Rug pads - where to buy and what kind?

[wawa]

I need to buy two rug pads ASAP for fairly large rugs. (supposed to do it sooner, forgot. Need them by saturday) I think one is 9x12 and the other is 8x10? Around there anyway.

Pretty sure that rules out the internet since rush shipping is expensive. though feel free to tell me I'm wrong. The soonest I can order them though is wednesday. (long story)

So...where do you buy rug pads anyway? Preferably for a reasonable price. Carpet store? Lowes/HD?

And what kind? It seems like there are two types - the rubber grippy things that seem to be the same material that my MIL uses as a shelf liner, or the thicker felted material. We've got one flat hand-woven wool rug (actually nice quality) that used to have one of the felt pads under it. We had to trash the old pad. Would you just get another of that type?

And then the other rug is a lower quality wool tufted rug with a cloth backing. Would you go with one of the rubbery kind here? Or the felt thing?

[mrs.jacinthe]

I'd go with the felted kind if you have nice hardwoods. The rubber kind leaves marks on the floor when it degrades. At least, it did in my parents' house.

[bunnymendelbaum]

Second vote for felt kind.
I got mine at Ikea. I didn't see them at Lowes, but the rubbery ones were a little $$ at my Lowe's.

[wawa]

Oh, our ikea is only 15 minutes away. that'd work I think. I can get MH to grab them on his way home from work.

[Deleted]

Third for felt. The rubber kind will make a mess of the finish on a wood floor (personal experience). However, if you have a smaller/lighter rug that will slide around, the felt pads can make the rugs slippery on a hard floor. I have a few plain felt pads, but they are all held down with furniture on multiple sides. When there is an exposed corner, I have noticed that hitting the rug the wrong way can make it buckle and is a little dangerous. I buy them from rugpadcorner.com, and their website (pure marketing ploy, I'm not sure?) touts a felt pad with natural rubber backing, claiming natural rubber won't harm floors the way synthetic rubber will. I don't have first-hand experience with the so-called natural rubber backing though.

[wawa]

Dammit...I didn't know that the rubbery kind was bad for hardwoods. ok, so the one rug I have that is smaller is a super thick tufted wool. 5x8 I think. I was planning on just using one of those rubbery ones under there to keep it in place because it will be pretty much floating in the room on 3 sides.

I feel like the felt kind would be total overkill because the rug itself is so thick. Do I just not use a pad? Use the felt one and hope the door clears it?

WWYD?

[Deleted]

I would not bother with a pad on a tufted wool rug myself. IMO, the glue on that will fail before you have to worry about wearing down the wool. But that's just IM(very)HO and experience with one tufted rug. I worry a lot more about protecting the rugs I plan to have for 50 years.

ETA: Caveat, I would only skip the pad if the back of the rug didn't seem like it would harm the finish. If it's cloth backed, I'd probably go without, just periodically pulling it up to check for any sign the finsh is being harmed (easier to check if you can pull it up with sunlight shining through a window and view it at an angle; that's when the damage to our finish was visible). I found the polypropylene rugs to be scratchier, so I probably wouldn't skip a pad on those.

[wawa]

Dec 31, 2012 16:32:53 GMT -5 @juno said:

I would not bother with a pad on a tufted wool rug myself. IMO, the glue on that will fail before you have to worry about wearing down the wool. But that's just IM(very)HO and experience with one tufted rug. I worry a lot more about protecting the rugs I plan to have for 50 years.

Ok...so I don't have to worry about the rug hurting the floor? The pad is just for the rug itself, right? So my two good rugs that my mom gave me - those I'll get the felt pads. The two tufted rugs - those I can just let be on my wood floors naked.

[wawa]

Oh...side note: for Juno and any other rug lovers who will share my annoyance - the house i grew up in had nice hand-knotted rugs in pretty much every room. I forget which country they were from...but all real oriental rugs. When my mom downsized after my sister and I moved out she only had room for the smallest one - so two of the big rugs went to my house and the third she loaned to her sister.

Last year she was at her sister's house and noticed the rug was gone. She asked where it was and my fucking dumbass of an aunt said, "oh...it got stained so I threw it away."

It was a $3,000 rug. Which my mom bought on a really good discount because a friend worked at the shop. I'm not sure how much it originally cost.

She just told me this story over the weekend. I was dumbfounded. How can somebody get to adulthood and not know that a nice rug is not something you THROW AWAY because you spilled some soda on it?

When I took the first two rugs we were in a little townhouse and only had room for those two. Now that we're in a bigger house I could totally use all three. But NOOOOO. It's gone. Stupid.

[Deleted]

Cross-posting I think it's sort of for protecting both floor and rug, and since all my rugs are now rugs that will last forever, it's an easy choice for me to pad them all. With the 5x8 in your situation, I'm not 100% sure, which is why I'd keep an eye on it. If the door did allow for it, a felt pad might be worth it for peace of mind. Not sure.

[wawa]

Ok, your ETA answered my question I guess. Hm. I guess we'll try that rug with no backing and see how it looks. Well...that and get MH to actually install the bedroom door so I can see how much clearance we have with the rug. If a felt pad will fit I'll just get one. Better safe than sorry, right?

[Deleted]

Dec 31, 2012 16:41:24 GMT -5 wawa said:

Oh...side note: for Juno and any other rug lovers who will share my annoyance - the house i grew up in had nice hand-knotted rugs in pretty much every room. I forget which country they were from...but all real oriental rugs. When my mom downsized after my sister and I moved out she only had room for the smallest one - so two of the big rugs went to my house and the third she loaned to her sister.

Last year she was at her sister's house and noticed the rug was gone. She asked where it was and my fucking dumbass of an aunt said, "oh...it got stained so I threw it away."

It was a $3,000 rug. Which my mom bought on a really good discount because a friend worked at the shop. I'm not sure how much it originally cost.

She just told me this story over the weekend. I was dumbfounded. How can somebody get to adulthood and not know that a nice rug is not something you THROW AWAY because you spilled some soda on it?

When I took the first two rugs we were in a little townhouse and only had room for those two. Now that we're in a bigger house I could totally use all three. But NOOOOO. It's gone. Stupid.

:-|

[wawa]

LOL! cross posted again.

[wawa]

Dec 31, 2012 16:43:01 GMT -5 @juno said:

Dec 31, 2012 16:41:24 GMT -5 wawa said:

Oh...side note: for Juno and any other rug lovers who will share my annoyance - the house i grew up in had nice hand-knotted rugs in pretty much every room. I forget which country they were from...but all real oriental rugs. When my mom downsized after my sister and I moved out she only had room for the smallest one - so two of the big rugs went to my house and the third she loaned to her sister.

Last year she was at her sister's house and noticed the rug was gone. She asked where it was and my fucking dumbass of an aunt said, "oh...it got stained so I threw it away."

It was a $3,000 rug. Which my mom bought on a really good discount because a friend worked at the shop. I'm not sure how much it originally cost.

She just told me this story over the weekend. I was dumbfounded. How can somebody get to adulthood and not know that a nice rug is not something you THROW AWAY because you spilled some soda on it?

When I took the first two rugs we were in a little townhouse and only had room for those two. Now that we're in a bigger house I could totally use all three. But NOOOOO. It's gone. Stupid.

That's EXACTLY what I said!

[Deleted]

Dec 31, 2012 16:44:13 GMT -5 wawa said:

Dec 31, 2012 16:43:01 GMT -5 @juno said:

That's EXACTLY what I said!

With maybe a :-( thrown in. I hope someone found it in the garbage and pulled it out for cleaning. At least you know who to never lend anything to!

We had to have one of our new ones cleaned recently. Our poor pup had an upset stomach (or maybe he just disliked the pattern) and barfed on one maybe 4 weeks after we got it down on the floor. My DH really did :-( Fortunately he has a better relationship with our dog than your H does with cats, haha. And, everything came out.

[lys]

depends on the thinkness of the rug and the surface on which it will go.
I have mine custom cut at a local mom carpet store.