. Then you can just take the carpet off and take a look at the edge of the bullnose.
If you see that it’s square, you can just buy a bullnose, finish it, and install it in place. You can use the hot melt tape to put back the carpet just like mentioned in the previous steps. If it’s a much thinner carpet, you can nail it to get a better finish and a clean look to the edge.
5. Fibers
Cats or dogs can damage the frazzled fibers of your staircase carpet, which can be a very tricky thing to fix all by yourself. If you have an impromptu fiber filler, you can do the quick fixes without much trouble. You can use a scissor to remove the fibers from an unused carpet that you don’t use anymore.
With this fiber, you can reattach and make your damaged carpet better again. For that, you should use hot melt glue to attach it to the place where the area is damaged. Just keep adding until you are satisfied with the end result. Also, make sure to fluff the fibers a little bit with a stiff brush, which is going to help you get the finished look.
When to Hire Repair Services
As briefly mentioned earlier, professional repair services provide you with the best possible fix if you ask how to repair carpet on stairs. You don’t have to do any effort, and you get the best service for just a couple of bucks. However, you need to consider a few things before you call a repair service that’s going to give you the best results. If you try to fix a giant tear all by yourself, it’s not going to be the best fix to go with.
So, first of all, you should identify the amount of wear and tear, which is the most essential part. That’s why you are choosing to hire a professional repair service in the first place. If you don’t feel that the damage is severe, you can skip it and try some of the methods shown above to fix it. You are more likely to fix it without any problem at all. But if the damage is too severe, there’s no better option for you than to hire a repair service.
Yet, try to go for a well-renowned service as it’s going to give you the best value for your money. With carpet installations, replacements, or even fixing, it’s very easy to mess up. That might lead to unwanted accidents that you want to avoid. Also, you need to be careful about your budget and about all the charges that you’d have to bear. Once you got everything down properly, you can hire a professional repair service to fix any problems with your staircase carpeting.
To Wrap Up
You just went through some of the best methods on how to fix carpet on stairs. As you saw, they are pretty easy to follow through and you don’t need a lot of money to do the simple fixes.
However, if all that seems like a lot of effort to you, you can always hire a professional service to do the job. You’d need to spend a little money, but you won’t have to do anything by yourself. But if you feel like doing it by yourself, just make sure to follow the instructions properly, and hopefully, you’d get the best results. Read about How to Get Dog Pee Out of Carpet – Remove the Odor
