That "let it sit in the sun on the driveway" part is the whole trick and I never thought about it that way. I read a thing on a flooring forum a while back where a guy in Phoenix said he lets carpet bake out back before it ever goes in the door, and I kind of brushed it off as one of those old timer tall tales. But it makes sense, warm backing bends instead of fighting you. I've always just cranked the stretcher and cussed at ripples in the cool months. Gonna try warming the roll first on my next job and see if the second pass goes smoother.

Same kind of deal happened to me with a tap. Ran the exact same speeds and feeds for almost four years and just kept breaking taps and blaming the cheap ones I was buying. Old timer watched me for about a minute and said my peck was too deep so the chips had nowhere to go and were getting recut. Dialed it back and started using a spiral flute tap and I bet my tap life tripled overnight. The worst part is I had read the same advice in a handbook like ten times and it never clicked until someone said it to my face. Funny how that works. Now when a tool is acting up the first thing I check is chip clearance instead of messing with speeds.