Rant: Discovered my seam roller was the wrong weight the whole time

I was at a supply house in Cleveland last week just grabbing some adhesive and a guy from a larger crew pointed out I was using a 50 pound roller for every seam. He told me residential carpets need lighter pressure around 30 to 40 pounds or you crush the backing. I looked it up on a carpet installers forum that night and sure enough, he was right. Been doing this for 8 years and never knew there was a difference. How many other people learned a basic tool spec way later than they should have?

3 comments

3 Comments

troychen16d ago

Crush the backing" is real. I've seen it. Messes up the whole install. Took me 6 years to figure out the roller weight thing too. Same situation, a old timer pointed it out. Felt stupid but at least I fixed it. Now I use a 35 pounder for residential. The 50 stays in the truck for commercial only. Saves so much headache with callbacks.

emmamason16d agoMost Upvoted

I remember reading on another forum a while back about some guy who swore by using a really light roller for everything. He claimed it prevented all his headaches. But then someone else jumped in and said that only works if you're using the exact same carpet every time, which nobody does. So I get why you settled on the 35 pounder for residential. It's kind of like Goldilocks, you have to find the one that's just right for the job you're doing most often.

emma_wells8316d ago

Wait, six years before someone told you? That's insane. How many bad installs did you have before that?