How to fit StopGap – the quickest way to fill floorboard gaps

StopGap is the cleanest, simplest and quickest way to fill floorboard gaps. These fitting instructions will show you how.

StopGap is made from flexible, springy plastic, the seal sits invisibly in the shadow at the bottom of the gap, leaving the appearance of your floor unaffected. Fitting StopGap couldn’t be easier.

Cut off corner of plastic bag and pull out the end of the strip to create a dispenser. Do not remove the roll from the plastic bag – it’s like a cat – once it’s out, it’s difficult to get back in.
Starting at one end of the gap, fold the strip along the crease and push into the gap with the ‘V’ pointing down.
Using a plastic card, push the strip into contact with the joist below. Joists are the supports at right angles under floorboards. You will find them directly below rows of nail heads, spaced 400 to 450mm apart.
Continue until you reach the far end of the gap and cut to length. You can ignore gaps which are too narrow for StopGap.

Please note that neutral colour StopGap has been used for clarity in these photographs. We recommend brown StopGap for all floors except white

In practice, choice of colour is not critical because the seal is virtually invisible in the shadow at the bottom of the gap

StopGap – simple enough to be fitted by anyone 

Carpeted Rooms

Use StopGap to seal floorboards when laying new carpet and between skirting and floor in carpeted rooms.

carpet-fitting-2 carpet-fitting-1

Tongue & Groove

StopGap is designed to stop draughts in gaps of 1–8mm wide, especially gaps between square-edged wooden floorboards. The gap must be 10mm or more deep so that the seal can be pushed out of sight. This makes it unsuitable for tongue and groove boards. Exceptionally, the seal can be trimmed with scissors to fit shallower gaps. This restricts the width of gap which can be dealt with and is not really practical for large areas, but, if you are desperate…