Stair nosings

[dhicks]

Hello All,

 

I'm fitting some flooring in a friend's flat. They have a split-level flat, with a wooden staircase down to the bathroom. It's a old Victorian house, not recently refurbished or anything. We're nailing 3.2mm hardboard down over the exposed floorboards on the landings, then we're putting carpet squares on top of that. We're aiming to put laminate flooring in the lounge.

 

What am I supposed to do with the stairs? The carpet-squared areas here at the school have natty non-slip nosing trim on them, which I don't seem to be able to find anywhere. B&Q and Homebase both sell carpet squares and trim to go under doors, but no stair nosings. Is there some other trick to finishing off stairs? I suppose I could cut carpet square to the edge of each stair and leave the verticle part of each stair bare, or put flat trims on the edge of each step, but nicly rounded nosing trim would look better.

 

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David Hicks

[Heebeejeebee]

Get proper carpet for the stairs It needs to be tucked in over the lip and secured with carpet rods (or gripper rods) and you won't get the flexability with carpet tiles.

 

Either that or see where your caretaker would go to get some for school.

 

HBJB

[dhicks]

Get proper carpet for the stairs

 

I thought about getting proper carpet, but fitting it properly seems like a complicated business involving stretchers and grippers, and I doubt my ability to fit it on the three small, fiddly landings in this flat. Note if you're building or refurbishing a house: you want plain, straight door frame trims. You'll curse fancy wiggly-shaped mouldings when it comes to fitting anything around them.

 

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David Hicks

[leco]

Wild shot here - wasn't there a thread about protecting the corners of a laptop trolley which suggested stair nosings as a solution? Maybe there's a link to a supplier. I'll have a nose around

 

Found it try here

Edited December 7, 2009 by leco
link found

[dhicks]

I'm fitting some flooring in a friend's flat.

 

Just to follow up on this post:

 

For cheap laminate flooring (at £4 per square metre, actually cheaper than most carpet tiles), go to Homebase. The stuff from B&Q is exactly the same, but Homebase's fitting accessories are better. Their pulling bar, in particular, is a much better design.

 

If you need carpet tape to fit carpet tiles, get the brand-name Duck stuff. It's just as cheap as the own-brand stuff and actually sticks.

 

Laminate needs insulating wood-fibre boards underneath it. This is best cut with a decent pair of scissors, knives just mush it up.

 

For laminate floors, as per the instructions, you need to leave an expansion gap around the edge of the floor. To save messing around measuring accurately, simply fit the flooring as flush to the edge of the skirting board as you can manage and finish by trimming to the required gap with an angle grinder.

 

Scotia can be fitted around the edges of laminate floors with woodscrews. The instructions say special fixant, or wood glue, or pins, but decent-looking brass screws are way less messing around and look fine. They also allow the scotia to be removed easily if you've messed something up. Also, the cheap scotia is soft - you can almost push a woodscrew straight through if you try - and if you're hammering in pins there's a good chance you'll miss and smash the scotia up somewhat.

 

To cut carpet tiles to the correct shape to fit around fiddly corners, make a template out of strips of cardboard and cut the carpet tile around that.

 

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David Hicks

[broc]

Have you tried google?

 

I searched on stair nosing & came across this (& many others)

 

MW Floors - Stair Nosings Direct

 

No idea who they are & what sort of service they offer...... but they even have a product for carpet tiles

[dhicks]

Have you tried google?

 

I was hoping for something local to the flat (Wandsworth), although I suppose I could get stuff delivered here and take it up on the train. I was mostly surprised that nowhere seems to sell stair nosings - all the big DIY stores sell various other stuff, whole rows of flooring-related bits and bobs, but nothing to do with stairs. Maybe I'm missing something - is there some other new, snazzier way to finish off stairs these days? Or does everyone just leave them bare and stick a coat of paint over them?

 

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David Hicks

[broc]

Most of the houses I visit (family & friends) use carpet, usually installed by a carpet fitter. Bare stairs (especially wooden) can be really noisy in a domestic situation, particularly with small children around.

[dhicks]

Most of the houses I visit (family & friends) use carpet, usually installed by a carpet fitter. Bare stairs (especially wooden) can be really noisy in a domestic situation, particularly with small children around.

 

Good point. Carpet fitters, and carpets, are expensive - I suppose I could try fitting a stair carpet myself, it looks less complicated than cutting carpet to fit the landings, and there's a bunch of shops in the area selling carpet remnenats off cheap. My Mum also suggested simply fitting one carpet tile in the middle of each step, where people tread, giving the same sort of effect as a stair runner on the cheap.

 

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David Hicks

[dhicks]

I'm fitting some flooring in a friend's flat.

 

Yay! Finished:

 

 

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David Hicks

[webman]

Great result

 

Phone cable could do with being tidied up a bit though

[dhicks]

Great result

 

We'll see if it lasts - I'm just worried that I'll turn up in 6 months time and the boards will have expanded and pushed up, making great big lumps in the floor.

 

Phone cable could do with being tidied up a bit though

 

I ran out of those little white naily things.

 

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David Hicks