Prior to laying your floor, you will need to allow your Luxury Vinyl to acclimatise. This simply means leaving your brand new flooring as they are in the box, in the middle of the room for a period of 24 hours. During this acclimatising process, the room should be kept at a steady normal temperature. While acclimatising, ensure that the flooring is placed in the room that you are going to fit your floor in.

Once your subfloor is fully prepared, you can lay and apply your underlay across the entire room. Start by placing the roll of underlay at one end of the room and unroll from wall to wall. As you go along, make sure the edges of your underlay meet, but don’t overlap, as this will create an uneven floor. (Remember that the majority of Vinyl floors do not require underlay and can be laid as a floating floor on top of your subfloor).

To get a perfectly balanced floor, we recommend you start laying your floor from the centre of your room. To find the exact centre, you must measure the length and the width of the area, then from the middle point of the length and width, simply draw a line towards the middle of the room. Where the lines meet is the centre of the room.

Always try to label and mark your floor prior to cutting, as this will keep your work consistent and tidy. You should also try to use a pencil or a chalk when marking your floor, as it’s least noticeable and easy to remove. This is the most efficient method that usually prevents errors from occurring.

Chop saws are usually very stable when it comes to cutting your floor, however the blade in place has to be
exceptionally sharp. Circular saws on the other hand are commonly used for cutting long straight lines. Jigsaw’s
usually come into play when you’re required to cut around objects such as pipes, toilets, and stairs. Whilst fitting, try to avoid accumulation of dust in the house by using these tools outside.

Remember that the top layer of your flooring can chip very easily whilst cutting. To prevent any damage or chipping of the boards, you must use a saw that has very fine teeth/blades, and cut only downward into the board. If you’re using a hand saw, you can cut the board whilst it’s facing upwards, only place pressure on the saw when applying the downward strokes. Make sure you don’t allow the saw to come in contact with the uncut sections whilst pulling the saw back up, as this could cause the surface of the board to chip. If you’re fitting around pipes, you should mark the position of the pipe on the board you are planning on laying. Then simply drill a hole about 10mm larger in diameter than the actual pipe and make two angle-saw cuts from the edge of the board (cutting a wedge out of the board). Finally, fit the board passing by the pipe and carefully glue the small off-cut wedge at the back of the pipe.

The challenge with any floor is to ensure that it continues maintaining its appearance and purpose for as long as possible. The average lifespan for Luxury Vinyl flooring is between 10 – 20 years. The difference in life expectancy usually depends on the quality of the floor, whether it was fitted correctly, and the amount of traffic it experiences. However, inappropriate maintenance, such as the use of potent cleaners, can heavily reduce the floor’s durability and lifetime.