How to Replace Carpet Yourself

Updating some of the rooms in your home can be an exciting time. Replacing carpet is just one of the many ideas you can use to update the rooms in your house and it's not all that difficult to do. Getting up the old carpet and putting down the new are the two basic ideas involved with replacing carpet, but there are some other things that one should know before getting involved with this project.

Things You'll Need

• Tackless strips
• Vacuum Cleaner
• Utility knife
• New carpet pieces
• Carpet stretcher
• Wall trimmer

Instructions

Preparing Your Floors for the New Carpet

1. The first thing that needs to be done is to vacuum and clean the old carpeting that's currently on the floor. No one should be breathing in dust during the carpet-replacing process, so this is absolutely necessary!

2. Remove the moldings that are one the floor around the perimeter of the floor. These will usually be in doorways and wherever else the carpet stops.

3. After the moldings are off the carpet floor the next step is to actually take up the existing carpet. Before you can actually take it up, though, many experts suggest cutting the existing carpet with a utility knife into small sections. For example, sections that are 18 by 24 inches wide is what is usually done.

4. After the existing carpet on the floor is cut, though, it can then be taken up into those smaller sections which you previously cut. When taking up the carpet it's important to leave the tackless strip on the floor, unless of course it will be used for the new carpeting.

5. Even though some people prefer to use the old tackless strip for the new carpet, it is best to take up the old tackless strip and lay new ones down. Hence, new tackless strip should be put down on the floor after all the old carpet is taken up. Of course, the tackless strip should not be placed in the doorways and should be spaced approximately one-half inch from the wall around the perimeter of the room.

Laying New Underpads

1. There are some people who prefer to leave their old under-padding on the floor for the new carpet. But chances are that if your carpet needs replacing then so does the underpad. However, assessing the quality and condition of the current under-padding should be done before any decision is made.

2. If it was decided that new under-padding is going to be put down, the old under-padding should be taken up in this step. This should be relatively easy to do and require no special tools.

3. New under-padding for the carpet should be laid on the floor. In order to lay it just right, it should not be overlapped but should be laid right against each other. They should also somewhat overlap the tackless strips that were laid down previously.

The New Carpet

1. The new carpet should now be ready to be put down. The first thing to do in this step is to actually measure the room in which you're laying the carpet.

2. After you have the room's measurements, cut the carpet to your desired length, but add several inches (the suggested added length is about 4-6 inches) so that enough carpet will be laid to allow for proper trimming.

3. Lay the carpet out in your room. If you have more than one carpet piece you'll want to join the two pieces together by creating a seam. This can be done by overlapping the two carpet pieces when laying them down and then trimming the excess carpet that overlaps.

4. Use the carpet power stretcher to make sure that the carpet is properly in place around the perimeter of the room. The carpet stretcher will be able to securely fit the carpet over the tackless strips and against the walls.

5. Any excess carpeting around the perimeter of the room (such as near walls and in doorways) now needs to be trimmed. This can be done by either using a utility knife or a wall trimmer.

6. Finally, the molding can now be placed around the room in the areas that it was originally taken up.