Many people know that today's laminate flooring can be installed on almost any rough floor, but do they know that the process can be completely different? Of course, laying a laminate on a concrete floor does not in essence differ from that on a wooden base. But the rough basis is prepared in these ways in different ways.
By the way, if the above-mentioned concrete acts as such, then the matter is greatly complicated. The fact is that the concrete before laying must not only be completely dry, but also have a perfectly flat surface and the absence of any serious defects.
Otherwise, you will definitely not succeed with a smooth and eye-friendly surface of the floor covering. In addition, laying a laminate on a poor quality concrete floor will inevitably lead to the fact that the key joints of the plates break, after which the appearance of the laminate is completely ruined.
Thus, before starting work, in any case, you will have to carry out at least cosmetic repairs. It is necessary to completely remove potholes and cracks, if necessary, covering them with mortar. In addition, it does not hurt to check the floor for evenness, correcting the shortcomings with the same concrete and constantly checking the construction level.
After that, you need to be patient and wait until the new concrete at the patch site is completely dry. This will take at least a week, and in no case should you rush things! And only after that the laying of the laminate on the concrete floor begins.
It should be noted that in this case, you can not do without vapor barrier. The fact is that concrete contains a large amount of unbound water, which will eventually evaporate from it, impregnating the floor covering. For a laminate, such a property of this base is simply fatal, since it begins to quickly swell, crack and quickly lose all its decorative properties. Even the use of water-resistant varieties does not help. And therefore, laying a laminate on a concrete floor can not be done without high-quality vapor barrier.
Of course, in the ideal case, films specially made by industry for this purpose are used, but ordinary polyethylene (of normal thickness) is also suitable. It is lapped, fastening the edges with glue or a special “ironing”, welding strips with each other. After that, they put the substrate on the floor. It should be noted that the floor difference when laying the laminate can not exceed 3-4 mm maximum, so when working do not forget to use the level. At the level of the walls, the film is also attached to the glue. Do not forget to leave time for it to dry!
And only then begins the installation of the flooring itself. They start from the walls, placing the material panels perpendicular to the windows (so the seams are less visible). It is necessary to carefully maintain the gap from the last plate to the wall (at least 5 mm), since this flooring is prone to expansion. You can use both adhesive and a simple lock connection.
As you can see, laying laminate floors on concrete has not so many nuances.