How To Repair Squeaking Stairs Covered With Carpeting

By Greg Vanden Berge


Your tired of walking up and down the stairs and listening to them squeak, you have no idea what's causing this horrible noise, but you're tired of it and it's time to fix your squeaking stairs.

I have been building stairs for so long, I can probably do them while I'm sleeping. The most common problem with squeaking stairs will be a loose nail or two pieces of wood rubbing together.

Sometimes squeaking stairs, are extremely difficult to repair or fix and other times, it could be as simple as installing one screw into the stairs stringer, through the stair tread.

The first thing you will need to do is find out where the stairs are actually squeaking. If you can push this stair tread up and down or move it just a little bit, while its squeaking, there's a good chance that it's rubbing up against a nail or the back stair risers

What do I do, if I have one stair treads that squeaking? It's all going to depend on whether your stair treads are finished in wood or covered in carpeting. If you're stairs are covered in carpeting, you're in luck. You will need to locate the center stairs stringer and trite to install a screw through the carpeting, and reattach the stair tread to the stairs stringer.

The stairs stringer is going to be hard to find, but it will usually be located within a couple of inches, directly in the center of the stairway. Locate the center of the stairway, and start screwing your first screw at that location. If the stairway is still squeaking, remove the screw and moved the screw over an inch and a half in either direction and try again. If this doesn't work, go to the opposite side of the center and try again.

Keep working your way at inch and a half intervals, until you have reached the stairs stringer. You shouldn't have to do this more than four or five times, if you do, stop what you're doing, and try to figure out where the center stairs stringer is located exactly, using a stud finder. That might or might not work, you could always try tapping on the stair tread with a hammer.

As you tap on the stair tread, listen for a certain noise, the stair tread will be located, where the noise seems to sound like it's hitting something solid, instead of a hollow sound. Try screwing into these areas and hopefully your problem will be solved.


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