Essay

College Essay Tips – Laminate Flooring Pros and Cons

Sometimes neither wood, tile nor carpeting seems like the right choice for the Floor. An alternative worth considering is laminate.

Laminate Flooring

A type of flooring and product created and designed in various colours, materials, mechanism, shapes, size and style.

Laminate flooring is multi-layer synthetic flooring product fuse together with the lamination process. Laminate flooring simulates wood with the photographic applique layer under a clear protective layer.

Laminate Floors

Laminate Floor is a hybrid floor covering consisting of particleboard wood base topped by image layer and a transparent wear layer. Laminate floors are a particular type of Floor covering for homes, living area, kitchen, dining area, bedrooms, hallways and other areas that are not subjected to excessive moisture.

Layers of Laminate Flooring

The Backing Layer

The backing layer of laminate flooring is typically made up of melamine, a durable material that provides structure and support, and that also helps the flooring resist moisture.

The Core

Under the decorative pattern is the wooden composite core. The core layer of laminate flooring consists of high-density fiberboard, a composite material made from waste products of wood.

The Decorative Surface

On the top of the core layer is a decorative layer which makes laminate resembles a piece of wood board or in some cases stone. Typically decorative layer is a photo printed on paper.

The Wear Layer

The last layer, the wear layer helps to protect the laminate flooring from wear and tear. Without this layering, the decorative surface would get scuffed and worn out quickly.

Types and Styles of Laminate Flooring

Glue-less Laminate Flooring

This type of laminate flooring installation uses tiles or planks that don’t have glue. You have to get the right method of affixing them to Floor. They are easy to install and are indeed more popular in the market.

Glued Laminate Flooring

You will need the glue the joints together. While this installation type makes for a very strong floor once installed. Its cost and time will be higher than with a bond less type.

Pre Glued Laminate Flooring

Rather than applying glue separately, these planks have glue already used. So you can snap the plank into place. You can also not mess with this type of flooring since flue is already applied to the tongue and grooves. It is quick and easy to install.

Underlayment Attached

The glueless plank comes with an included underlayment, so all you need to do is snap them into place. Several types of tongue and grooved locking systems are available. The attached underlayment reduces noise levels.

Maintenance of Laminate Flooring

Laminate Floors require a special type of care to keep them gleaming.

Maintenance Tips

A soft bristle broom can get up most of the dust and dirt that collects on your Floor.

To grab the hard to reach dust in the corners of your room, use a soft brush attached to your vacuum.
Use a damp mop due to which less water has a chance to seep in between your laminate floors.
Use very hot water and few drops of dish soap.

Design of Laminate Flooring

Laminate flooring is not a material that will add long term real estate value to your home. Although it can be a good way too quickly and inexpensively renovate a floor.

Laminate flooring can faithfully reproduce the look of wood, stone and other natural materials at least at a distance. Laminate flooring is by no means identical in appearance to real timber, partially because of pattern repetition.

Pros of Laminate Flooring

Easy to Install

Laminate is popular because it can be installed fairly easily. There is no glue involved as laminate planks do not adhere to floors.

Durability and Resilience

Fortunately, there is a highly durable wear layer above the image layer designed to withstand sun fading, scratches, dents and stains. And if a piece gets damaged, you can often replace the individual plank.

Cheaper

Laminate flooring can run about half the price of wood flooring. They look more realistic than others. You typically find laminate floors starting from $1 to $5.

The Option of Every Style

All laminate flooring has a core layer topped by an image layer into which a digitally enhanced photo of natural material is embedded. It comes in a variety of colours, lengths, widths and many more different and beautiful styles.

Easy to Clean

Laminate surfaces are multilayered. One of these layers is a wear layer. The wear layer provides support and protection for the Floor .it prevents scratches and the sudden appearance of seams. As a result, the Floor maintains its flatness.

Versatile

Laminate flooring can imitate any hardwood, stone or tiles. The choices are virtually endless with laminate. Modern technology makes laminate flooring seems particularly the same as the exact floor type.

Cons of Laminate Flooring

Moisture

Moisture can doom laminate flooring. That is if exposed to moisture for a considerable amount of time. It is suggested to avoid laminate flooring in a laundry room or a bathroom. Any leak inside these rooms will destroy any laminate flooring.

Hard to Repair

Wood can be refinished 6, 7, 8 times and essentially you get a new floor. Laminate, on the other hand, is much harder to repair even when it comes to simple patch jobs.

Proper Installation

It is pretty tough to make it look sharp. Laminate flooring is the most critical and difficult aspects of achieving a professional-grade, quality installation.

Cleaning

The inability to sand and refinish is the major disadvantage f laminate flooring. If laminate flooring is heavily worn, deep scratched or grooved, it cannot be refinished like solid hardwood. It may be replaced.

Not Natural

The Floor is not as natural as a wood floor. If you are interested in a genuine item, you should not choose this product.

Hard

The Floor has a hard surface that is not comfortable for most of the homeowners. Some manufacturers add underlayment structures. However, this structure doesn’t give a lot of help in reducing the hardness from laminating floors.

Conclusion

If you are on the fence as to whether to use laminate flooring, the best way to decide is figuring out the pros and cons of laminating flooring.

Amit Kumar

FreeEducator.com blog is managed by Amit Kumar. He and his team come from the Oxford, Stanford and Harvard. At FreeEducator, we strive to create the best admission platform so that international students can go to the best universities - regardless of financial circumstances. By applying with us, international students get unlimited support and unbiased advice to secure the best college offers overseas.