Personally I don’t like carpets at all. I always wear slippers and I think carpets are the home for all the dusts and bacterias. The property I’m buying has carpets laid in the living room and bedroom. Actually it looks quite new – I guess it was laid 3-5 years ago, but I still want to replace it with hard flooring.
In the UK there are several choices for flooring suppliers. To name a few: IKEA, B&Q (diy.com), and carpetright. It took me quite a while to decide which type of flooring I’m going to laid: vinyl, laminate or wood flooring. Having calculated the budgets for three times I put up my mind to go with the wood flooring.
Ashridge Tawny Brushed Oak Solid Wood Flooring (carpetright.co.uk)
Obviously I have chosen the most expensive material, so I have to take full control on how I laid them out and what to use during this process.
First, I need to figure out the exact size of my rooms and leave an extra 5% to 8% when when calculating the number of packs I need. I found the tape measure from STANLEY quite useful. Remember – don’t try to save money on this one. Buy the 8m version, unless all of your rooms are less than 3m in length or width (or even height)!
(AD) STANLEY 8m/26ft Tape Measure on Amazon.co.uk
Next, when the floorings arrive, it is almost inevitable to cut them into pieces, as you would either follow the transposition (offset) fashion or laid them in the herringbone pattern. Thisangle ruler from WORKPRO is versatile and very easy to use – whenever you are measuring the angle or testing if the level is horizontal.
(AD) WORKPRO Combination Square Angle Ruler on Amazon.co.uk
To cut the wood flooring into pieces – never try to use a hand saw unless you have only one room. It will be a nightmare if you haven’t got proper tools. When it comes to circular saw there are an array of options, and I decided to try this one. It would have cost me at least 5 minutes with a hand saw (and to get a ‘jigsaw’-style edge), but with this HYCHIKA circular saw I only used 5 seconds to get a smooth and (almost) industrial level edge!
(AD) HYCHIKA Mini Circular Saw on Amazon.co.uk
Then, to put the flooring pieces into the right place I need to strike them and make the tongues and groves join. Obviously it is not advisable to use your fist so I tried different hammers in store and bought this one from amazon. It has the proper weight – not too heavy nor too light – and protect my wood pieces because it is made of rubber.
(AD) OX Black Rubber Mallet on Amazon.co.uk
Finally, although it is not required for recently-laid floors, it is advisable to polish your wood floor once several years. That is the charm of solid wood flooring – upon polish it will look brand-new no matter how many years it has already been used, while this option is unavailable for other floorings including laminate flooring with wood effect. I decided to buy this car polisher as I believe it is sufficient for me to use.
(AD) OX Black Rubber Mallet on Amazon.co.uk
Yay! This is the end of my notes on the useful tools when laying solid wood floor. Please let a comment and let me know what do you think!
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