If you're set on fitting laminate flooring in your home, but are not quite confident enough to do it yourself, fear not! Here are some handy tips to help provide an overview of the stages involved, which will hopefully make the task seem much more manageable.
First of all, be sure to choose you measure out the space where you plan to fit the laminate flooring. It is always a good idea to purchase about 10 percent extra laminate boards than you think you'll need, just in case you've made a mistake in measuring, or some of the boards get damaged during the installation. Most quality tile and wood flooring specialists will refund any products you have not used if they are still in their packaging. To calculate the amount of laminate flooring you'll need to purchase, measure the length and width of your room in meters, and multiply the two numbers together to give you the amount of m2 you need to cover. Most packs of laminate will tell you how many m2 is in each pack, which is great. Always make sure you double-check your measurements, never take just one set of measurements. If you have a particularly awkward shaped space to measure up, a useful method is to split the room up into smaller squares / sections, and then add the m2 together at the end.
Ensure you leave your laminate flooring lying flat in the room you are going to install it at at least 48 hours before you begin fitting. This is to allow the laminate to acclimatise to the room temperature, and to do any expanding or shrinking that it may do in the new environment. Then make sure you clean and hoover the surface you are going to lay the laminate flooring onto. Before you begin laying the laminate flooring, be sure to install a quality underlay to help with padding the surface, reducing noise from walking on the boards, and also to help with damp-proofing (particularly if you are laying onto a concrete floor).
The first step to fitting your laminate flooring is to achieve a 'master row'. A master row is the first line of laminate boards stretching across the widest edge of your room. By including the master row provides a straight line, you can safely begin adding the rest of the boards to this row. To create a master row, you lay out a line of laminate boards along one edge of your space, and then using spacers, you pad out the side of the boards touching the wall to create a nice even, straight line on the edge of the boards farthest away from the wall. Just one last thing to consider before you get going – make sure you take any inward opening doors off the hinge, or make sure there is enough clearance under the door that it will still open after you have laid the floor – the last thing you want is to trap yourself in the room while you're laying the laminate!
Now that you've started laying your laminate flooring you will unduly find that you need to cut some of your boards when you reach the far side, or the top or bottom side of the room. The best tool for the job is a laminate cutter, which is purpose-built to give a quick, easy, clean cut to your laminate, without creating the mess of using a hacksaw. As you proceed through the laying, make use of beater blocks, and pulling bars along with a hammer, to encourage the boards to sit neatly and form a good lock together. A beating block is a buffer between your board and your hammer, to prevent damage to the board, and a pulling bar is a useful tool when you reach a wall, and there is no room to hammer a board in place; instead you insert the pulling bar into the gap between your laminate flooring and the wall, and then hammer the vertical lip of the bar to encourage the board in place.
After you've laid your laminate flooring, you will need to apply some finishing touches to make the job a quality one. There will most likely be a small gap between your laminate boards, and your skirting board, as well as a gap between the boards and any doorways in the room. For filling the gap between the boards and the skirting, you can choose from a wide range of skoshers or quadrants to compliment the color and tone of your laminate flooring. For doorway, you can use a transition bar, which again is available in different forms to suit the profile and type of doorway and flooring you are using. For help and advice, why not contact a tile and wood flooring specialist who should be happy to assist you.
Hopefully this brief guide has given you a good overview of the stages involved in fitting laminate flooring, so that it no longer feels like such a daunting task!