I hope it works

[highup]

Two openings going into a kitchen and both look like this one. She wanted metal.
The metal is shimmed up on tack strip to bring it up to the level of the plank flooring and I don't like miters because when you hammer them down they tend to do weird stuff at the last moment. One side was like 41 and a half degrees and the other one was 48ish. I didn't even check to see what the small angles were.
When I pound it down, I'll use the handle on my rubber mallet amd hope it least flattens out the curve a little bit. The carpets heavy enough it won't need to move much and it's backed up by tack strip anyway.
........ Oh and by the way I didn't have to cut this 12-ft bar of metal. It fit perfectly end to end.
What do you think the chances are of that happening on the second openin it's almost exactly the same size.
I'm going to guess 100%
I'm feeling lucky.

 

[DarisMulkin]

Trick is to put a piece of the carpet into the metal pound it down some then cut your miter. But I'm sure you already knew that.

 

[C.J.]

Ball peen hammer helps to remove any sharp corner edges.

 

[highup]

Trick is to put a piece of the carpet into the metal pound it down some then cut your miter. But I'm sure you already knew that.

Yup, but with these whacko angles, and there are two identical "doorways" going into the kitchens. I wasn't going there. There would be 16 cuts to screw with. That, plus I have a Crain miter box. It doesn't have 20.75 or 24.something degrees.
They didn't leave much carpet overlap, so I couldn't change the shape.
It's gonna be another stinger stretch job

 

[highup]

Trick is to put a piece of the carpet into the metal pound it down some then cut your miter. But I'm sure you already knew that.

Yup, but with these whacko angles, and I have two of these I wasn't going there. There would be 16 cuts to screw with. That, plus I have a Crain miter box. It doesn't have 20.75 or 24.something degrees.
They didn't leave much carpet overlap, so I couldn't change the shape.
It's gonna be another stinger stretch job

 

[highup]

Ball peen hammer helps to remove any sharp corner edges.

If you're talking about mitering, I just use a tack hammer when I do that, and buffering with a piece of thin, stiff cardboard from a staple box or something similar.
I put flattened tack strip underneath the metal to support it then because everything was a little bit uneven I just wasn't going to mess with these angles. She'll be happy, she's been waiting since the end of May.

 

[DarisMulkin]

That, plus I have a Crain miter box. It doesn't have 20.75 or 24.something degrees

I did a JC Penneys store without a miter box. I had to lay out the angles on the floor by overlapping the metal to the angle it had to be then mark and cut. Surprisingly the the angales and cuts were spot on when done.

 

[JPfloor]

I did a JC Penneys store without a miter box. I had to lay out the angles on the floor by overlapping the metal to the angle it had to be then mark and cut. Surprisingly the the angales and cuts were spot on when done.

That's how I always did it, with vinyl reducer too. There's a custom tool for cutting vinyl on a 45... I always had better luck with a knife.

 

[Floorist]

Never owned a vinyl tile cutter.

 

[highup]

Oh, there's definitely ways to make the angle. You can lay a carpenter square against each angle and draw lines up and away. Where the lines intersect, you can draw a line straight back down to the intersection of the angle you're going to cut. Oh yeah there's way to do it. Previously they had vinyl on the floor in this kitchen. You can tell by the marks on the back of the carpet this is the same shape as the original metal. Had this been on a smooth, flat vinyl floor, I would have opted for the angle cuts.
There's an underlayment seemed directly where the metal sets and because I had to shim the metal up with tack strip there was some stability and height issues.... So I went this route. Hard to explain, you'd have to see it. I did a test and screwed my test piece to the floor and tap the top edge over to see how it behaved. It'll be fine.
When I made this straight cut and the angle cut, instead of snipping straight up to a perfect V, I filed it open just a little bit and to keep the bottom edge from splitting when you bend it. I'm thinking that may be drilling a 1/8" or so hole at the bend point might be easier, achieving the same result.

 

[JPfloor]

Never owned a vinyl tile cutter.

There's a special tool, or was, just for cutting vinyl reducer. Problem I had was when you squeeze down on it it stretched the reducer out of shape there by skewing the angle. Never came out right, I just used a knife. Looked like this.

As for a vinyl tile cutter or a "chopper". It comes in handy on big jobs with a lot of the same size cuts. Also makes a nice clean, beveled cut if you want to butt up to other tiles for border work and stuff.

 

[highup]

Well it kinda, sorta of worked good enough. The bends were consistent anyway. I did make a discovery. When you bend the metal sharply and it's cold, it will crack easier. I took down one extra bar of metal just in case I had issues. The job was 30 miles away so if I screwed up a piece I needed a backup. I was working in the open garage and it was cold the other day and one of the pieces did crack when I've been it. I had my heat gun with me so prior to bending it on the 2nd attempt, I heated it up hot enough that my spit would sizzle on it and then made the bend. No breaky this time.
Anyway not my prettiest work but all the bends were consistent and the lady was thrilled. I wish there was 6 inches of carpet overhanging and I could have made radiuses out of these. That was my initial plan before seeing the job in person. You don't learn unless you try
I remember many many many years ago they made this same metal but it wasn't hardened. Much more malleable.
I thought you guys might enjoy another circular set of stairs....
...that I'm not going to carpet .......ever! I told her not to even ask I've actually done four sets of these stairs over the years, all done by the same contractor. His name was Barney and he was a fantastic contractor. These stairs were his trademark. If you saw anything remotely similar, you know that he built them.

 

[C.J.]

Surprised you aren’t carpeting those stairs.

 

[highup]

Surprised you aren’t carpeting those stairs.

You may be surprised, but I'm not.
My brother and I did two of these stairways in a cabin at the lake back in the late '80s. I think one day we each got three stairs carpeted. At one point during the installation its really helpful to have two people. Actually I should have some pictures of another set of stairs that I did 10 years ago if I had to guess? All of the other stairs had walls on three sides so I never had to wrap the open end of a step. One side fit to a wall on the other side fit against the tree. The stairs were tack stripped, padded, then a pattern was made for each step. An exact pattern there was no cutting done after the pattern was cut out. They just fit, kind of like self coving a bathroom, no trimming after the fact.
Here's a link to those stairs. Scroll down to comment number 9.
https://www.flooringforum.com/threads/flooring-stories.5773/#post-58219

 

[highup]

The link I just showed, with that other spiral set of stairs....
..... I don't recall offhand the actual date that I did them but it's been a while back. That job is about 50 miles south of me.
............ The store just gave me a contact number for a measure.
...... Yeah, it's 50 mi south of me.
That tree trunk has 24 stairs. In the pictures I showed I only did the first 12 that's all they wanted at the time.
I don't think I'm up to 24 stairs. It would require building a scaffolding in order to do the top 12 so I could work off of a ladder.
Oh dear, why did I bring that job up?
Karma?

 

[randylee0908]

I did a JC Penneys store without a miter box. I had to lay out the angles on the floor by overlapping the metal to the angle it had to be then mark and cut. Surprisingly the the angales and cuts were spot on when done.

That's how do all mine...