Stripping Carpet and Rebuilding a Rancho Palos Verdes Curved Stair
About This Project
The homeowners wanted the carpet off their curved staircase and hardwood on. Straightforward — until demolition. Under the carpet, three treads on the curve had been shimmed with stacked plywood offcuts to correct a rise problem, and one stringer had a split running back from the third riser.
We stopped, documented it, and re-quoted before continuing rather than absorbing a structural repair into a finish job or pressing on and covering it. The stringer was sistered, the shimmed treads rebuilt properly, and only then did the hardwood go on. This is the most common surprise in stair remodeling and the reason we never quote a carpet-to-hardwood conversion as a fixed price without seeing what is underneath.
What the Homeowner Needed
Remove stair carpet and install hardwood on a curved flight — which became a structural repair once opened up.
Challenges on Site
On a curved stair every tread is a different shape, so the three rebuilt treads each had to be individually templated rather than cut to a repeating dimension.
How We Solved It
Paused and re-scoped on discovery, sistered the split stringer, rebuilt three individually templated treads, then completed the hardwood finish.
Project Highlights
- ✓ Structural issue found and disclosed, not covered
- ✓ Split stringer sistered
- ✓ Curved treads individually templated
Common Questions
What problems are commonly hidden under stair carpet?
Shimmed or packed treads correcting an original rise error, split or notched stringers, and squeaks that were never fixed because carpet muffled them. None are visible until demolition, which is why a fixed price before demolition usually contains a large contingency or an exclusion.
Project Overview
What looked like a carpet replacement turned into a structural repair once the carpet came off.
Materials & Details
- Sistered Stringer Repair
- White Oak Treads
- Painted Risers
They found a problem they could easily have hidden under new wood and told us about it instead. That is the whole reason we would use them again.
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