Guide To Furniture & Chair Feet

Welcome to the Vital Parts guide to Chair Feet!

This is your one stop source of information when it comes to measuring, installing, and finding the ideal parts for your chairs or furniture. This guide has been put together to provide insight to our customers on the world of replacement feet, and ensuring a proper fit first time.

Chair Feet, Chair Ferrules, and Chair Inserts are all forms of feet used mainly with chairs, appliances, and furniture. They act either as replacements or as upgrades to promote grip and to prevent damage to the flooring that they are placed on. Popular inside Schools & Educational facilities, each product is suited to a long-term usage, and is easily installed to your application.

Overview:

Types of Chair Feet:

Coming in two main styles, these feet can be split in two based on their installation type. These are:

Internal:
Internal fitting feet includes products such as our Chair Inserts, which are designed to fit on the inside of a tubular leg. This is to improve grip and prevent scratching. These internal type feet tend to be available in a larger range of sizes than their external fitting counterparts. They also come in bespoke shapes such as Oval & Rectangular, which aren’t available for external.

External:
External fitting feet includes products that are often referred to as ‘ferrules’. These work by being pushed over the chair leg by hand to ‘cup’ it. By doing so, materials such as Rubber can be used to provide added features. These include levels of grip, anti marking properties, and stability for heavier furniture/objects. External Feet are slightly more restrictive when it comes to the amount of sizes and shapes available. However, most industry standard sizes are catered for.

When to use Chair Feet:

To protect a worn chair leg:

As one of the most common reasons for replacing Chair Feet, having a worn leg can cause many issues when used in a public setting. They can cause major damage to a wooden or hard floor. Installing a ferrule or insert can be extremely useful in this instance. They can provide refreshed levels of grip and prevent un-necessary marking.

To prevent marking of a floor:

More applicable to public or business type uses, these feet are recommended for preventing the scratching/damage of floors. They can go a long way to reduce wasted spend on refurbishment or repair. Certain options, such as Rubber Ferrules, come with anti marking properties from standard.

To increase grip:

Almost every product within our selection of feet provides excellent gripping properties. This helps to increase stability, and prevents any potential injuries or health and safety related issues. Rubber is generally recommended for harder surfaces to add grip, with Plastic recommended for Softer types.

How to measure Chair Feet:

When measuring up your object for the installation of Chair Feet, it is important to consider the type you will be looking at. This is because measuring for internal is slightly different to external. Outlined below are the main differences between these measurements, as well as how you can go about getting them.

Internal type feet are matched up using Outside Diameter measurements.

External type feet are matched up using Internal Diameter measurements.

Outside Diameter (OD)
Finding the outside diameter of a tube can be done by measuring the distance between its two outer walls (as pictured). The distance between these walls is the measurement which should be taken for the outside diameter.

Outside Diameter inserts guide image

Internal Diameter (ID)
Similar to the measurement for the outside diameter, finding the internal diameter of your tube is done by measuring the distance between the two inner walls (as pictured). This distance is the measurement to be used for the internal diameter.

Internal diameter inserts support image

Wall Thickness
Once you have both the internal and external measurements of your tube, you can start to work out the wall thickness required for a flush fit. You can do this by using the following equation:

OD – ID ÷ 2 = Wall Thickness

Wall Thickness inserts support guide

Once you have your measurements, including wall thickness, you can look to match it up with our sizing provided on site. For internal fitting feet, you can match up your tube outside diameter with the outside diameter of the insert. However, for external fitting feet such as ferrules, you will need to match up for internal diameter rather than outside.

It should be noted that wall thickness should only really be considered if you are fitting internally, externally fitted feet should slip on no matter the wall thickness (as long as your measurement is correct).

How to install Chair Feet:

Installation, as you can see from the images below, is a quick and easy process that can be completed quickly by hand. With regards to inserts, these may require hitting with a hammer for a flush, secure fitting to your tube or box section.

Installing Inserts & Ferrules:

Surface Guide:

Below, we have separated out the best product types for each surface / flooring type, based mainly on grip related properties. Please note that it can also be down to preference as to your choice of material depending on factors such as noise.

Surface Type	Suitable Materials
Laminate	Rubber / Plastic
Parquet	Rubber / Plastic
Smooth Stone	Rubber / Plastic
Hard Stone	Rubber
Carpet	Plastic
Vinyl	Plastic
Linoleum	Plastic

Please note that all of our Plastic / Rubber Chair Feet products are anti marking.

What’s available for Chair Feet?

Our selection of feet is applicable for all types of chairs, furniture, and appliances. They come in a number of different sizes and styles depending on your requirements. As one of the largest suppliers of Chair & Furniture Feet products in the UK, we have a truly vast range available for all uses.

Inserts:

Chair Inserts are an extremely common choice for school type chairs with tubular legs. They are available in a massive amount of variations and sizes for almost every possible use. Inserts example image

Round Tube Inserts: Angled, Domed, Wide/Thick Base & Coloured options
Square Tube Inserts: Angled, Domed & Coloured options
Rectangular Tube Inserts: Angled & Standard options
Oval Tube Inserts: Angled & Standard options

Threaded:

Threaded Feet are another common choice of foot. They are used mainly for heavier furniture / objects where additional height or levelling is required. They are available in many variations suited to different weight ratings, from 100kg all the way up to 10,000kg.

Fixed / Articulating / Tilting styles available

Ferrules:

Ferrules are a popular choice as an external fitting option, pushing straight on to the end of your chair or furniture leg. They come in many heavy duty reinforced and grip styles for all Ferrules example image kinds of furniture, objects, chairs, and appliances.

Plastic Ferrules: Angled, Standard & Square options
Rubber Ferrules: Reinforced, Crutch & Pimple Base options

Saddle:

Saddle Feet are a lesser known form of chair foot. They are used specifically with tubular furniture to add grip and prevent the marking of flooring. As a simple to fit product, these simply clip around the tube to provide additional grip for both hard and soft flooring types.

Tube Saddle Feet / Bases: 5 different styles
Saddle Glides

Glides:

Glides are essentially feet made to promote loss of grip, enabling quick and easy movement across hard and soft surfaces. They are often used inside consumer industries to increase comfort and reduce noise. Glides are an extremely popular choice.