What You Need To Know About Carpet Removal

Having a new carpet installed at your place? You decided to remove the old one all by yourself? It’s a smart move and an easy way to save some money. Also, no special carpet removal tools or skills are needed, and the job goes pretty quickly.

Before getting into the work make sure to talk with your installer to find out exactly how much you’ll save by doing the tear-out yourself. Your installer can also give you advice on handling any unusual situations in your home and what to do with the old carpet.

Before you begin tearing up carpet, remove any doors that swing into the room, including bi-fold closet doors. Doors that swing into adjoining rooms can stay in place. Then clear the floor completely, removing all the furniture from the room. Slip on a pair of gloves to protect your knuckles from the abrasive carpet backing and the needle-sharp tack strip. There’s a lot of dust trapped inside old carpet. So if you’re sensitive to dust, strap on a dust mask, too.

Carpet removal tools:

• Protection gloves: you’ll be using a knife and pulling carpet off of tack strip so protect your hands.
• Dust mask: you might encounter dust, mold spores or disintegrating carpet pad.
• Knee pads: good pads will help prevent injury and pain.
• Floor scraper: this tool will remove all the old carpet pad staples in the subfloor. An alternative is to pound them all down with a hammer or remove them individually with a screwdriver.
• Twine: nylon twine is cheap and strong – jute twine is a natural, green alternative.
• Pry bar/Claw hammer: this tool can help you to pull up tack strip and to remove baseboard trim.

Preparation to the removal of carpets in Ottawa:

• If you want to reuse the baseboard, use your pry bar at every nail used to hold it in place, and go slowly. This will help to prevent broken baseboard.
• Be careful to use your pry bar behind the baseboard, not above it, to avoid damaging the drywall.
• Be sure to mark each piece of baseboard to remember where they go, if you plan to reuse them.
• If paint covers the wall and baseboard, use a utility knife to cut through the paint where the two meet.

With all this info you should be ready for your ”carpet removal project”. If you have any question feel free to contact us!