carpet

[Simon Caster]

What brand & style of carpet did you get for your home? Looking for something, which will hold up to traffic (stairs).

[dpb]

It was called "oak"...

:)

[Ed Pawlowski]

Stairs are tough on carpet. Consider alternatives like hardwood, laminate and the like. Easier to clean, wears better, looks better.

Carpets just hold dust and dirt. We've eliminated most of it in our house.

[Shaggy]

Simon Caster wrote the single word "carpet" in his subject line.

Carpet is what you put on the floor.

Now, if you put something more useful in your subject line, I might actually respond accordingly...

[Pat]

Carpet doesn't hold up to traffic. If you use it plan on frequent replacement.

[Simon Caster]

Heh, just tore out porcelain in the kitchen, and put down laminate.

[Frank]

I would stick with nylon only. I'm not up on current fibers but nylon is the toughest. Get the highest basis weight you can. Flat constructions like shag, if they still make it, wear worse. Then there is a matter of dirt hiding and static resistance. There are nylon fibers constructed for all the best attributes but I've also seen off spec industrial grades used that were not made for carpets. These are things to discuss with the carpet seller. I also avoid the remnant type places. Guy once sold me a nylon carpet that turned out to be polyester. I had done the testing myself. I got a chunk of purchase price back.

[Robert Macy]

Half the house is carpet and half is travertine.

You can have ours, it's high quality with expensive pad underneath. approx 2,000 sq ft worth, some extremely large sections.Never been 'lived' on. Replacing it ALL with travertine.

[Doug]

Well of the houses I owned or own, one rental home has tile for the stairs and it holds up best (I don't like it for other reasons) but you wanted to know what carpet is best and I'd say berber for strictly traffic. The negative side of berber is when you have to have it steam cleaned, it's harder than pile carpet.

[Simon Caster]

Well, here's your lower end house. And, yes that's laminate in the kitchen.

[dadiOH]

Low level loop commercial nylon. Not pretty but wears better than most.

[Harry K]

Carpet - the onlhy thing you will buy over...and over....and over... Carpet Cleaning companies love it when you put that stuff on the floor. Just did ours _again_ only one room

18x15 =3D$181. I can look forward to doing it again in 2 years when it will be over $200. As for stairs - never!

The caveman who was the first to throw a bearskin on the floor should have been shot!

The things one puts up with to satisfy the wife!!

Harry K

[bob haller]

gee carpet is warm on the feet and quiet......

however we have dogs so its not really practical. I am 55 and as a child wall to wall carpet was fashionable. carpet normally lasts 10 years if you vacuum it often......

carpet doesnt really wear, the imbedded dirt wears the fibres of the carpet

[Norminn]

What kind of traffic.....five kids? Old couple? Dogs? Open stairway, where looks matter more? Cheap or luxury? You can buy runners in all price ranges...hold down with removeable rods so it can be changed easily.

I just looked at a nice home that had carpet in the kitchen...hadn't seen that for about 40 years :o) Bought the one with vinyl in the kitchen....I'm more fussy about maintenance than esthetics at my age and if I slip and fall the vinyl will be a tad softer.

[Robert Macy]

Years ago, we bought a 'commercial' grade carpet cleaner, about $4,000 that heats the water, has rating of 1200psi, plugs into two different service outlets to operate, and purchased cases of really good carpet cleaner from Brulins Indiana. Every month, just clean the carpet, like vacuuming. The extraction is so thorough, the carpets dry within

2-4 hours. That way, the carpet stays new. The top 'look' keeps nicer. When I took up a section, underneath between rebond pad and carpet had NO grit, or dust, bright colors - looked like just installed.

Seriously, look into getting a cleaner like that, both your Ms. and YOU will be lot happier. Plus, line the perimeter of the room with Raid's new product, "Bug Barrier" in our area takes out spiders, centipedes, flying critters that land on it, and scorpions.

[nestork]

I just thought I would mention this because there's a widespread misconception that carpet shampoo'ers clean carpets better than vaccuum cleaners.

A carpet shampooer and a vaccuum cleaner are two separate tools meant for totally different purposes, just like a screwdriver and a pair of pliers.

Vaccuum cleaners are intended for removing SOLID dirt from carpets, like sand, pollen, dead skin cells, paper and cloth fibers, etc.

Carpet shampoo'ers are intended for removing wet or dried up liquid spills from carpets.

That's because as soon as you get a carpet wet, there's a force that comes into existance called "surface tension" that wants to keep solid particles like sand grains and dead skin cells stuck to the fibers of the carpet.

Next time you're at the beach, try cleaning sand off of wet feet and dry feet and see which one works better. Of course it'll be dry feet cuz in that case there's no surface tension trying to keep the sand grains stuck to your skin.

The best way to clean any carpet is to vaccuum it with a good quality vaccuum cleaner to remove the solid dirt particles first, and then shampoo it to remove any dried up liquid spills or dissolve any stains.

[HeyBub]

You have a basic contradiction.

Look at high traffic areas: sidewalks, department stores, the neighborhood Stop-&-Rob, etc. None - or almost none - have carpet.

[nestork]

Yes, but all those places are areas where road grit (from sanding and salting) are going to get ground into the carpet pile and wreck it. I wouldn't use carpet floor mats in the cab of a garbage truck either.

There are different kinds of flooring suitable for different applications. If there's gonna be no more sand and road grit on these stairs than there would be on the living room floor, I don't see why carpet would be any less suitable for the steps than the living room.

If this carpeting was ti be installed on the front or back stairs into the house, then I'd agree as well. But, my understanding is that the stairway is inside the house and not at either a front or back entrance.

[HeyBub]

I agree; I wouldn't use carpeting for the living room either.

Full disclosure: I'm not totally opposed to carpeting. I built a cat-scratching post using a piece of very expensive carpeting material.

The cats enjoy it.