Tag Archives: luxury vinyl plank flooring

How to Install Vinyl Plank Flooring as a Beginner | Home Renovation

Welcome back to Fix This Build That. Today we’re installing vinyl plank flooring. I’Ve installed ceramic tile before, but this is my first time doing: laminate or vinyl flooring now I’ll be installing this in this laundry room and giving you all the beginner tips that I learned along the way I started by moving the laundry machines and everything else out Of the room and apparently elves, don’t really steal your socks, They just hide them under the dryer, But while the machines were gone, It was a great time to paint the rest of the wall that I didn’t paint because I didn’t think anybody would ever see it.

Now I know I’m not the only one so comment down below and tell me where your unpainted walls are hiding in your house. Next, I pulled off the quarter round molding to prep for install.. I would have pulled off the baseboards too, but since I have wainscoting installed, It would make a huge undertaking and in the end you won’t really be able to tell the difference anyway In the vinyl planks that I’m using are a little under 4 feet.

Long and just under 8 and 3/4 of an inch wide I’ll have a link below to this exact product, as well as all the tools that I use during the vinyl plank flooring, installation Which I tried to keep as basic as possible.

Now, before the install you need to do a little planning and for a nice-looking room, you don’t want a super-short board at the beginning or end of a row and you don’t want to narrow run at the end of your installation, either on the install instructions.

With your flooring should help you figure this out or You can nerd out like, I did and make a 3d model of the room and lay out the planks Exactly how you want them beforehand. Seriously, though, for an over analyser like me, this is the only way To go, you can map out and stagger the seams and play around with the different layouts, based on the bump outs in the room to see how it’s all going to look, if you don’t have any programs, you can do this with just find a nerdy friend And have them do it for you or you can Always just use graph paper too, And with my layout all done.

I went back to the laundry room to start the install. You always want to start on the left side of the room in a corner due to the positioning of the tongues and the grooves on this flooring. I pried up the transition piece between the current vinyl sheet floor in the carpet.

Then I cut back the carpet to make room for the new transition strip, which is a metal channel. Then there was a small gap between the plywood underlayment of the vinyl sheet and the tack strip the carpet.

So I filled in the gap to give that channel a little place to be attached. I used a sample piece of the flooring as a spacer, and I undercut the door jam with flush cut saw now. This will let the flooring slide, underneath the trim for a clean look and on the baseboards I’ll cover those gaps with quarter-round that I took off earlier.

I Cut the other side of the door too, and I cut into the baseboard a bit that I could slide the floor in cleanly under The whole jamb, so that wasn’t just a mistake. I did had on purpose Now. Next, I measured the transition channel for the door opening it has marks on the back where it’s supposed to snap cleanly, But it just bent when I tried to do it, so I grabbed a hacksaw and not cut to size instead.

I positioned the channel so that my finished transition piece would just hit the middle door stop. Then I secured it to the floor with screws and During my layout. I decided to take two and a half inches off the width of my initial starter row, And this will give me two and a half more inches of width on the other side of the Room to avoid those narrow strips That I mentioned earlier you’ll see that in just a bit Now my walls aren’t exactly straight either and I needed to account for that.

In this cut, I used the vinyl sheet design as a straight reference to lay the planks on, and I measured the gaps across the wall. If you’ve taken up the flooring or don’t have a reference line, You can always snap a chalk line and use that to reference.

The measurements. I Mark the first plank on both ends for this angled cut line. Vinyl plank flooring can be scored and cut with the utility knife, So I went ahead and grabbed my t-square to score the plank between my two marks.

The problem I found is when trying to snap the plank along that line, since I couldn’t really grab it and pull it up to snap it. I put a piece of scrap wood underneath the score line and Just beat on it with my mallet until it snapped.

As you can imagine., This went pretty badly. I quickly realized that scoring and snapping for the long cuts is not a great option. So instead I took it down to my shop and I laid out a new line That was a quarter inch in from that jagged mess that I just made.

Then I used a circular saw to cut the line and it turned out great now really. I was just trying to avoid using power tools as much as possible, But using a jig saw table saw or circular saw, is really the only way to go here.

The final plank is a floating floor and it needs to be held off the walls, a quarter-inch in all the directions. So to do this, I use these wedge spacers from the flooring install kit that I link and I taped them to the wall.

I laid down the first plank under the door jamb, but it was still a bit far from the metal channel. So I marked the piece along the door jamb and I used a jigsaw to quickly trim off that corner and then it fit in there.

Nice and smooth and The next piece gets dropped in and locked into that first piece and using a tapping block across the front on the seam Aligns the boards flush with each other, and this got me to my first partial board.

I measured the gap to the wall and I transferred it over to the board. Then I used a 12 inch carpenter square to score line on the plank with my utility knife.. I flipped it over and I snapped the plank by pulling up on the hand while supporting it behind that scoring line To finish the cut.

. I flipped it over and cut through the backing to release the piece. When I snapped this board, It really turned out a little bit jagged. It was because, when I scored the plank the second time, the blade veered off that original line a little bit So make sure if you’re gonna go over it twice that you stay on, that original line or you’re gonna need to clean up the edge.

Like I’m doing here, Hey If you like what you’re seeing so far and you haven’t done it already Go ahead and hit that subscribe button and ring that bell for some more great content.. I cut this small piece, the same width as the other first row boards, And then I installed it on the end now to pull the board tight, I used this small pull bar that hooks over the end of the board and helps you pull that into place.

Using a mallet now to start the second row, I cut a full plank down to 18 inches long, and This time was a lot more careful scoring that line and the piece snapped nice and clean Connecting the boards from here on out is pretty easy.

You just angle the tongue on the long edge into the groove of the road before it, and then you lower the plank and tap it into place. Using this tapping block from that kit that I mentioned earlier, a Few taps with a non marring mallet across that short seam also is gonna lock it into place Now working in a small room has a lot more stops and starts, because I could only put Down One or two full boards in each row before needing to make another cut At the end of this row, I had a really small cut to make off the end to make my board fit, And you can’t really score it and snap it because it’s just Too short, So go ahead and use a circular saw for this as well After I got the first two rows in.

I use some dumbbells to weight them down and keep that floating floor from moving as much There’s only so many different patterns on these planks. So I made different piles of them in the room to help keep the floor as random, as I could So when I came in to grab a board I’d rotate through them, so that the similar planks weren’t close to each other.

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When I got to the other door jamb, I had to notch the piece like before I Laid out the plank and I transferred marks where the door jamb was and how much I needed to take off. And when you’re doing this, I always try to err on the side of taking off too little versus too much so that you don’t get stuck with any big Gaps.

But after a few back-and-forth, I had it fitting really nicely to install the plank. I slid it up close to the door jamb and then locked it in place with that prior row. Then I used the tapping block on the end of the board and just tapped it in place until it slid all the way into The trim as you’re working through the room.

You can start using some of the offcuts from one in the room to start or finish the other end of the room. Keep that in mind to make the best use of your flooring. So you don’t have a bunch of scraps that you have unused at the end, It’s a little hard to see here, but I’m really staggering.

The seams of these planks. Randomly You want to avoid having a consistent spacing between seems like a brick laid pattern, because it just won’t look natural to the eye, And when I got to the bump-out on the other side of the room, I measured and marked the planks for the knotch.

And this corner was way out of square, So I made sure to measure at the beginning and the end of each side of that notch I made the angled cuts with my jig saw and taking that extra time Gave me a great fit When I got back To the sink vainly, you can see why I made that first road narrower than the full-width, because if I had have started with a full width plank, Then this little sliver in front of the vanity would have been under two inches.

I Also planned the staggers that I didn’t need to notch this narrow piece either, And I would just have a small notch on the next full-size plank Planning. These little details ahead of time is really gonna make your flooring install, go much smoother and look a lot nicer now, if you have a board that doesn’t want to lock into place, make sure to check the tongues and the grooves for debris a Little bit Of flooring got stuck in this groove and it kept it from seating properly Now.

Another little surprise in the install was this overflow drain in the floor. I’M gonna work around this, but if you have a floor outlet or another obstacle to work around, you can use these same steps.

I Measured the distance off the side of the cabinet and off of the back wall and Mark the plank. Then I used a Forstner bit a little bit larger than that pipe in the floor. The final flooring is pretty easy to drill through with normal woodworking bits.

So it goes pretty quickly And next I laid the board in place and I finished the row before putting an extension onto that drain. I just marked it and cut a one and a half inch to one of the quarter, inch PVC down pipe to length, and I installed It just below the surface.

I added a little bit of caulk around the edges and that gave me a nice watertight seal and it looks way nicer than that one Did before it and the water will have a place to go if it ever leaks. Out Now from here, I could reinstall my quarter round molding in my carpet transition, since this is a floating floor, Just make sure to nail into the baseboards and not into the floor when you’re putting on that molding and I cut the final transition piece to size And I see the lit in that metal.

You channel that I installed earlier with my mallet. This floor really brings the laundry room together.. It looks awesome in here. I think installing vinyl plank flooring is a great option for an easy install with a big impact and you’ll have some really durable flooring.

Hey if you want to see how I did that wainscotting in that room or how to tile a bathroom. I’Ve got a playlist for you right there with home renovation projects. I’Ve got another one for you down there as well that you might like until next time, guys.

Get out there and build something awesome.

Source : Youtube

How to Choose Kitchen Remodel Colors

Hey everyone! And welcome back to my channel. In today’s video I’m going to talk to you about the best way to choose the color of your cabinets. Now a lot of people think that the minute they choose their cabinet color well, that’s downhill from there and then that’s going to help them narrow down the countertop color.

Well that’s exactly what’s going to happen if you choose your cabinet color first. Then that immediately curates your countertop colors because now your choices are a lot more slim. But if you don’t know which countertop to install, it’s not going to get easier when you choose the cabinet color because once you finally decide what it is, you don’t want to be stuck to a cabinet color that may or may not work with your countertop so this is how you do it.

I was recently in a client’s home and when I got there, because I was there to help her choose her kitchen finishes, she had her countertop and her backsplash and everything was just laid out flat on her chocolate-brown dining table so there is the first mistake.

Because you can’t see color when it’s all just laid out flat like that. So the first thing you want to do is lay your finishes exactly how they’re going to be when you install them. So here I’ve got just a medium brown hardwood floor this is Calacatta Novo with Caesarstone and this is Misty Carrara right here.

So what you do is you lay them down because now the countertop is going to be horizontal along with the floor, right? Let’s do our potential cabinet colors first. So then you plunk them up and what I usually do is I just turn around whatever sample I happen to have.

You can see that I’ve got an off-white wall here but just so that you’re always creating a clean backdrop with your samples. You can use any poster board for this but if you’re using my large color samples, that’s the easiest way to just instantly create like a clean backdrop.

Okay so then I’ve got a white, true white and an off-white here and this is [Benjamin Moore] Chantilly Lace and this is [Benjamin Moore] White Dove and then the next thing you want to do … this is a really good tip… Most big-box stores sell white, off-white, and cream subway tile. These are really great control tiles to have with you, especially if you’re a designer and you are helping your clients choose tiles.

Because immediately, you can start to see if you’re dealing with a true white tile or an off-white tile or a cream tile because you’ve got the ones that you know are that color, because there’s so many tiles that are just greige, so how do you know that they’re gray? Well you compare them to your control tiles, which is what I have here okay this is my true white backsplash tile here and then I’ve got my off-white backsplash tile here and then you can start to see which one is right.

Now, can I do a true white over here with Calcutta Novo well Calcutta Novo is actually a little bit greige and so if you had decided that okay, I’m just going to go with true white because that’s got to go with their most things, right? And then later you decided that Calcutta Novo was the best countertop choice.

You could not go with Chantilly Lace because Calcutta Novo is actually greige and taupe. Taupe actually looks really good with it. So let’s just walk through what my client was considering when I got to her house.

So when I got to her house she had chosen taupe LVP flooring (luxury vinyl plank flooring). I don’t have any taupe flooring here but I’m just gonna use this [Benjamin Moore] Ranchwood sample because it is identical to the LVP that she was considering.

So let’s put that down here and then so Calcutta Novo, you can see actually has this taupe actually has some nice taupe veins on it so if you plunk that down, it matches great. Now how do I know that this is greige? Well, when I put my cream sample right next to it, it’s too yellow and that’s how you know that cream is not actually the correct way to go at all.

So, basically you’re in the world of off-white or you would choose just a lighter, greige color perhaps for the cabinets so that would tie in with that color. However, she was considering [Benjamin Moore] Collingwood she had a true white backsplash tile and Collingwood was the color that she was considering for her cabinets because she’d seen it in a celebrity designer’s kitchen.

Well when I placed them all together like this, I said, “You know, if you go this route it’s all really greige now. You’ve got like a you know gray feeling taupe-y floor. Now you’re going to Collingwood, which is a bit of a purple gray, for your cabinets.

You know your whole kitchen is going to feel greige.” You know it’s 2020 right now and gray is already dated now that the black and white trend is here so in this celebrity designer’s kitchen she had this countertop but she had this great classic and timeless medium brown floor so Collingwood worked great because it created this balance of warm and cool and that’s what you want to do when you’re choosing colors, is that you don’t want everything to be cool or everything to be warm.

You want to create a balance of warm and cool and so if you’re going to copy someone else’s kitchen make sure you’re actually copying the kitchen almost identically or you’re just not going to end up with the same results and you’re going to be disappointed.

So always choose your countertop first because everything flows from there and if you need some help choosing your countertop or any of your kitchen finishes, I can help through my eDesign department. You’ll be very happy with the results when you follow these useful guidelines on how to choose kitchen remodel colors.

We’ve got kitchen packages and you can even just buy a countertop package or cabinet package if you want to. So I hope that helps. Please post your comments below!

Source : Youtube