carpet .. or why didnt i rip it out sooner

[stephenj]

have you ever started a home improvement project and said to yourself ... what in the heck was the previouse owner thinking .

this last week i did just that ... our local lumber liquidator had a sale on laminate flooring so after nearly 15 years of looking at and smelling the ratty old cheap carpet
that was in my house when i bought it i decided it was time for a change .
and a buck a square foot for decent flooring was to cheap to pass up .
so i went and bought enough to do my whole house excepting the kitchen and bath
700 square feet worth .

yesterday i decided to get started ... out came the utility knife and my carpet .

i'd just bet you cant guess what i found hidden under that nasty carpet ....


suprise suprise suprise in the living and dining room i found what was probably still a very nice looking oak floor up until the carpet got put on and ruined the finish in the high traffic areas .
in the two bedrooms i found some rather nice southern yellow pine hidden under the carpets that probably also looked rather nice nice up untill the carpet got put down .

what kind of fool puts carpet down over top of a nicely finished existing floor ... idiots thats who ...

now i feel like an even bigger fool for not having looked under that dang carpet 15 years ago .....

looks like i can see a floor sander rental in my future .

[Bullshop Junior]

I hate carpet. Can you take the flooring back?

[stephenj]

i never asked if i could return it , i'll load all 1500 lbs of it up and make my mother happy by putting it down in place of her carpet

[Just Duke]

I hate carpet.

[Bzcraig]

Carpet sucks and get busy with the sander. Personally I think pine flooring has much more character but I know the oak will outlast it. At my age they both have a lifetime warranty!

[freebullet]

There are drawbacks to wood flooring aswell.

[snuffy]

There are drawbacks to wood flooring aswell.

Yeah, have any trouble with your knees?

After working for years on concrete, the carpets feel a LOT better.

That's also why the company put soft rubber mats to work on the assembly lines at the factory. Lots less knee problems.

[firefly1957]

Carpets were sold to people who complained of cold floors on their feet they have there place i like wood also.

[JSnover]

I love wood floors but my feet and knees like carpet, hands-down.

[waynem34]

The whole eastern sea board of the U.S.A. was covered in long leaf pine 250 years ago.It all went into housing and factories.I see a lot of reclaim that looks like **** but finishes up nice.I seen one floor that had tiny worm holes in it and nail holes everywhere but that's what she wanted in her new kitchen.My floors have faded areas from rug also.After 150 years they still have a lot of life left.The heart pine is very insect resistant too.The yellow and red pine is beautiful some with very curly grain.Lots of moping and dusting too.I use one of those little dust mops and shake it outside.Enjoy your new found treasure your lucky it was there.

[MrWolf]

When we were looking at my current house about 13 years ago, the woman had carpet on every floor. When she was talking with my wife I found an extremely dark stained wood floor under a corner of the carpet. We ended up buying the house and after ripping up the carpet and resanding the floors, the entire downstairs was done in a clear finish so you could clearly see the walnut pegs at each end of each board. Floor look beautiful and still get compliments on it.

[ACrowe25]

Carpet is terrible. We have hard wood floors everywhere through the house. Right before I moved out (young guy here) I rented a Home Depot sander and got to work. Took a good amount of time, but nothing terrible. Restained them, they look new. Only costed about $300 to refinish everything in the house including rental, sander, pads, etc.

[Mausermeister]

When we bought our house it was carpet and linoleum throughout. My wife wanted hardwood in the living and dining room and new carpet in the rest of the house. When I started pulling up the carpet, we discovered the whole house was oak floors. So instead of installing new carpet, I uncovered, sanded, and refinished the whole house.

[Love Life]

I like carpet in the bedrooms, hardwoods in the living room/den/dining room, tile in the kitchen and bathrooms.

[MtGun44]

Spent a WHOLE LOT of time repairing negligent damage to our oak floors done when the
previous owner ripped out the sheetrock and added insulation and then put in carpeting.
Spilled sheetrock mud, relocated the heater vents, put in 96 (ask me how I know the
exact number) long sheetrock screws to stop squeaks, and dropped some tools, leaving
big gouges., but they were still worth saving.

Fixed it all, pulled the tack strips, and a million staples for the pad, bleached some stains
due to dampness on the tack strip nails near the bathroom, sanded down and varnished
and it looks great! I like quality wool area rugs over hardwood floors.

Bill

[freebullet]

Properly maintained carpet provides better indoor air quality than hard surface flooring.

[shooter93]

For a number of years it was quite common to carpet over wood floors . It was done because the old floor finishes required a lot of care and needed to be waxed and people didn't like doing it. The finishes today are pretty bullet proof and I always have them waxed when they are first finished to get a much smoother finish. After that very little maintenance is needed. When people call me about a remodel in that period of house I always pull back the carpet for them to look and most always they can be saved. During that period of time property taxes were actually higher here for homes with wall to wall carpet....hard to believe but true.

[CastingFool]

Currently, I am installing hardwood flooring in our dining room and hallway. It's been quite a project, as I had to remove the existing 3/4" plywood subflooring and install furring strips on the floor joists, so I could reinstall the plywood subflooring so it's even with the joists. I had to do that, so the new floor will be even with the old hardwood floor. I also had to replace the subflooring in the hallway. When I get done, I will have installed 320 sq ft of new hardwood flooring.

[ryan28]

I have hardwood flooring in my place. Nice to look at, but you see every speck of dust and dirt. Carpet, I think is the toughest. No damage from dropping things, quieter, etc.

[Gunslinger1911]

Getting ready to buy and remodel also. Lucked out in the past with salvageable wood under carpet. Not this time, bummer - now I have to start scrounging for wood !

But, you want to talk about "why?" people do things ??? Check out the pic !!!

Yup, pink and purple walls. That pic was taken from the front door - that's a "half wall" blocking you from the main room. You have to go down the hall, around the back of the fireplace to get to the living room. We won't talk about the master bedroom - with the open bathroom.

[Charley]

Built a house with a production builder 17 years ago. Asked if they could just leave out the carpet and vinyl flooring, and I'd finish it up. "Oh no, we can't do that. If my Supervisor saw that, he'd have a stroke!"
Pulled all the carpet and vinyl during the first year. Stairway was replaced with oak, common areas and bedrooms with laminate, waterproof laminate in the upstairs bathrooms, and ceramic tile in the kitchen/entry/utility, and powder rooms. Never looked a. All flooring material have their strengths and weaknesses, but carpet has more weaknesses, as far as I'm concerned.

[smokeywolf]

Lived in carpeted houses most of my life. Won't be that way when we vacate Kaliforiastan and move to America. Mrs. smokeywolf agrees. No crapeting!

smokeywolf

[wv109323]

A lot of the reason people covered up their wooden floors was the amount of labor that it took to refinish them. The finish in the heavy traffic areas would need refinishing. The only way to make it look right was to strip the entire room and refinish the entire floor. I remember my Dad renting a floor sander that must have weighed 300 lbs. from the local hardware. At that time I remember it like an asphalt grinder of today. And all the dust the machine created that settled throughout the house was enough to make people switch to carpet.

[leeggen]

Someone probably put the carpet in cause the wood was cold in winter. Noticed you are in Ohio so that might be the reason. If you are over a basement then the wood will be great.
I really like wood finished.
CD

[shooter93]

Here 109...you hire a guy who does them for 1.80 a sq. ft. perfect finish and virtually dust free with his machine.

[TES]

The whole eastern sea board of the U.S.A. was covered in long leaf pine 250 years ago.It all went into housing and factories.I see a lot of reclaim that looks like **** but finishes up nice.I seen one floor that had tiny worm holes in it and nail holes everywhere but that's what she wanted in her new kitchen.My floors have faded areas from rug also.After 150 years they still have a lot of life left.The heart pine is very insect resistant too.The yellow and red pine is beautiful some with very curly grain.Lots of moping and dusting too.I use one of those little dust mops and shake it outside.Enjoy your new found treasure your lucky it was there.


I have installed and finished a few 100k sf of heart pine... we used to call it turning chicken **** into Chicken salad....looks great when you get it finished. In fact the old church picture in my avatar is a heart pine floor I did.

[stephenj]

got most of the furniture out of the house this afternoon , going to pick up the sander in the morning and make some dust ...

who mentioned staples ... that was the worst part so far pulling all of those dang staples

[longhorn]

"Properly maintained carpet....better indoor air quality....?" I somehow doubt that, but in any event, I don't have the necessary staff to "properly maintain." Slate here. Kinda cool in even Texas winter, but I own shoes......

[rexherring]

Yup, did the whole upstairs in laminate last year. No regrets, cleaner, no smells, reduced dust, easy to keep clean.

[Hardcast416taylor]

For all my back and leg medical problems from injuries over the years I`ll vote for GOOD quality carpeting in most of my house. A friend of mine in S. Carolina makes a living "flipping" homes. Says you can`t believe the number of times he finds drop dead gorgeous wood floors underneath .99 cent per yard cheap carpeting.Robert

[GOPHER SLAYER]

Several years ago I came home after a day at the range and my entire living room carpet was in rolls and laying on the patio. My wife had grown tired of trying to vacuum that deep pile ****. Underneath the carpet was a beautiful yellow oak floor. That carpet was so deep I had to add an inch to the bottom of each door after its removal. We sold that place two years ago and moved to a retirement community. In order to sell this place the owners had installed deep carpet in an off white. That carpet was also rolled up and scrapped. We replaced it with dark oak laminate. Much easier to maintain.

[gwpercle]

Things were different back in the "good old days". Wood flooring and vinyl-asbestos tile were the floor coverings of the 1950's. Wood was finished with old school oil based varnish, it wasn't very hard and the floors were waxed with Johnson's Paste Wax. I remember seeing my mother on her hands and knees, with that big yellow can putting on a coat of wax then letting it dry and buffing the haze off to make it shine. Every few years the wax build-up had to be laboriously removed or the floors stayed tacky. If the traffic areas wore down then the floors had to be stripped, sanded, stained , re-varnished then waxed and the cycle started all over again. All this was back breaking work in a house that didn't have air-conditioning, just an attic fan.
When wall to wall carpet came out, and my father agreed to have it installed, my mother was the happiest woman I have ever seen. My brother and I could no longer "skate" in our socks on the waxed hardwood floors but that was OK....mom was happy!
We just pulled up carpet and installed engineered bamboo wood flooring last year , our house is raised up off the ground, now the house is colder in winter because the wood transmits the cold to the floor. We started putting down area rugs....what can I say? The wife wanted wood so up came the carpet, they do look good and she's happy...that's all that counts.
And the laminate woods and improved floor finishes take all the back breaking work out of upkeep. No more waxing on hands and knees. But that's why a lot of hardwood floors got covered with wall-to-wall.....to eliminate a lot of back breaking maintenance.
Gary