We recently installed our very first real floor in the container house. We used FinFloor Black Forest laminate, and I must say, we are impressed with this product, but not surprised. Small Scale Engineering has installed FinFloor products for clients previously and know exactly what sort of quality we can expect; extremely high quality.
Have you spent weeks at home due to the Coronavirus pandemic? Have small things around your house been annoying you? Have you been considering redoing your flooring? If you are a fan of laminate flooring, and want a top quality product, FinFloor is worth your consideration.
About FinFloor Black Forest Laminate
For the south container, we opted to use the Black Forest Laminate which is a durable laminate flooring that is fit for commercial installations and high-traffic area. We thought that this would be a good product because shipping containers are quite narrow at about 2.4m. Therefore, the same section of floor in each private section would have to endure much walking over the same area over and over again.
Another thing we like about this product is the size. Each board measures 2200 x 239 x 12mm, which is bigger and thicker than most other laminate boards out there. It looks beautiful once installed. The boards are also water resistant which means that they can better withstand the spills of daily life and will be less prone to swelling.
It is guaranteed against termites, and is available in several varieties and colours.
All of the above, along with European manufacturing processes, ensures a quality product you just cannot ignore.
Installation on the South Container
For our installation, we started with a rubberized underlay. There are various underlays available for laminate flooring. This particular one that we used comes in different thicknesses measuring between 1mm and 6mm thick. It’s important to use an underlay suitable to your application, as it helps with sound dampening and stops moisture from rising through from underneath your house. Once the underlay was down, we could immediately get to work on the Black Forest boards themselves.
Kevin loves installing FinFloor products because the boards fit together nice and snug. The hardest part on the installation is probably measuring around cupboards and doors to get the neatest installation. It is too easy to measure incorrectly. Measure twice, cut once!
Once all the boards were in, Louis added some skirtings to complete the floor.
What do you think?
Where to Buy
If you are keen to install this product in your own space, you can contact FinFloor regarding purchase. They will also be happy to give you a list of their preferred installers in your area.
PS: Here’s our previous FinFloor article if you want to find out about their waterproof flooring option.
Honestly, not a fan of laminate flooring.
I went with parquet – lots of that available secondhand, usually in the R80/m2 or under on tree of gum, plus install. Avoid the finger parquet, as that is too time consuming to install, and a lot of installers won’t touch (at least the ones I called). 60m2
I have a lovely herringbone pattern in my apt that looks quite nice. Still have another few hundred m2 I’ve bought over the last year or two waiting for my newer build to get to the right point! Grr, lockdown, grr!!
I had 60m2 in the small house, costs were around 20k for the entire area, so around R333 installed.
Parquet = 60m2 x 80 = 4800.
Install = 14k (Sanding/sealing 3 coats, relaying and fitting)
Some photos of mine – https://www.flickr.com/photos/sheedl/albums/72157657886445540
Quite happy with it.
I grew up with parquet floors and know they are pretty awesome floors. I just remember we had to polish them every week! I know things are better now with current varnishes etc. I did, out of interest, ask Kevin if they would have worked in our situation and he said it would not have worked very well, and then we were interrupted so I didn’t find out why. I’m happy you found something that you’re happy with for your floors. 🙂
Looks very nice once finished off and the progress is great. You will have so much to show after the Isolation period is done!
And our lives just that little bit more comfortable!
Ooh, looking very smart!
Thank you! 😁