Laying any flooring, from laminate and wooden floors to tiles and carpets, can be a tricky job but it really doesn’t have to be left to the experts. Let’s start off with how to lay wooden flooring, that to say it is an engineered or laminate product you are searching to fit... Wooden Floors Wooden floors expand due to the humidity of the room so it is essential that you allow time for your flooring to acclimatise to the room’s atmosphere. Move your flooring into the room, open the pack and lay in sunlight for the flooring to get the full impact of the room’s temperature.
Leave the flooring for 24 hours before you start installation. Remove skirting boards with a crow bar, these are refitted during the last steps of laying a wooden floor. Vacuum the floor then fit the underlay; use a utility knife to cut the underlay to size and secure by taping around the edges. The tape will also ensure that any moisture residing underneath the underlay doesn’t rise and damage your flooring. Now position plastic spacers around the room, this will allow some extra room for expansion as the wooden floor will swell after fitting. Now lay the first board, ensuring that the groove is facing the wall.
Check the manufacturer’s instructions to see that to say the flooring should be fixed using nails or glue. Cut this first board to fit and use the cut end to start the second row to stagger the joints of the adjacent rows for a truly professional result. When fitting the rest of the boards, continue to stagger the joints and push the sides of each board using a fitting tool for a snug fit. Work your way across the room and cut the final board lengthways to fit, again force in with the fitting tool. Cut any boards that conflict with pipes or corners to fit. To finish remove the plastic spacers and refit the skirting to cover this gap, this allows enough space for expansion as well as providing an expert finish with no gaps!
Tiles
See our section ‘How to fit tiles’ on page 18. The same rules apply when it comes to fitting tiles for wall and floor; the only thing that differs when fitting floor tiles is that you have to leave the adhesive to dry for up to 12 hours, without walking on the tiles. You also have to seal the tile surface to protect from damage and finish by grouting.
Carpet
Start by removing any old carpet or flooring and fit gripper strips around the edge of the room, ensuring they are positioned at least 1/5 inch away from the edge of the skirting board. This small gap between the skirting and the gripper strip ensures there is sufficient room to tuck the carpet under neatly when you have finished the fitting. If you are laying onto floorboards, nail in the grippers, however, if you have concrete floors glue the grippers to the floor with a quick setting polyurethane product.
Fit the underlay next, roll out the underlay across the room and join the edges with doubled side carpet tape. Trim the underlay so it fits perfectly within the gripper strips. Now unroll the carpet and fix to the grippers, smoothing out any creases by stretching the carpet to fit. Fix all sides of the carpet to the grippers to secure. Next tuck the edges of the carpet into the space between the gripper strip and skirting board, use a bolster chisel to push the carpet into this tight gap. Finish by trimming off any excess carpet from the edges with a Stanley knife.
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