Plastic Skirting Installation Guide
One of the final touches in the repair of the premises is the installation of skirting boards. This decorative element allows you to give a neat appearance to the floor covering around the perimeter of the entire room. Also, the skirting board for the floor allows you to close some irregularities in the edges of the material used to finish the floor. Once upon a time, only wooden products were used for these purposes, which did not provide a snug fit of the plinth to the wall. After all, not all apartments could and can still boast of perfectly even walls. Slots have to be covered and tinted in the color of the baseboard, while you should try not to smear the wall decoration with floor paint. The era of plastic skirting boards has removed most of the problems described above. Therefore, these easy-to-install products have practically displaced their wooden counterparts from the market of finishing materials.
Content
- Skirting board calculation
- Selection of skirting boards and accessories
- Installation Methods and Process
- Glue the plastic baseboard
- Self-tapping
- Plinth mounting: special hardware
A plastic baseboard for a floor with a cable channel provides the ability to place a television, telephone and electric wire in it
Skirting board calculation
Installing skirting boards with your own hands is not at all complicated, you just need to accurately calculate the number of skirting boards in meters. In this case, take into account the number of corners (external and internal) and connecting elements. To do this, use a tape measure to measure the room around the perimeter. Eliminate the size of the doorways from the resulting value. Divide the resulting number by the length of the selected plastic baseboard. The division result, rounded in excess, shows the number of profiles to buy..
Important! Rounding off the excess, recall, means leaning toward choosing a larger integer. Let’s look at a specific example. The perimeter of your room, taking into account all the protrusions and niches, is 23 meters. The length of the baseboard is 2.5 meters. If 23 divided by 2.5, it turns out 9.2. So, you need to buy a plinth in the amount of 10 pieces..
These calculations can be done by sales consultants, who should always be contacted in case of doubt. In addition, other supplies must be purchased..
Selection of skirting boards and accessories
When choosing a plastic baseboard, you need to pay attention to:
- a color that can be matched to the tone of the floor or contrast with it;
- the presence of the cable channel in the baseboard, which allows you to hide the wiring and other connecting wires;
- baseboard shape.
Skirting board with cable channel
On sale there are special types of skirting profiles that have removable parts in their design that provide access to wiring for repair. Manufacturers also produce plastic skirting boards with flexible edges that easily cover uneven floors and walls..
Draw a plan of the room and calculate the exact number of corners, plugs, couplings. All these elements are called in one word – hardware. Please note that the shape of the corners is different for the outer and inner corners. The stubs used to close the ends of the baseboard are left and right. Couplings are difficult to calculate in advance, so they are taken with a small margin. The cost of these elements is low, so you will not feel a big loss in finances. But save time due to lack of downtime due to the lack of some important trifle.
The presence of fittings speeds up and facilitates the installation process.
Installation Methods and Process
Installation of the floor skirting can be carried out in several ways, which differ from each other by the mounting options. Thus, the skirting board can be fixed with:
- glue;
- self-tapping screws;
- special fasteners.
Glue the plastic baseboard
The advantage of installing plastic skirting boards with glue or liquid nails is the absence of drilling. This means the absence of dust and dirty work to remove it at the end of installation. In this case, do not rush to glue the skirting boards. First, measure everything and install floor skirting boards without glue. After fitting and trying on, stick the elements to the selected places.
The disadvantages of this method is the one-time use of a plastic baseboard. Re-apply them no longer have to, as dismantling worsen the appearance of the product. You also need to be able to work with glue, skillfully dosing its amount. In this case, you must try not to glue the floor covering and the wall decoration material with glue.
Self-tapping
This type of fastening is slightly inferior in decorativeness, but at times exceeds in reliability. The following algorithm is performed:
- in the baseboard profile, it is necessary to drill two-millimeter holes in increments of 40-50 cm;
- in the hole, use a large drill to make a recess in the form of a cone, which allows you to imperceptibly “drown” the heads of the screws;
- start installing the baseboard from the corner;
- press the baseboard firmly against the wall and put marks through the holes with a pencil;
- in the marked places, drill holes and insert the dowels;
- Next, attach a piece of skirting to the wall and twist the screws.
Important! When tightening screws, make sure that the plastic skirting board does not squeeze or crease.
Repeat the described algorithm for fastening the following sections of skirting boards. After the cap, the screws are masked with plastic plugs that are matched to the color of the baseboard. In order for the plugs to hold tight in place, experts advise sticking them.
Fixing the skirting board with self-tapping screws is a reliable way to use the skirting board again after dismantling
Plinth mounting: special hardware
This method has several advantages, but does not exclude the presence of minuses. The pluses include easy dismantling if necessary. The same simple re-installation, in which there are no traces of fasteners on the outer surface of the baseboard. The disadvantages include increased requirements for the evenness of the walls and floor, which narrows the scope of their use, especially in the secondary housing market. Also, re-installation does not always go smoothly, as the fastener system is loosened, which can no longer provide the initial tightness.
The installation of the skirting board with this installation option is as follows:
- mark the places for fastenings in the wall;
- drill holes in places with a marking, the depth of which should not exceed 2-3 cm;
- insert plastic dowels into which screw the screws holding the fastening elements;
- maintain the distance between adjacent fixtures in the range of 30-50 centimeters;
- baseboard installation always start from the corner.
Important! The first mounting point from the corner should be at a distance not exceeding 10 cm.
Now, after reading the article, you yourself easily choose how to fix the plastic baseboard in your room. A screwdriver is useful in work, which several times increases the speed of installation work.
