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| Laying
Laminate Floors - Laying the boards |
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Assuming the wall is reasonably straight,
you can start your first row against this. Place the
special plastic or cork spacers at 50cm intervals along
the longest straight wall and lay the first row of boards
with the groove side facing the wall, starting from
a corner.
If the wall is not straight, you will have to mark
and cut the boards to fit. To make this as easy as possible,
loosely lay a row of boards so that they run straight
and sit just touching the part of the wall that sticks
out the most. |
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| Each laminate floor board has a tongue and a groove
side. The tongue side is actually the smaller that sticks
out from the board. The tongue needs to be cut off on
the long side and short side when you install boards in
the corners. It makes a better corner and gives you a
place to start your work and build outward. |
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| When installing laminate boards around a door opening,
you may have to put in a transition strip unless the doors
a flush (see picture on the right). Put the spacers in
place and then measure to see how much longer the laminate
board in front of the door is compared to the other laminate
boards. This will show you how to cut off the board in
front of the door. |
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| You will probably need to cut the last board of the
row to fit. Mark it with a try square, and saw with the
finished surface facing up. This way, you are less likely
to splinter the surface. |
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Begin the second row, starting with the off-cut of
the board used at the end of the first row. This helps
reduce wastage and ensures that the joints are staggered.
Always stagger the end joints of adjacent rows by
at least 30cm. Use the fitting tool to push the ends
of the boards together. |
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Continue across the room, pushing the completed rows
firmly against the plastic spacers and laying more underlay
ahead of the boards you are fitting. Force each piece
together by gently tapping the edge block against the
grooved side of each board.
Make holes for heating pipes etc by marking the position
of the pipe(s) on the laminate board to be fitted.
Drill a hole about 5mm larger in diameter than the
pipe. Then make two angled saw cuts from the edge of
the laminate board to the sides of the drilled hole.
Fit the board and carefully glue the small off-cut wedge
behind the pipe. |
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If the last row of boards need to be cut, measure
the gap between the boards and the wall, deduct 10mm
and saw the boards lengthways to fit.
If you prefer, you can loose-lay the last 'full-width'
row staggering its joints as if it were the final row
against the edge. Take a full width offcut of the boarding
and use this as detailed earlier to mark and scribe
the boards. The protruding tongue on the offcut will
ensure that you have sufficient clearance for fitting.
Fit a new 'full-width' row in place of the ones used
for scribing. Finally, fit the scribed laminate boards. |
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Either replace the skirting board or fix a decorative quadrant
moulding over the expansion gap around the edge of the floor.
Pin the moulding to the skirting board and paint or varnish.
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