How To Lay Linoleum Floors
In the past, linoleum has been regarded by many as a temporary floor-covering. Not much care has been used in laying it. But you want well-finished floors in your home that will need a minimum amount of attention as the years go by. For this reason, we strongly recommend that you have your linoleum floors installed by the merchant from whom you buy the goods. Experience has taught their layers how to cut the linoleum so as to avoid waste and how to lay it to prevent buckling and cracking, conditions which result from faulty workmanship.
Skilled Workmanship Required
Insist that your linoleum be laid right. If the merchant does not employ skilled mechanics to do this work, go to a merchant who has a staff of layers and who will guarantee his laying. He will make a charge for the cost of labor and materials; but, in the long run, it will prove greater economy for you to pay well to have your linoleum laid properly than to have the laying done in a makeshift manner in order to save a few cents per yard.
LAY LINOLEUM AS A PERMANENT FLOOR
When you purchase a good grade of linoleum to be installed as a floor in your living-room, dining-room, or even in the kitchen or bathroom, naturally you desire to have it put down as a permanent floor. The most satisfactory way to install linoleum is to cement it down solidly over a lining of builders’ deadening felt paper. This will give you a permanent floor, smooth, firm, without cracks or crevices. Owing to the variations in moisture conditions, any wood underflooring will expand in summer and dry out in winter, leaving cracks. Linoleum cannot be cemented directly to such a wood underflooring without possibility of damage. One of the chief advantages of the felt lining is that it tends to take up this expansion and contraction, thus saving the linoleum floor from breaking or cracking. In addition, the felt acts as a cushion, deadening sound and adding to the warmth and comfort of the floor, making it delightful to walk or stand on.
Should it become necessary, in time, to remove such a linoleum floor, this can be done easily, without damage to the linoleum.
Laying Linoleum Over Felt Paper
Leading contract linoleum layers and good stores have adopted the felt paper method of laying linoleum and recommend its use to their customers. A brief description is given here of this method in order that you may understand how the work should be done. If your merchant is not yet equipped to lay linoleum by this method, ask him to write for a copy of our linoleum layers’ handbook, “Detailed Directions for Laying and Caring for Linoleum,” which lists all of the materials and equipment needed, and includes illustrations showing the several steps in laying linoleum by this improved method. A copy of this handbook will also be sent to you, without charge, upon request.
In cementing linoleum down over felt paper, the felt is first cut into lengths to go across the short way of the room. The quarter-round floor molding is removed, and the felt fitted snugly at each end. A linoleum paste is then applied to the undersurface of the felt, which is then rolled or pressed down until it adheres firmly to the floor.