Laminate flooring is a beautiful choice when real wood is out of the question. Installing real wood flooring can be a very difficult and timely job that requires many different skills and tools. Laminate flooring on the other hand is quite simple to install and requires only a few common tools to get the job done. Properly installed, laminate flooring has a real wood look without all of the timely and laborious work that is involved with its counterpart.
First things first, when installing laminate flooring it is important to consider the amount of waste that will be used in the routine installation. A quick little trick that I use to determine waste is adding 10% additional square feet that is needed in the layout. There is no need to consider a waste factor in when purchasing the under mat that is to be used with the laminate flooring. These pads are usually sold in increments of about 25 square feet and they can be cut and taped together to utilize the entire amount of the pad. A little bit extra is a good thing but do not figure in 10% the way you would for the wood style laminate flooring itself.
The surface area of the existing floor must be thoroughly swept and relatively smooth before beginning the laminate wood flooring installation process. The best tips for cleaning the existing floor are to use a floor scraper if the floor is concrete and if there are large chunks of concrete on the existing surface then it may even be necessary to use a die grinder to grind down the uneven surface before installing the wood flooring. The most important tip that can be given when it comes to installing wood style laminate flooring is the fact that the initial row of laminate must be perfectly straight. It is very easy for a small stray in the evenness of the line to quickly get away from you as you go down the room and this can make for a huge problem many rows later when the flooring may not evenly lock together due to unevenness in the initial row. Make sure that the very first row of laminate flooring that is laid is laid very straight preferably along the longest and most straight wall of the room.
Tools of the trade when it comes to installing wood style laminate flooring include a chop saw, a jig saw, a rubber mallet, and a tape measure. A great trick that I have found when laying laminate flooring is to actually use a spare piece of flooring to butt up against the existing piece that is to be locked in and then tap the spare piece with the rubber mallet to lock the piece in place. This will prevent any damage from being done to the tongue or groove of the piece of laminate that is actually being positioned on the floor. Using this process, you can actually install the laminate flooring without even using a rubber mallet if necessary!
