Laminate Floor Care
How to care for laminate flooring
It's hard to damage and easy to care for laminate floors. Here are some tips on how to properly maintain them:
- Carefully read the warranty and care instructions provided for your flooring. Follow them as much as you can and refer to them if a problem develops.
- Ask for post-installation care instructions. You may not be able to mop the floor for 48 hours or you may be given other care instructions, depending on the flooring brand.
- Don't wet-mop laminate floors, because puddles could seep behind baseboards and under your floor, damaging them. Only vacuum and then damp-mop them.
- Don't ever apply wax or acrylic floor finishes.
- Use only the stain-removal products recommended by the flooring manufacturer. Typical suggestions in product literature are: acetone, for cigarette burns and nail-polish spills, and mineral spirits for grease and tar.
- Buy doormats for doorways that lead to the garage or outdoors. These doormats will trap grit that can gradually cause light scratching on the laminate floor's surface.
- Put easy-glide protective buttons on the feet of the furniture.
- Use dollies when moving a large piece of furniture or a heavy appliance across a laminate floor or else you could leave a scratch by getting tiny pebbles caught under a furniture foot or a wheel.
Take common-sense precautions to protect your floor when working with sharp or heavy objects. For example, put down a thick tarp or a carpet scrap to protect the laminate floor when installing a ceiling fan and using a drill; you can damage the floor by accidentally dropping it.