Floor and Floor Treatments

Floor And Floor Treatments 3 (1+2)

Lesson :06 Man-made resilient or soft flooring

Vinyl Flooring

Vinyl has become a valued design tool for many interior designers and architects. It is used particularly for designing of heavy –traffic locations such as grocery store, hospital rooms, operation rooms where cleanliness is top priority. Now a days, they are preferred even in residence buildings. Vinyl flooring is made out of vinyl plastics (polyvinyl chloride or PVC) and in adding vinyl resin, fillers, plasticizers, stabilizers and pigments. Vinyl products differ in manufacturing process and content. Some floors contain as much as 55% of vinyl and others may contain as little as 11% vinyl. Yet there are called as vinyl flooring.

Vinyl is versatile product. It is produced in varying degrees of flexibility and in huge number of patterns, thickness and textures. It provides stripped surfaces vinyl can be used over under floor heating. It is used over the floors of residential and public building to improve the durability appearance and to hide the defects. It should be used over damp proof surface and not recommended for basements. Once it is fixed with glue it cannot be lifted. In general there are two types of vinyl flooring i.e sheet and tile.

Vinyl sheet: Are of 2 categories. Viz, inlaid and rotovinyl

Inlaid: Inlaid vinyl’s are solid and wear surface is built up layer by layer of tiny vinyl granular fused under heat and pressure. Some will have extra layer of foam to provide added comfort under foot. In inlaid vinyl is available in different colors and pattern. Inlaid vinyl is last until the flooring wears out completely.

Rotovinyl: are made by process that combines photography and printing. Photography makes possible for realistic images like stone, brick and wood. Once image is printed a wear resistance finish is given to improve the quality.

Characteristics:

• It provides comfort while walking.
• Moderately warm with cushioning effect.
• Stain resistance
• Offers adequate insulation against noise and heat.
• Slip resistant
• It rotten when kept wet for sufficient time.
• Does not offer resistance against fire.
• It is easy to cut and light in weight.
• It supports static load and durable under heavy foot traffic and use.

Laying technique:

• It has to be laid by company professionals.
• It can be laid over old smooth surface floor.
• It is laid on wooden (plywood) or concrete base floor.
• It is fixed with suitable adhesive in order to have proper bond and high durability or can also laid loose.
• Self sticking tiles can be installed easily on smooth and leveled surface.

Maintenance:

• Daily sweeping and mopping with clean wet mopper.
• Do not use emission polish but commercial floor may require periodic application of high quality floor polish.