Browse Forums Flooring & Floor Covering 1 Aug 23, 2009 4:02 pm Hi Guys, building a 3x2 in Harrisdale (VERTU) getting Laminate throughout whole house getting the German Laminator Parador 1040 Afzezia just wondering if anyone else here has Laminate Flooring through whole house? and any pics you could upload would be great Thanks Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 3Aug 23, 2009 11:57 pm Hi rayray, We used Parador's floor laminate when we were living in Germany - it's the norm in Europe (and far more cheaper there than it is here!). My hubby and his friends actually installed it themselves. We loved it heaps - it is the cheaper/economical equivalent to timber flooring (when one's budget doesn't permit real timber flooring). In terms of aesthetic look, it has the same sort of look as engineered timber flooring with the difference being that laminate is made of high density plastic (if there's such a phrase even - am using my own terminology) and of course doesn't have the rustic look of wood. The only disadvantage of laminate is when you get a water leak, the laminate warps quite badly (as it happened to us when our undersink pipe leaked in Germany). If you don't have kids, your laminate flooring should last a fair few years. If you do have kids (small/young kids prone to dropping their heavy plastic toys), than some damage may occur... Building thread viewtopic.php?f=31&t=22917 27.07.09 Contract signed. 08.09.09 Site scraped. 18.09.09 Slab completed! 23.11.09 Bricking done 09.03.10 - Tiling 15.04.10 PCI 01.05.10 Handover Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 4Aug 24, 2009 12:10 am I'm NOT a fan of this type of flooring! It has some good points, but mostly I dislike the echoey sound issues, and the metal trims at doorways are ugly. It just doesn't feel like a quality floor should! And yes, it is quite moisture sensitive. Ash. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 5Aug 24, 2009 12:30 am Royalblue, you're right about the echoey sound laminate flooring emits when one walks about with "click click" shoes as I call (plastic heels, high heels). This is due to the HDF (which I like to call plastic) of the flooring. We didn't use the metal floor trimming when we had laminate flooring, there's a variety of trimmings available (well in Europe anyway). we'd used the same "wood" effect trimming as the flooring itself. Building thread viewtopic.php?f=31&t=22917 27.07.09 Contract signed. 08.09.09 Site scraped. 18.09.09 Slab completed! 23.11.09 Bricking done 09.03.10 - Tiling 15.04.10 PCI 01.05.10 Handover Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 6Aug 26, 2009 10:30 pm Just make sure you get extra strips, being laminate it is produced in batches and you will have trouble colour matching if you have to replace any damaged to the floor. Cheers Lou http://take2-customdesigndownslope.blogspot.com 07-10-09 omg they have cut the block 14-05-10 we finally have the keys Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 7Aug 31, 2009 3:47 pm I have laminate through my flat in the UK and although I've had tenants in there for 3 years, it's still showing few signs of wear and tear. The flat has floorboards over which I laid 4mm hardboard underfloor, then 2mm foam sound absorber and then 10mm laminate and didn't experience any noise issues. Tips: - If you have areas which may get wet then use PVA glue to glue the joints as you "click" them to help keep the moisture from the joins. - Lay the underflooring at an angle to the laminate - Use matching join strips at doorways - Remove skirting boards (carefully) before you lay the floor and then replace them afterwards. - Use a jigsaw with a fine blade to cut the boards - Don't overlap them too close - allow 300-400mm - Mark on the board you're cutting which is the part to keep to match the existing board - it's easy to measure and then cut the wrong bit when doing ends. - You can use expanding foam below the underfloor to level over small depressions but after applying the foam through a hole in the underfloor, screw the underfloor to the subfloor so that the underfloor is flat to stop the floor from rising beyond that level. I agree about buying extra strips not because the batches don't match (they do in my experience) but because the manufacturers can change the edge connection method so new batches won't work with the old - although the surface looks identical. Hope this helps Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 8Jan 25, 2010 12:29 pm It is not suitable to install laminate flooring in place where there is too much water as the flooring is not water resistive. It is just moisture resistive. So you'd better not install the flooring in the washroom or kitchen. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 9Jan 25, 2010 12:55 pm We've had it in the kitchen for over a year with no problems from moisture - occasional drops of water are no problem and it gets swept and steam mopped to clean it - had it in kitchen of old house too - no problems. Im not sure what you mean by the 'washroom' but no-one would suggest it for laundry or bathroom, these are nearly always tiled, or perhaps polished concrete, in Australia. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 10Jan 25, 2010 1:04 pm Huh?????? Helyn, you must be a miracle worker!!! Steam mopping laminate flooring is normally a perfect recipe for DISASTER. How that is not the outcome with yours is a complete mystery! :-0 Ash. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 11Jan 25, 2010 6:21 pm Dont know, Ash All I know is we sweep and spot clean it every few days (laminate is in hallways, entry, family/kitchen/dining, carpet in bedrooms and lounge) steam mopped and then polished about once a month and comes up fine Have lived here for 15 months now. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 12Feb 04, 2010 6:10 am My entire house is now of Laminate flooring. It looks great, inexpensive and if there is ever a future problem it is very easily repairable. I always recommend removing the baseboard, undercut any door frame so the laminate slides under it and make sure to cut your underlayment 2 inches longer than the total length of the floor (so that it runs up the wall) then you may remove any extra after the laminate is installed (this is a preventitive measure against moisture). Check out my laminate intallation at http://house-fix.blogspot.com/2010/02/installing-new-laminate-flooring.html. $200 Canadian Cash-BACK Mortgage - Visit HERE for promotion coupon and details! Canadian House Fix, Repair and Renovation - Follow a blog about my personal renovation experiences. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 13Feb 04, 2010 4:20 pm Helyn We've had it in the kitchen for over a year with no problems from moisture - occasional drops of water are no problem and it gets swept Mind you, when we purchased our house the Mud room was also laminate. lol! I removed it there because I was certian that the winter snow and water would kill the floors (but I never gave it a chance to find out) Laminate flooring is water resistant. If it sits in the cracks it may start to swell but from my experience of over 1 year I haven't had a problem with it in my Kitchen or getting it wet and wiping it within the hour. $200 Canadian Cash-BACK Mortgage - Visit HERE for promotion coupon and details! Canadian House Fix, Repair and Renovation - Follow a blog about my personal renovation experiences. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 14Feb 09, 2010 5:10 pm I have requested for mine to be vinly throughout the house (kitchen, dining/living, bedrooms, toilet and laundry area)because of my hairy drooling dog and had recently inherit a steam mop that says it can be used on vinyl as well. Though I had in mind to change the vinyl to polish concrete eventually but would rather not damaged the vinyl as long as I can. Would steam mop actually damage the vinyl? With my limited knowledge of science, I know that heat and plastics does not go together, but would assumed that the vinyls would have been improved over the years. Oh... my house is still being built currently and does not know the outcome of the look or even the actual pros and cons except that I can remove the drool and the hair easily. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 15Feb 13, 2010 4:20 pm We put this in our new house just over 6 years ago, and have been very disappointed with it. We bought a cheaper brand at a discount price, and when we found we hadn't bought enough, it was unavailable, so we had to hunt around for something similar. That was our faut. It is also the type that needs gluing, and we find now that a few boards have come loose as the glue is failing. Several boards have chips taken out from damage of one sort or another. The kitchen area has several areas of edge swelling around the dishwasher and kettle areas. In humid weather with the evaporative a/c on the floors expand with the moisture and creak, plus they look awful. I agree that the metal strips are very down market. The main dislike we have is that the dark, semi-gloss timber look looks great when just washed, but as soon as you walk on it in any manner the footprints show up. Being dark, any dust or dirt, pet fur etc shows up immediately. Come 5pm each day when the sun is low all of the dirt shows up, no matter when last swept. So it never really looks nice. We were advised to keep the room dark so these marks wouldn't show up. The extra that we had to buy has less gloss and is a bit better, but still never looks good when walked on. We are now thinking seriously about replacing it, just can't decide what with yet, but probably vinyl of some sort. If you do get laminate: get only the click lock; don't do any wet or potentially wet areas; get the best you can afford; check carefully how it looks with footmarks; lighter colours would be the best for not showing dirt and foot marks. Don't be sucked in by the photos of glossy floors, the reality is much different. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 16Feb 21, 2010 2:41 pm taurus We put this in our new house just over 6 years ago, and have been very disappointed with it. We bought a cheaper brand at a discount price, and when we found we hadn't bought enough, it was unavailable, so we had to hunt around for something similar. That was our faut. It is also the type that needs gluing, and we find now that a few boards have come loose as the glue is failing. Several boards have chips taken out from damage of one sort or another. The kitchen area has several areas of edge swelling around the dishwasher and kettle areas. In humid weather with the evaporative a/c on the floors expand with the moisture and creak, plus they look awful. I agree that the metal strips are very down market. The main dislike we have is that the dark, semi-gloss timber look looks great when just washed, but as soon as you walk on it in any manner the footprints show up. Being dark, any dust or dirt, pet fur etc shows up immediately. Come 5pm each day when the sun is low all of the dirt shows up, no matter when last swept. So it never really looks nice. We were advised to keep the room dark so these marks wouldn't show up. The extra that we had to buy has less gloss and is a bit better, but still never looks good when walked on. We are now thinking seriously about replacing it, just can't decide what with yet, but probably vinyl of some sort. If you do get laminate: get only the click lock; don't do any wet or potentially wet areas; get the best you can afford; check carefully how it looks with footmarks; lighter colours would be the best for not showing dirt and foot marks. Don't be sucked in by the photos of glossy floors, the reality is much different. Hi, Sorry to hear your bad time with your flooring.........but as you have said, you went for the bargain and you got what you paid for. What type of glue did you use ? It has to be a cross linked PVAC D3 with as high a solids content as possible. It sounds like the product is made from the lowest range of HDF or even a MDF coreboard, rather than a dense HMRHDF. Anyway, don't be put off a hardfloor for ever, just next time, well you know......you have learnt the hard way. I wish you better luck with your floor next time. Buy it from a professional, pay a bit more - and you'll be pleasantly surprised Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 17Feb 23, 2010 1:15 pm Hi Anthony, the floor was laid by professionals, and the glue suitable was for the task, from my recollection of the label, but I threw the extra bottles out at the last shed cleanup. You are right-it is HDF. Domino brand. We bought a low grade product, as you say. But...when you read other forums, even this one, there is a universal problem with footmarks on clean floors. It is a huge topic, so the problem would seem to be with a variety of brands. We think a light colour would be better in not showing dust and fluff, but that wasn't the look we were after. While we are very disinclined to use laminate flooring again, we are also having difficulty in choosing an alternative. We like the idea of vinyl, but some need polishing and stripping. tiles are too hard and noisy. Timber is nice but very costly, and may also need refinishing with wear. Karnean looks interesting, and friends have some down which looks excellent. But there are chemicals required and a 2 day non-use period. We wish to avoid chemicals and high maintenance floors. So locking laminate appears to be a logical option, we just have to find the cleaning solution. We use vinegar, water and robbing alcohol. Floor looks great-until you walk on it. Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 18Feb 23, 2010 6:46 pm Hi, to answer the steam mop on vinyl question....they are evil. Do not use them onany floor. The wreck ceramics, timbers, laminates and vinyls. They can ruin the adhesive in the vinyl ( under the vinyl ). They can change thedimensional stability of it and generally are the worst things ever invented for floors ( except those 3 rooms for $50 ******* cleaning companies ). As to the other question, if you buy a laminate with a heavy texture, it will refract the light better than a smooth finish, they will not show foot prints etc as much. They still will a bit though. Karndean and Amtico and kenbrock etc the vinyl plank products, will do well for you, but unless you go a rough, hand scrapped style, you will still see it. Allure is a floor just like Karndean, but floats (save alot in laying costs as you can DIY). You don't always have to seal them, but it ads a sacrificial wear layer - your choice. Who told you 2 days ? Re: Just wondering who has Laminate Flooring throughout house? 20Feb 24, 2010 7:46 pm I have put sealer on and walked on it in 30 mins (in my shop). 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