Front carpets

My front carpets have had six years and roughly 300 hours of use. They look fine still, but are pretty limp. Due to some fuel leak issues prior to my buying the plane we've had a couple of very thorough shampoo & scrubbing sessions -
everything reeked of mogas. Anyway, the Velcro doesn't stick to the foam pads well, and the carpets tend to bunch up and creep forward under the rudder pedals. Not a great situation.

It's annual time, and i want to do something about that. What we need is something to give the rugs some "body" and keep them in place despite people getting in and out and moving around. I can order new front carpets from Abby at a pretty reasonable price. My wife has offered to help find another solution, since these look fine. Has anyone else been down this road? Any suggestions? I told her I'm willing to invest a couple of hours and a few bucks, but anything more elaborate makes it very attractive to just replace them.

I bought a flying 12 with those carpets and hated them since they kept bunching up and moving around. When I built my new 12 I used the carpet idea listed in the old Printed collection of RVAIATOR (1980-2003) that I used for my RV-9. I took aviation fireproof carpet and cut it to fit tightly in the floor recesses, in between the middle floor support. Next take liquid nails from your Home Depot Aviation supply store and with the help of a squeegee totally fill the backside of the carpet so you can not see the fiber backing. When dry it is now stiff but flexible and will not fray. With the smooth backing you can now use Velcro to attach to the floor. No slip, skid and removable and also very cheap. With this idea you don't have carpet on the step but in the pedal control recess where you need it. On the step I just use black nonskid tuck bed liner paint, like the standard for the SLSA RV-12s.

Abby's carpets for the RV-12 S-LSA fit the E-LSA very well. 2 pieces on each side between the floorboard angle. Very happy. They do not slip.

MartySantic said:

Abby's carpets for the RV-12 S-LSA fit the E-LSA very well. 2 pieces on each side between the floorboard angle. Very happy. They do not slip.

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Oh? So they're different than what I have? I'll have to ask about that. Mine consist of two blocks of what seems to be closed cell polyethylene foam per side, and one piece of carpet. The problem is, there seems to really be no way to keep the Velcro strips stuck to the foam blocks. Nothing will stick to that stuff, so the carpet slides. ACS has some soundproofing foam of appropriate thickness, but I don't want to order it and just hope it works.

I'll have to give Abby a call Monday.

I found a hot glue gun will do the trick to hold the Velcro to the polyethylene. It will eventually tear out of the foam but I just hot glue it back every annual. Stiffer carpets are probably the answer but the floor board gets a beating.

I also hot glue the Velcro to the aluminum too. Holds much longer.