In order not to spend extra money during the repair, the necessary amount of material should be calculated. How to calculate the amount of laminate flooring, you will learn by reading this article.
The choice of flooring is an important point in the repair process in the apartment. For bathrooms and in the kitchen, ceramic tiles are usually laid, but for other rooms there are much more coating options. It can be linoleum, tile, carpet, parquet board or laminate.
Laminate advantages over other floor coverings
Linoleum is an inexpensive material, but it is subject to rapid abrasion of the picture. Laying ceramic tiles in a large room is a long and painstaking process, in addition, this material is not cheap. The carpet will give the room home comfort and warmth, it is pleasant to walk on it. It is easy to install, but it quickly becomes dirty during operation, and cleaning such a coating is not easy. Parquet is also considered an expensive material, and after laying it needs to be treated with a special varnish coating.
The best option for flooring in the room is a laminate, because it has a number of important advantages:
- durability;
- low cost;
- ease of installation;
- easy and quick repair in case of damage to part of the coating.
How to save?
During the repair, most owners of the premises try to save their money. One way to save money is to buy the right amount of materials. Let's figure out how to calculate the amount of laminate needed for laying indoors. There are two ways to perform such a calculation: on your own or using the online calculator.
Buying material to give your home a home is extremely costly. Here you can not save on the quality of acquired building materials. One of the options for significant money savings is to calculate the amount of laminate flooring. You need to accurately calculate how many packages of this decorative coating will be needed to decorate your room. We will find out how to correctly and accurately calculate this building material using both of the above methods.
Preparing a room for laying flooring
Before installing the laminate, free the room from interior items and heavy furniture. After that, you should clean the floor of debris, level the surface level. Remember that the amount of laminate needed should be calculated before going to the store, otherwise the building material may not be enough or, conversely, it will be too much.
Why do you need to make calculations?
Many people who first encountered construction, think that information on how to correctly calculate the amount of laminate, they do not need. All materials for this are quite accessible, they can be bought at the nearest hardware store. This approach is erroneous. If you do not buy the material, the floors will not be completely covered, you will have to spend precious time on the purchase of additional boxes. In the store, the material may end, you will have to wait for the next delivery.
In the opposite situation, when the calculation of the required amount of laminate on the calculator turned out to be incorrect, extra money will be spent. It is not always possible to return the purchased goods back to the store and get back the money spent. However, it will be nice if a few lamellas remain, because in case of spot repairs they will be necessary. The damaged area after replacement will again look as if you laid it recently. A solid supply of laminate may not be needed at all.
Mounting the coating yourself
First you need to determine the type, color, class and size of the laminate. Only after this knowledge can we begin to directly calculate the amount of finishing material. Such data is necessary, since each manufacturer of laminate flooring independently chooses the dimensions of the board. Even the same company can produce different sizes of coatings in different collections. The number of boards in the package may also vary. Neglecting such data can lead to serious calculation errors.
If your room has non-standard shapes, then first of all you need to measure all the walls and draw a diagram. Only after calculating the area and all non-standard angles can a calculation be made. Do not forget that it is necessary to purchase material for laying the floor with a margin, since during installation it is easy to damage. During transportation, the boards may also become unusable.
Factors Affecting Coverage
In order to understand how to calculate the amount of laminate correctly, it is necessary to take into account some factors that greatly affect the consumption of the material during installation. Here are the main ones:
- The area of the room where the laying of the building material is planned.
- The shape of the room. In the event that the room where the repair is taking place is rectangular, the laminate will be consumed in a minimal amount. If the room is designed with a complex shape of the floor, then the worker will have to sweat, cutting out the desired figure from the laminate board. In this case, there will be many unnecessary scraps of wood coating.
- The size of the material is also of great importance when deciding how to calculate the amount of laminate flooring. For maximum savings, choose small panels. Remember that the longer the material, the more waste. Try to choose the length of the laminate, which during assembly will be equal to the length of the room.
- Savings also depend on the installation method chosen. Orientation in this matter will tell you how to calculate the amount of laminate per room. The simplest and most economical option is to lay this building material in a straight line along the wall. The amount of residue in this case is not more than 10%. Some people like laying the laminate diagonally obliquely. Using this method, approximately 15% of the lamella residues will remain. In this case, the calculations do not take into account the material consumption in case of unsuccessful cutting and accidental damage.
Consider how to correctly calculate the amount of laminate before buying for decoration, given the above factors that affect consumption.
The use of the calculator in the calculations
The easiest way to use a special calculator. You can find it using the search engine. Working with a virtual computer is very simple, just enter your values into the free windows.
Before downloading such a calculator, you need to know the following parameters:
- the total area of the building where it is planned to lay the building material;
- laminate board size;
- the number of lamellas in each pack;
- laying method (along the wall or at an angle).
After entering this data, the calculator will calculate the amount of laminate that must be purchased.
Self settlement
In order to learn how to calculate the amount of laminate flooring per room with a calculator, you should calculate the same parameters that are listed in the article above. For clarity, we give an example of manual calculation:
- given a room measuring 4.5 x 3.3 meters;
- the size of one board is 1295 x 195 mm;
- the amount of laminate in a pack - 10 pieces;
- The laying method was chosen at an angle of 45 degrees.
So, how to calculate the amount of laminate flooring. The calculator will help us with this:
- First you need to calculate the area of the room. Multiply the length of the walls: 4.5 x 3.3 = 14.85 m 2.
- Given the consumption of 15%, we obtain 17.08 m 2 . It is this area that the laminate should cover.
Usually, the manufacturer indicates the coverage area on the bundle, but just in case, we will calculate: 10 pieces in the bundle we multiply by the area of one board (1.295 x 0.195) and get 2.52 m
2. Now you need to calculate the number of laminate bundles to be purchased: 14, 85 / 2.52 = 5.8. Now it becomes clear that you need to buy 6 packs of laminate.
To summarize
When planning repairs in an apartment or your own house yourself, without resorting to the help of specialists, you will have to set aside a lot of money for the purchase of various building materials. To keep costs to a minimum, be mindful of your calculations. If after laying there are excess pieces or whole boards of the laminate, do not discard them. Perhaps they will come in handy during the operation of the room. Laminate is afraid of strong mechanical stress, but it can be quickly repaired if there are any remaining pieces of this coating in stock.
Now you know the answer to the question of how to calculate the amount of laminate per room using a calculator and independently, using your knowledge in mathematics.