My power stretcher snapped a tooth mid-install in a living room yesterday

I was stretching a 12x15 room in Bellevue and the metal tooth on my power stretcher just snapped off clean. I had already glued the seams and everything so I had to pull it all back up and start over. Ended up using a knee kicker for the whole room which took twice as long. Has anyone else had a failure like this with a power stretcher or did I just get a bad batch of teeth?

2 comments

2 Comments

evaperez7d ago

I had a Crain power stretcher for about 8 years and never had a tooth break on me... maybe it's a fluke or maybe you just had bad luck with that one batch. But honestly I see people blame the tool when it's usually something they did wrong, like putting too much pressure on one tooth instead of letting the whole plate spread the load. Carpet stretching is all about technique not brute force, so if you were yanking hard that could have done it. Plus you said you had to start over with a knee kicker which tells me you probably should have checked the tooth condition before you even started the job.

hayden7206d ago

The real issue might be how the carpet itself is built. If you had one of those newer carpets with a loose backing and stiff face yarn, the teeth can't grab evenly and you get stress points that snap them.