Laminate Flooring

There are many types of products to choose from nowadays whenever you have doubts on what types of flooring you need to put in your house. There is tile and carpet, laminate and hardwood,bamboo and vinyl, among others. However, each of these flooring has its own weakness. Carpet is easily stained by dirt, tile will get discolor especially in the grout lines, bamboo is expensive and exotic, vinyl are easily filled with dirt and hardwood is quite good, but it does not last long if you do not know to maintain them.

Laminate is another generation of flooring among them. Furthermore, laminate flooring is the latest trend of flooring and it has been a very popular option for flooring among consumers nowadays. Laminate flooring has been around for more than twenty years and it has been rapidly growing in the flooring industry. Behind their success in leading the flooring industry, laminate flooring also has its own disadvantage. Consumers who are looking forward on purchasing a laminate floor will need to be aware of it. There is no doubt that laminate is the best choice for you if you have pets or small children because of its durability; for example; laminate flooring is hard to scratch.

Laminate flooring can be purchased in various textures, colors and price ranges. About its texture, you can find rich cherry, oak or maple colored finish on the flooring. In addition, laminate flooring is designed to look exactly like the real thing such as stones and wood. As time moves, hundreds of patterns have been made to satisfy with consumers need. Without any problem, you can find laminate that looks exactly like tile or hardwood. Mostly, the wood patterns have three to five inches plank texture for a different appearance. Meanwhile, the tile patterns can be at twelve inches square tile. You might even want to try on a slate look. Even though, the styles of laminate floor looks exactly like hardwood floors, these floors are not even close to woods or engineering wood floor either. People have always been fooled by its look especially the wood grain texture flooring. Actually, these textures are made high quality photographic image imprinted paper.

Other than wood texture, there are many more types of texture that can be imprinted such as terra cotta, marble, terrazzo and ceramic. These texture imprinted papers will be laminated along with high density fibre tile base. The surface then is sealed and locked with a long lasting coating that can protect the tiles surface. Mostly, aluminium oxide highly scratch resistant will be used as coating. The main purpose of these coating are to strengthen the flooring material. What is more, laminate flooring can be purchased at cheap price and it is easy to maintain. To be similar with the original properties, for example wood, the wood textured laminate floors will be designed with thick structures. As you walk on these flooring, it will produce sounds like the real wood floor.

In general, laminate flooring might be considered success in imitating the real material like woods or marbles. However, it does not have the original characteristics such as the beauty, character and warmth. The best method to decide what type of looks you want to go for is by requesting a texture sample from the flooring manufacturer. Most laminate flooring manufacturers offers their free texture samples to their customers if requested. In general, high quality laminate floors mostly are scratch, stain and water resistant. These laminate floors will not dent or fade if compared to hardwood flooring. Also, hardwood floors are not long lasting and it requires more maintenance. Other than that, hardwood flooring is absorbent. The improved and enhanced laminate floors have water repellent cores and each tip of the tiles is sealed with wax so that they can be used in kitchens, bathrooms, and other room that have the possibility to be wet.

Most of high quality laminate floors are designed perfectly and they have lifetime warranty. Laminate flooring can handle heavy traffic places. Yet, consumers has to be careful of some cheap laminate floors as these types of laminate floors mostly cannot be used in kitchens or bathrooms because they are not protected from water absorption. There are few things that you need to keep in mind. You will have to consider on where to install your laminate flooring and how large the space is whenever you plan to buy laminate flooring. For example, it might not be a good thing to install laminate flooring in a bathroom and kitchen due to its high probability of being humid and getting spilled by water. Excessive moisture will results the floor to cup and bubble. As a conclusion, laminate flooring can be an excellent choice if you are searching for affordable and low maintenance choice in flooring.