Deslippifying hardwood stairs
July 7, 2017 12:41 PM Subscribe
The stairs in my house are plain sealed hardwood and slippery under sock feet; they look good and are easy to clean but I've just earned a second grotesque bruise this year slipping on them. What are the best products/methods can I use to improve traction and save my fool neck? (Bonuses for ease of cleaning and not damaging the wood flooring underneath.)
Best answer: This catalog has a variety of stair tread "rugs" both in fabric and rubber. I really like the look of these rubber lacy ones--even for indoor use.
posted by agatha_magatha at 1:11 PM on July 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by agatha_magatha at 1:11 PM on July 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
After my third slide down the stairs I started wearing grippy yoga socks inside, instead of regular socks. There wasn't a fourth incident. If you don't like toe socks you can find grippy regular socks but I don't have any specific recommendations for those.
posted by mama casserole at 1:20 PM on July 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by mama casserole at 1:20 PM on July 7, 2017 [2 favorites]
If you can tolerate a little bit of physical modification and your stairs aren't open-riser, a tradiitonal solution is to use a runner and stair rods.
posted by rhizome at 1:42 PM on July 7, 2017
posted by rhizome at 1:42 PM on July 7, 2017
I gave up on bare hardwood stairs many years and many bruises ago.
As much as I hate carpet, stairs need runners, whether removable or not.
posted by rokusan at 1:46 PM on July 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
As much as I hate carpet, stairs need runners, whether removable or not.
posted by rokusan at 1:46 PM on July 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
We always just wear sandals or slippers inside the house (we each have indoor-only sandals, so we're not tracking dirt around), and no one has ever slipped on the hardwood stairs as long as we've lived here. I find it to be an effective solution without any modification needed to the stairs at all.
posted by primethyme at 1:59 PM on July 7, 2017
posted by primethyme at 1:59 PM on July 7, 2017
Best answer: We got two sets of these, and they work great. (we got them because our dog was slipping on the stairs.) They don't slide at all, but are rubber, not adhesive, so they can be removed at will. Dean stair treads.
posted by mercredi at 2:38 PM on July 7, 2017
posted by mercredi at 2:38 PM on July 7, 2017
Best answer: IKR?? My stairs will be how I die.
I've been looking at stair treads for a few weeks and the Dean stair treads linked to by mercredi above seem to be the best in terms of nonslip no glue and durability. Home Depot has a bunch of options on their website but I haven't found any real people reviews of nearly any of them, and their pricing is really difficult to determine because they're sometimes sold in sets and sometimes individually and the cost range is ridiculous. I'm also looking into buying carpet tiles and DIYing some treads out of them; we have some from flor in our living room that really don't skid and the key is the vinyl backing so I'm thinking I can find some on deep discount somewhere, though that's a bit tricky since their store down by Pike Place closed.
One thing that has really helped my shitty-proprioceptive ass from biting it thus far is the sturdy handrail we had a handy dude install on our basement stairs before we deemed it safe to move in. He gave us weird looks, since the basement stairs have walls on both sides, but I needed a handrail to help me with laundry hauling and such. Really though it's been something that I've deathgripped multiple times at this point. If your stairs don't have a good handrail that you can put your whole body weight on and haul, get that sorted. It didn't cost very much for a simple one and it only took maybe an hour, since there were no spindles or anything to install.
posted by Mizu at 2:57 PM on July 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
I've been looking at stair treads for a few weeks and the Dean stair treads linked to by mercredi above seem to be the best in terms of nonslip no glue and durability. Home Depot has a bunch of options on their website but I haven't found any real people reviews of nearly any of them, and their pricing is really difficult to determine because they're sometimes sold in sets and sometimes individually and the cost range is ridiculous. I'm also looking into buying carpet tiles and DIYing some treads out of them; we have some from flor in our living room that really don't skid and the key is the vinyl backing so I'm thinking I can find some on deep discount somewhere, though that's a bit tricky since their store down by Pike Place closed.
One thing that has really helped my shitty-proprioceptive ass from biting it thus far is the sturdy handrail we had a handy dude install on our basement stairs before we deemed it safe to move in. He gave us weird looks, since the basement stairs have walls on both sides, but I needed a handrail to help me with laundry hauling and such. Really though it's been something that I've deathgripped multiple times at this point. If your stairs don't have a good handrail that you can put your whole body weight on and haul, get that sorted. It didn't cost very much for a simple one and it only took maybe an hour, since there were no spindles or anything to install.
posted by Mizu at 2:57 PM on July 7, 2017 [1 favorite]
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It's translucent, in that you can see them on the stairs, but they don't look out of place - I've actually had people comment that they thought that's how the house came. I just put a strip right on the edge of the step where your toe or heel (depending on the direction you're walking) would hit, centered on the stair. You don't need to go all the way to the edge, going most of the way is fine.
Things don't really stick to them, and you can run a vacuum over them without a worry. I've had them for three years now and they look absolutely the same as day one.
I haven't had to pull them up yet, but considering it's just sticky stuff, some sort of cleaner should be able to remove any residue if you need to remove them.
It ended up just fitting two flights of stairs for me, but the math on how much you need should be pretty straightforward.
posted by chillin411 at 12:49 PM on July 7, 2017 [3 favorites]