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Southend Flooring has an excellent range of different laminate and wood floor styles available for residential and commercial projects in Southend-on-Sea and across Essex. It’s one of our most popular products and all our stock is predominantly delivered next day from order. We are constantly analysing the market to identify new areas of consumer demand and manufacturing innovation to provide you with the best options available.
Laminates are extremely durable, great for homes with a high degree of foot traffic (children and pets add significantly to traffic in a home). They are incredibly easy to maintain and will not fade, even in direct sunlight.
Laminate flooring is made from a number of layers that are fused together, under high pressure at high temperature. The layers in laminate flooring include:
Wear Layer - This is the top layer, the one you walk on. It's usually made from cellulose paper that's been saturated with melamine resins that include carborundum to make laminate flooring so incredibly scratch-resistant.
Design Layer - This is the image you see, typically a photograph or patterned print that has been copied onto cellulose paper. Because it is below the upper melamine layer, it cannot be marked, scuffed or even fade. The latest trend in manufacturing to print directly onto the core board.
Core Layer - This is the backbone of all laminate flooring. The core layer is usually some form of processed particleboard and comes in different strengths and thicknesses.
Stabilising Layer - This is the bottom layer that balances the other layers. It's usually made from resin-saturated paper, just like the top layer.
Laminate flooring is still a young industry tied to its European roots. Although major manufacturers are now producing laminate flooring in North America and ASIA, the industry still looks to Europe for design trends and product innovations.
Any laminate flooring you buy in Europe will have an AC Rating based on standards devised by the European Producers of Laminate Flooring (EPLF). These ratings are a ranking system that indicates how a product compares to others like it. The AC Ratings involve numerous quality-control tests that cover such things as a product's resistance to abrasion, stains, burns and indentation.
The AC Ratings are a numerical scale ranked from 1 to 5. AC 1 is the lowest rating, and products with this rating should only be used in light-traffic areas. Most residential laminate flooring will come with an AC 3 ranking, though the very best premium brands will have an AC 5 - strong enough to handle anything!
Laminate flooring was made for modern families. It requires virtually no maintenance and cleaning up spills couldn't be easier. Caring for laminate flooring is much less time consuming and labour intensive compared to other flooring types because of the material you are working with.
Some points to keep in mind to ensure your laminate floor stays in top condition for years to come:
Book our mobile showroom to visit your home today it's FREE and there's no hard sale just a casual visit to view our samples.
People just love the way wood flooring enhances a room. It gives a room a sense of permanence, stability and warmth. Even in a small house with minimal square footage, wood floors give a house a well-crafted, "high-end" appearance. Southend Flooring stock a variety of woods from light to dark oak. It’s definitely worth the time to educate yourself about the woods available before you make the investment.
There are many good reasons why wood flooring could be the right choice for your home. Among the reasons to choose wood are:
Solid wood flooring is the type most consumers recognise, because it’s been available longer. This flooring is comprised of wood strips nailed side by side. It provides excellent insulation, and it adds substantial strength to a home's structure.
Many people feel solid wood flooring is the most aesthetically pleasing, especially considering the wide range of species and colouration available. Westco’s solid floors are installed by floating using glue or the clip methods.
Engineered Wood flooring is composed of 3 to 5 layers of wood glued together in a cross-grain lamination that makes it very resistant to expansion and contraction from temperature changes and moisture. As a result, engineered wood is the only wood flooring that carries a stability warranty. While thinner than solid wood flooring, engineered wood choices are much more stable and dent-resistant and can be installed over concrete.
