Laminate Flooring – Buying And Installing

Laminate flooring offers a long-lasting alternative to stone and real wood at a fraction of the price. What’s more? It is easy to install and maintain, and this makes it ideal for a do-it-yourself-er.

Features to consider when budgeting and purchasing laminate flooring online include:

Floor Thickness

Laminate flooring comes in various thicknesses ranging from 7-12 millimeters. Buying a thicker laminate is always better so as to prevent bending due to unevenness of floors; it also helps in sound reduction.

AC Rating

This entails a laminate’s resistance to wear. It ranges from 1-5 with the level of durability being the highest number, AC5. As for AC1 laminate, it is recommendable for rooms with little feet movement such as bedrooms. On the other hand, AC5 is ideal for a lot of foot movement such as that in department stores; it goes without saying that it’s also the most expensive option.

Flooring Texture

Laminate flooring comes with various textures like high glass, hand scrapped and embossed. This allows the buyer to choose what suits them best from a variety of options on offer. The high glass has a mirror finish that makes it more appealing.

The beauty of online purchases is that you can browse through multiple samples before settling on your best buy –all at the comfort of your home- provided you have internet access. Most online retailers will also provide the cost of various laminate floors beside the samples.

The basic tools needed for a self-installation are a measuring-tape, dry erasable marker to ensure correct measurements, reversed jigsaw blade and an undercut saw to trim the door and avoid door jams.

Most of these tools are available from sites like ebay.com pr craigslist.com at pocket-friendly prices.

The Installation Process 

1. Measure the room in which you intend to install and calculate the number of packs needed. As a safety precaution, buy an extra set in case there are accidents or mistakes and always have some money set aside in case there’s damage to the ones bought.
2. Lay the laminate flooring on a dry leveled surface. Ensure that all floorboards are fitted well and if the floor is old, use self-smoothing material that dries up the floor.
3. Lay the boards on the same direction. In a square room, lay the boards facing the direction of incoming light. Start from the corner and lay the boards on the first two rows along the longest straight wall.
4. Place plastic spacers of 60cm between the board and wall. Make sure the spacers are all around the edge of the floor. Join the boards using adhesive. The last board may need trimming to fit in.
5. Begin the second row with the cutoff of the last board. When done, remove the spacers and put the skirting board over the new boards. Then you can polish or paint.

If this proves hard to follow, there are online installation videos; and recommendable sites include youtube.com, homedepot.com and diynetwork.com, which can show you how to go about it.

Author Colin McD: We recently had our kitchen flooring replaced with some new laminate (originally had vinyl tiles) and for the first time I managed to do it myself, all by myself! If you take the time it is something you can do yourself, and without too much hassle (2 and a half hours for a medium size room is all it took).

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