How to Bind a Fraying Carpet
Though residential grade carpet has a long lifetime, regular foot traffic and cleaning can cause fraying to occur. When a carpet is installed, strips with barbs are fastened to the subfloor. Padding is put down and then the carpet is stretched over those barb strips. In many cases, a single roll of carpet is not large enough to cover the entire floor and two rolls of carpet are adhered together with glue. If the seam splits, frays appear. Does this Spark an idea?
Things You'll Need
- Scissors
- Rubber gloves
- Binding
- Carpet thread
- Carpet (steel) needle
- Rag
- Carpet seam sealer
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Instructions
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Use scissors to cut away any frayed ends of carpet and make it even. Leave the rest of the carpet intact -- do not cut into it or more frays may appear.
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Ensure that your binding and thread are the same color as the carpet and/or its original binding.
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Cut a strip of new binding to fit over the carpet. It should overlap the fray.
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Whipstitch the new binding over the carpet with the needle and thread from the right to left.
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Put on rubber gloves and then wet a rag under plain tap water. Use this rag to blot up any excess glue as you bind the carpet back together. Squeeze carpet seam sealer onto the damaged spot where the fray appeared. Immediately wipe up any excess sealer with the wet rag.
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Press the carpet seam into the glued area. Let the carpet seam glue to dry over a 24-hour time period or as long as suggested by the adhesive manufacturer.
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Inspect the bind/seam after 24 hours and then in 48 hours to ensure it does not split apart again. Should any fraying begin to reappear, repeat these instructions.
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References
- "Carpet, Upholstery Cleaning, Carpet Repair"; William Thomas; 1988
- "Help, It's Broken!: A Fix-It Bible for the Repair Impaired"; Arianne Cohen; 2011
- "Popular Science"; How to Repair Your Own Rugs; Helen M. Klemm; August, 1950
