FFI 84 November 2016

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INTERNATIONAL trade journal f or impor t , expor t , dis tr ibution and lay ing of par que t , laminate, cor k f loor ing and r elated pr oduc t s

N° 84, November 2016 - Price: ₏8 - Published 7 times a year - (Feb, March, May, July, Sept , Nov, Dec) Of fice of deliver y 9099 Ghent X , P911092, BC 31359 - Responsible Publisher: Filip De Ridder

Special: Top Italian companies focused on export Special: UV lacquers and oils

Special: Producers of Hungarian point and fish bone parquet

Special: Maintenance and cleaning products for floors in vinyl, PVC and LVT

Special: Suppliers of tools for fitting terraces correctly

Special: Producers of profiles

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1/1 PAGINA

Releasing Oil Potential Bona Craft Oil 2K – Performance, versatility, design Get the charming look and feel of an oiled floor, plus the protection of a finish. Bona Craft Oil 2K’s unique formula exhibits accelerated drying time and strengthened wear resistance.

Works perfectly with a wide variety of wood species including otherwise problematic ones such as jabot, cherry, walnut and more. It delivers a beautiful and strong water- and stain-resistant surface and is ready for light use in just 8 hours. For enhanced protection, overcoat with Bona Traffic, Bona Traffic HD, or Bona Traffic Natural.

bona.com/craftoil2k

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INTERNATIONAL trade journal f or impor t , expor t , dis tr ibu tion and lay ing of par que t , laminate, cor k f loor ing and r elated pr oduc t s

Editorial

N° 84, November 2016 - Price: €8 - Published 7 times a year - (Feb, March, May, July, Sept , Nov, Dec) Of fice of deliver y 9099 Ghent X , P911092, BC 31359 - Responsible Publisher: Filip De Ridder

Special: Top Italian companies focused on export Special: UV lacquers and oils

Special: Producers of Hungarian point and fish bone parquet

“Adhesives without solvents nor isocyanates for all vinyl floors thanks to MS Polymer® technology” The Japanese company Kaneka has developed the renowned MS Polymer® and has been a leader since several decades in the development of new innovative solutions for adhesives, including in the parquet sector. This time we discussed the use of MS Polymer® technology for bonding PVC and vinyl floors.

For this sector, too, MS Polymer® offers useful benefits, as Viki Wouters from Kaneka explains.

Special: Maintenance and cleaning products for floors in vinyl, PVC and LVT

Special: Suppliers of tools for fitting terraces correctly

Special: Producers of profiles

Floor Forum International n° 84 November 2016 Photo Kaneka

4 Inside news 8 Special Lacquers and oils with real anti-bacterial properties 10 Special Suppliers of tools for fitting terraces correctly 13 Special Laminate floors : part 2 15 Special Skirting boards with laminate inlay 19 Project Bona (BE) 20 Special Producers of multi-layer floors 27 Special Subfloors 28 Special Producers of Hungarian point and fish bone

parquet: solid and multi-layer 34 Project Blanchon (FR) 36 Special Maintenance and cleaning products for floors in

vinyl, PVC and LVT

‘At Kaneka we have proved that MS Polymer® can also stand their ground in the vinyl floor market. The potential in this market is steadily growing, as reported by several sources in Viki Wouters Europe and beyond. Estimated growth figures (marketing assistant at Kaneka Belgium NV) of about 10% are circulating for the vinyl floor market in the next years, making the development of an adhesive solution for these floor systems a sensible investment. The growing vinyl floor market, and especially LVT (luxury vinyl tiles) or VCT (vinyl composite tiles), is partly due to the vast choice of trendy designs, the ease of maintenance, and its affordability.’

What are the features which vinyl floor adhesives must have for perfect application?

‘The growing interest in the market means there are lots of producers offering these floors to the market. As is the case with other synthetic products, the composition of these floors can vary considerably due to the use of various additives. Therefore the adhesive should have the ability to adhere strongly to various different floor systems in the market.’

How can MS Polymer® technology fit in?

‘With Kaneka MS Polymer® we enable the production of adhesives for vinyl floors with a very broad adhesion profile. This gives the formulator and later on the applicator a robust market solution for the vinyl market. Additional, the absence of solvents and isocyanates and the extremely low emission of volatile organic compounds in the Kaneka MS Polymer® based adhesives are a big advantage for indoor use.’

38 Special Sanding machines : part 2 42 Special UV lacquers and oils 48 Special Producers of elastic adhesives 52 Special Producers of profiles

What are other benefits of working together with Kaneka for adhesive producers?

‘As our market reputation dictates, Kaneka strives to deliver robust market solutions for innovative products. Our extensive experience and broad product portfolio enables us to guide adhesive producers with the development of their glues and therefore limit their development time to a minimum.’

56 Special Producers of veneer wooden flooring : what's new ?

57 Special Top Italian companies focused on export 65 Industry news 66 Product news

Editing & advertisements FFI bvba PO BOX 29 9870 Olsene, Belgium Tel: +32 (0)9 385 80 40 Fax: +32 (0)9 385 88 85 sales@media-pact.com www.floor-forum.com Publisher Filip De Ridder

Subscriptions to Floor Forum International: Mail to info@media-pact.com

Lay-out: Be-able Communication www.be-able.be Production: Lowyck - Oostende

Advertising & subscriptions Adriana Dascalu info@media-pact.com Hilde De Ridder floorforum@telenet.be Filip De Ridder sales@media-pact.com Editors: Jean Paul Talbot, Ludwig Janssens, Filip De Ridder Jacques Legros

Translation: Michael Robinson www.glossa.be Floor Forum International is a publication of FFi bvba.

The copyright of Floor Forum International and the articles appearing herein are retained by the publisher. By agreeing to publication of an article in this journal, the author assigns to the publisher the irrevocable and exclusive right under Copyright law to collect charges due from third parties for copying said article and to undertake legal or other action for this purpose.

Editorial and advertising copy in this issue have been carefully checked and Floor Forum International bvba cannot accept any responsibility for any errors.

∂ Inside news Bona Bona presents three subfloors here, namely the Bona U300, Bona U310, and Bona U340. The Bona U300 is a subfloor of bound cork and rubber granules and it is used for parquet, laminate, and other floor coverings. The material gives the effect of sound insulation. When this is glued with parquet, the tensions in the parquet are reduced and diverted to the subfloor. U310 is a polyester coating which reduces tension and is used glued parquet and laminate. This coating solves problems in the case of doubtful subfloors. It allows vapour to pass through and has an unlocking effect. The additional structural height is only 1.5 to 2mm, including the adhesive thickness. Finally, the Bona U340 is a polyester subfloor made of fibre-plate, which has a tension-reducing effect for the final floor covering such as ceramics, natural stone, wooden floors, etc. The great compressive strength accommodates heavy loads (5.0kN/m²). It is suitable for both household and commercial use. It provides considerably more acoustic insulation.

CSP Engineering With the development of the new filling technology of CSP Engineering the request grew from all corners of the EU. In the meantime CSP installed the PAR-Filler® in Benelux, France, Italy, Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary and Portugal. Recently CSP invested in an additional business space where the R&D department is able to extend even more. Potential clients are welcomed for “live”-demos to test the PAR-Filler®. This helps CSP to stress that a ‘personal and client-customize approach stays essential’ according to GM Jan Peeters.

Do not miss the unique opportunity to visit CSP on DOMOTEX – HALL 8 BOOTH D26

IMPERTEK AT CERSAIE 2016 Once again this year, Cersaie proved to be the global benchmark for the ceramics industry, providing international visibility for the exhibitors who attended the event held in September. Year after year, Cersaie continues to attract top-quality visitors, including a contingent of more than 50,000 foreign visitors, with a total of more than 106,000 industry professionals.

The Impertek stand also experienced some really busy moments, as customers showed an interest in all the innovations showcased this year. This experience proves that they are heading in the right direction in order to keep up with a dynamic market that is aware of the changes introduced by leading companies in the industry, including theirs.

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At the Impertek stand, the spotlight was on the company’s range of great innovations, which meet the needs of the entire supply chain, from a leading and popular designer over the specialist retailer of finishes to a traditional fitter.

All the operators in the sector seemed to pay close attention and were particularly interested in the new Balance self-levelling head, which can level all the supports of the Jack range fully automatically up to a 5% gradient.

They were particularly pleased also with the appreciation shown by all their stand visitors for Mega Pro, their new web application, which can be accessed from the Impertek web site in an area solely for registered users. With Mega Pro, the number of supports required for each project can be calculated easily and intuitively through their software, such as the required heights, and the full specifications can be saved.

This year's edition of Cersaie was certainly an extraordinary one, which can be summed up well with their new motto: change is possible.

Opening of new Osmo halls Osmo has expanded its premises in Warendorf. In September Christian Cordes, Managing Director of Osmo Holz und Color GmbH & Co. KG, officially opened its new production and storage facilities. With over 12,000 square metres in area, the three new halls offer ample space for the storage of wooden products as well as for a new surface treatment unit. The opening of the new halls was celebrated as a large summer festival together with all employees.

THE RUBIO MONOCOAT FAMILY KEEPS ON GROWING! It is going hard for Rubio Monocoat! As we are growing at an incredible speed and we want to invest in a high service level, our company structure is going through some changes.

Together with his sales team, Bart Defrancq has put our home market Belgium on the map. As Commercial Director he will use his in-depth product

∂ Inside news knowledge and hands-on approach to further stimulate the presence of Rubio Monocoat in the world.

Eldert-Jan Van Herk has successfully expanded the sales of Rubio Monocoat in Europe. From now on, he will also be responsible for Product Management, which includes launches of new products as well as the optimization of existing product ranges.

Geert Tijtgat is our new Export Manager Asia-Australasia. He has years of experience in the world of wood treatment and is he is eager to boost our Rubio Monocoat brand in this region.

As you know, we have been investing a lot in optimization, with a new plant, entirely dedicated to Rubio Monocoat. Next to the larger stock, and lots of automated processes, we also invested in extra people in the IT and Finance department, as well as Internal Sales.

MADE EXPO brings together design, construction systems, building performance, and living comfort, all on one big site

To support growth on the construction market, MADE expo 2017 is focusing on materials, products and systems that help produce safe,

high-performance and comfortable buildings. The Fair organizers are in talks with companies capable of presenting leading-edge materials and top-performing systems on the market. With a little less than five months to go until the Show opens its doors, 520 exhibitors have already booked up 60% of the exhibition area.

ANCE’s outlook for construction investment growth over the current year is for a 0.3% increase in real terms (1.3% on current terms).

Data on extraordinary maintenance are also positive, with promising 1.9% growth expected by the end of the year (up 21.3% since 2008); by year-end, an increase of €1.3 billion is expected in property refurbishment investments, corresponding to a 1.9% increase on 2015.

This performance is the result of stronger tax incentives for building refurbishment and energy efficiency, which are due to remain in place until December 2016. In addition to this, the government’s decision to extend its 65% ecobonus through to the end of 2017 will help the industry regain competitiveness and return to impressive growth rates.

After such encouraging data, this is the perfect time for activities and initiatives.

MADE expo is set to play a pro-active role in to stimulate the recovery in the building market Construction and Materials Hall (Pavilion 6/10), where it is showcasing systems, products and solutions for a new way of building: a circular system that creates essential connections between all materials, panelling, wood, concrete, steel and the most advanced building technologies and techniques. For the first time, at a single location MADE expo is presenting a 16,000 m²+ exhibition area,

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Impertek Srl Venezia | Italy www.impertek.com

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∂ Inside news a one-stop site for sustainable architecture, building energy efficiency and the presentation of all structural systems, materials, articles and high-performance products from the sectors of waterproofing, insulation, protection and recovery, colour, painting and surface treatments.

Drawing on contributions from leading scientific enterprises and institutional entities, the show features a special focus on anti-seismic safety to promote and encourage awareness among industry professionals who work in structural engineering, geotechnics, geology, town planning, architecture, restoration, civil protection and environmental protection. More in-depth technical exploration of these and other topics is the order of the day at the second edition of BuildSMART!, organized in partnership with Agorà and a number of top industry players for the purpose of disseminating knowledge and promoting technological innovation in the construction industry. The event focuses on pressing topics in the construction sector, drawing on product innovation from exhibiting companies while developing inputs from industrial and scientific research to ensure that pavilion visits are a unique opportunity for new insight.

The BuildSMART! Programme Through conferences, meetings, workshops, entertainment, prototypes and interactive workshops, BuildSMART! tackles the industry’s hot-button topics.

Security: Local security, emergency management, post-earthquake and hydrogeological instability, construction safety, anti-seismic improvements, engineering and site safety, anti-seismic planning, monitoring, mapping, and technologies for engineering and security.

Retrofit: Close-to-zero energy buildings, passivhouse and activehouse, envelopes, prefab, wood, panelling, steel, glass, re-building, efficient public buildings, improving tourist offerings.

Living Comfort & Wellbeing: Energy upgrades, building envelope, natural and mechanical ventilation, acoustics, colour, air quality, installations and home automation, radiation, sun shading, roofs and green walls.

Resilience: Urban regeneration, city system energy balance, minimising ground use, local security and smart-cities.

Material life-cycle: Circular Construction – Materials and component life-cycle – Building recycling – Demolition & Reconstruction – Selective demolition – Recyclable materials – Energy.

Innovation: New materials, new technologies, new building systems, prefabrication, computer design and modelling, light additive architecture, 3D printing, home automation, drones, augmented reality and software.

Digitization of the building industry and BIM: Product and process innovation, digital agenda, interoperability, integrated design, BIM, DIM, maintenance and installations.

New ways of living: Sharing-cities, co-housing, shared community spaces, user conduct and new services.

Building complexes: Intelligent complexes, energy and seismic upgrades, building envelope, building managers, installations and home automation, and comfort.

Professions: Training, the labour market, prospects, the New Procurement Code, regulations, and an update to the construction technique regulations.

MMFA : These floors are no stick-in-the-mud!

Hygiene made easy with MMF flooring Multilayer modular floors (MMF) are easy to clean and are therefore

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classed as particularly suitable for families and pets. And allergy-sufferers, for whom hygiene is a critical factor for well-being, can also benefit from the valuable properties of these products. It is also not without reason that even in the commercial sector, in all areas where hygiene is key – such as nurseries, schools, hospitals and doctors’ practices – hard floor coverings like these EU-certified MMF floors (EN 16511:2014) are the preferred choice.

A home is not a museum, it’s a place that’s full of life. Whether for children’s birthday parties, Champions League TV evenings, joint cooking sessions or simply enjoying time together with friends or neighbours, flooring has to undergo all this and more and will inevitably get dirty. Added to which, fresh air from open windows carries fine dust and pollen into the home and the daily wear on carpets, soft furnishings and household textiles results in even more dust. Pets shed their hair, and it is impossible to eliminate the near-invisible house dust mites and micro-organisms all around us. So when choosing the right flooring for a newly-built home or a renovation project, the question to ask is how easy is it to maintain and to keep clean.

Multilayer modular floor coverings are exceptionally hygienic. The smooth, high-quality surface finish of MMF makes these boards scratch-proof and wear-resistant, and their patented click-lock system ensures tightly-fitting joints. Because of this, these modern floor coverings are not only tough and durable in everyday use, they are also easy to clean and look after in the long term. No domestic or outdoor dirt can penetrate the surface of these floors and it is easy to remove by sweeping or vacuuming and the occasional damp wipe. It is advisable to add an environmentally-friendly floor cleaner to the cleaning water from time to time, such as those available in retail stores. Only a small amount is needed so as to keep the use of cleaning agents to a minimum. This doesn’t just protect the environment, it’s also kind on the household purse!

Increasingly, issues of the environment and sustainability are coming to the fore in terms of the production technology used for modular multilayer flooring, and the proportion of product ranges based on recyclable bio-based materials is growing accordingly. Innovative modular multilayer systems solutions suitable for wet rooms or for installing over conventional hot water underfloor heating continue to gain ground and due to their resistance to water, vinyl floors with swell-resistant core and solid vinyl tiles are in demand not only for kitchens and bathrooms, but also for the commercial sector – from shopfitting to doctors’ practices – where sales are increasing.

Notes on how to clean MMF floors properly are included in the MMFA’s Technical Bulletins (Commercial Use and Consumers), which can be downloaded free of charge from the Association’s website (http://www.mmfa.eu/en/download.html) www.mmfa.eu

DOMOTEX 2017 (14 to 17 January) DOMOTEX 2017: Trends barometer for global floor coverings industry – Substantially more registrations than for comparable timeframe two years ago

∂ Inside news – “Young Designer Trends Table” introduces flooring designs of tomorrow – Star designer Alfredo Häberli to deliver keynote on “Future Living” Hannover. Running from 14 to 17 January 2017 in Hannover, Germany, the DOMOTEX tradeshow will once again serve as the epicenter for all things concerning floor coverings. As the leading trade fair for the international floor coverings industry, the event showcases innovations and trends that set the tone for the coming season. “A full four months before opening day of the show, the signs of a dynamic and highly international event are already apparent,” reported Dr. Andreas Gruchow, member of the Deutsche Messe Managing Board. “In particular, many international enterprises are investing in their appearance at DOMOTEX by enlarging their stands, thus ensuring a good start to the new business year. This underscores the significance of DOMOTEX as a global marketplace and idea-giver for the industry,” he continued.

Some 1,350 exhibitors from more than 60 nations are expected in Hannover for the event.

Young designers hone in on latest trends DOMOTEX is focusing more strongly than ever on the latest floor coverings trends, honing in on what consumers can expect in 2017 with its Young Designer Trends Table.

This new DOMOTEX format features presentations by up-and-coming young designers from Germany, France, Great Britain, the Netherlands and Turkey, who will unveil the latest big trends. A highly personal take on the flooring trends of the future will be offered by Bilge Nur Saltik, based in Istanbul and London, Jane Briggs and Christy Cole from Glasgow, Klaas Kuiken from Arnhem, Hanne Willmann from Berlin and Victoria Wilmotte from Paris. These young designers will present their findings in Hall 9. DOMOTEX visitors can draw inspiration and be part of a roundtable discussion with the designers. The project is supervised by the award-winning Munichbased industrial designer Stefan Diez.

Forum for year’s best innovations The Young Designer Trends Table is a new feature of Innovations@ DOMOTEX – a successful showcase of innovations being staged for the fourth season in 2017. A special highlight will consist of the Innovations@DOMOTEX areas in halls 6, 9 and 17, featuring staged presentations of a prizewinning selection of exhibitor innovations. These special displays will be a focal point of the trade fair and a key attraction for visitors, who can get a quick overview of the most noteworthy floor coverings innovations and trends, with products they can see, touch and get first-hand information on.

Read more on www.floorforum.be/en/news

The 40-year anniversary invites the retail sector to actively join in with a special campaign.

“We are forging a future alliance to reinforce our brand and our partners over the long term. In this respect we will work offensively on three fields of action: firstly on the interface with our retail partners and their customers in order to provide the right products and services to make sales and the decision to buy easier, more convenient and secure.

Secondly on improved internal processes and procedures, and thirdly on the viable development of our product portfolio and the expansion of sustainable business models,” says Lubert Winnecken, chairman of the management board. By acquiring NORD Holding as an investor, the effective growth programmes already put in place will continue to progress dynamically in future in the direction of the market.

Fostering a culture of growth By the end of 2016, Parador is expected to generate turnover of well over 140 million EUR with 550 employees at two sites. The company has been growing successfully again for two years and will achieve an increase in turnover just into the double-digit range in 2016. The international figures show a share of over 50% of total sales. The new products introduced in 2016 have a notable share in these figures. One particular driver on the product side is vinyl flooring, but also further increasing sales in the modular flooring sector, such as Eco Balance PUR. Over and above this, laminate and engineered wood flooring appear to be stable.

Read more on www.floorforum.be/en/news

NEW

MACHINED FILLING OF FLOORING BOARDS VISIT US AT DOMOTEX HANNOVER, HALL 8, BOOTH D26

40 years of Parador Strategic fields of action for the future Parador continues on course towards stability and growth: Investments in markets, brand and production as well as a clear commitment to the production sites in Germany and Austria are key fields of action in this respect.

CSP ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY FOR WOOD FLOORING PRODUCTION info@csp-engineering.be T: +32 (0)14 37 77 52

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Special

Lacquers and oils with real anti-bacterial properties

PARQUET FLOORS CAN HAVE AN ANTIBACTERIAL COATING AS WELL

Photo – Tip Top Schuurmaterialen

For those who like things extra spick and span or for specific locations such as sports or multifunctional halls, crèches, nursing homes, and hospitals, a wooden floor coated with an antibacterial lacquer can provide effective extra protection.

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More and more parquet manufacturers are offering finished wooden floors with an antibacterial coating. There are also antibacterial finish lacquers for floors which are finished on site. This article gives the state of play.

Polyvalent technology In the world of medicine and the food industry they’ve been using high-tech and innovative solutions for years to keep the workplace and materials used as clean as possible. That’s logical since hygiene is an absolute priority in those sectors, and sometimes even a matter of life or death. The market for antimicrobial and antibacterial applications is growing strongly and has a turnover of over one billion euros in Europe. Since the technology used in the food and medical worlds is so versatile, it has also made its way to other sectors, including construction. For example, there are antibacterial acrylic panels for shower cabins, antibacterial glass for hospitals and sanitary rooms, and even antibacterial door fittings. And so, it’s only logical that there are also applications for the parquet sector.

Shark skin The systems which have been devised worldwide can classified in two types, namely the passive and active systems. Passive coating systems are those top layers which prevent or obstruct bacteria or foodstuffs from becoming attached to other substances in order to prevent or severely restrict the growth of bacteria. One solution amongst others which is used in the medical sector, for instance, is the microscopic structure of a shark fin. Indeed, research has shown that the texture of shark skin is ideal for preventing the adhesion and, especially, the growth of bacteria. In the medical sector these coatings have now proved their worth with implants and catheters.

treated with FINITURA UW SV 617 can be done with our VELUREX range of products.

Ciranova

This subject is currently being covered by the Ciranova research and development laboratory. When products are launched on the market, they will possess demonstrable antibacterial properties in conformity to the latest biocide legislation and take account of health and the environment. And so, the coatings are developed in such a way as to have no adverse effect on the properties of the finish. The challenge is to guarantee the antibacterial effect over the lifespan of the treated substrate.

Active coatings There are also finishes with an active antibacterial operation. These contain additives which effectively kill bacteria. These often include silver, bronze, copper or titanium oxide. As regards titanium oxide, Actio2 coatings from technology company Välinge proves that the coatings can not only kill bacteria, but also even improve air quality actively.

Silver Silver ions are usually added to antibacterial coatings. Silver as a disinfectant is no new discovery, as it’s been used for centuries to disinfect wounds. The active silver ions counteract the development of stubborn germs and bacteria (such as E. Coli or the hospital bacteria MRSA).

Moreover, silver ions are formed under damp conditions, so they perform best under (damp) conditions, which are precisely the conditions in which bacteria grow the most. The silver additives are also resistant to multiple cleaning and high and low temperatures and are virtually insoluble, so that they retain their effect for years. We asked some manufacturers for some information and we present a number of products:

The revolutionary Premium Hardwax-Oil System

Chimiver FINITURA UW SV 617 is a single component lacquer based on special acrylic resins in water dispersion. Thanks to it special formula with photo activators is ready to use and it cures with UV lamps. It is very fast drying and can be applied both by spray and curtain coater.

Its flash-off is 10 minutes in hot air oven and can be reduced to only 5 minutes on MOS and AQUADRY systems. After curing can be immediately sanded.

Maintenance of wooden floors

More information: www.saicos.de

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Suppliers of tools for fitting terraces correctly

THE RIGHT TOOLS FOR AN EVEN BETTER TERRACE MORE SPECIFIC TOOLS FOR A PERFECT END RESULT

Photo – Archi Wood

It is a myth to think that fewer tools are necessary for the perfect fitting of a wooden outdoor terrace or a terrace or swimming pool boards in composite. The fact is that tools are now geared more specifically to the job. There are now a lot more refined accessories and aids appearing on the market than in the past for fitting the ‘perfect’ terrace, and, nowadays, consumers expect perfection. Obviously, that affects the cost price, even if the fitting itself is a lot quicker.

However, the fact that the terrace thereby has a much longer lifespan provides ample compensation.

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There was a time when …

Indeed, there was a time (not so very long ago) when all we needed to fit a wooden terrace was a spirit level, screw driver, and screws.

That was all! You laid out a frame with beams, possibly with the help of wooden pegs, and you screwed the planks onto the frame, possibly with the help of blocks to ensure the right intervals. There was nothing to it and it never occurred to anyone that this method of work was quite destructive. From the very beginning, the plank was full of holes (i.e. sources of wear and tear) and, moreover, it was secured ‘firmly’ in place. ‘That won’t move any more,’ people thought. The problem was,

however, that wood does move and, in the course of the years, the screw hole around the screw got bigger and bigger. Result? Terraces has a limited lifespan, and for that reason they often had a poor reputation. ‘Give me natural stone any day; that’s for life,’ people said.

Thankfully, we’ve moved on from that fallacy, and wood and composite terraces have conquered their fair share of the market.

THE ULTIMATE GENERATION OF HIDDEN DECK FASTENERS

Technological materials The materials and means at our disposal to erect a wooden terrace to a level where we now refer to it exquisitely as ‘outdoor parquet’ are of a simple, but ingenious refinement. They are reliable, durable, and usually also completely ecologically responsible. The base structure and the fastening method directly affect the lifespan of the terrace.

Pedestals We’ve forgotten all about the old wooden pegs of those days and have converted to the now universally used pedestals. A pedestal is a support, usually designed in a particular synthetic, onto which a raised floor can be mounted. Most manufacturers offer two types: one type for erecting a wooden floor onto beams and another type for a raised floor with tiles. They are a problem-solver as far as the installation of outdoor floors goes, but, on the other hand, they can also be used perfectly well to make some really eye-catching architectural creations. In a great many cases pedestals have provided a ‘solution’.

Clip systems Clip systems for fastening terrace wood invisibly or almost invisibly to the base structure are a durable solution, if only because they have wholly or completely abandoned the old ‘destructive’ method. Two essential aspects contribute to the lifespan. The fact that on the one hand it is no longer necessary to drill through the wood is a benefit, whilst the space which is left to allow the wood to move naturally also helps. The combination of those two high-tech and invisible means has raised the quality of wooden terraces considerably.

TOOLS AND ACCESSORIES FOR TIMBER DECKING

Tools General The classic spirit measure and/or laser spirit level is obviously still necessary for fitting the support structure perfectly horizontally, whether we use wooden pegs or pedestals. A mechanical saw is needed for sawing the terrace planks to the required size. For that purpose it is normal to use a jigsaw or a circular saw. Here we prefer to use a ‘wirefree’ tool, even more so than for other applications. Since we are using a support structure (beams), there is a serious risk of a wire ‘getting caught somewhere’. The same line of reasoning applies to a screwing machine. A wire-free screwing machine with a switchable battery is an indispensable tool for fitting terraces. Here you need to take care that you have the correct bit for the screws which are recommended by the clip manufacturer. These are usually self-drilling TORX or SPAX screws so that it is no longer necessary to drill holes in advance. If you don’t use clips, then it is most certainly advisable to drill holes in advance.

Specific Some accessories and tools are designed specifically for laying terraces or they are ideal for that purpose. For example, it is possible to erect a watertight screen between the beams and the terrace planks using single-layer or multi-layer bitumen strips. These protect the support structure from damp and they help to absorb sound.

Then there are tools to counteract warped planks! When fitting clips or fasteners are fitted to the terrace planks, warped floorboards can play lots of tricks on the terrace fitter. You can more or less straighten a plank using lots of muscle power, but that’s no easy job. With a

made in Europe

www.novlek.com info@novlek.com

Special

Suppliers of tools for fitting terraces correctly

wrench you can straighten and fix a plank without too much trouble.

The plank stays in place without the fitter having to use any hands at all. This wrench lever combines a buckle joint with a lever function; pure physics, simple yet ingenious. To maintain exactly the same distance between planks, and if there are no synthetic spacers, you can use a universal shelf spanner.

A selection from the range

saw, a cross-cut saw, and the right screwdriver are enough.

Nevertheless, does also supply high-quality long screw covers, together with its clips and screws. This means that the planks can be mounted and dismounted quickly, even in the middle of the terrace. For B-Fix the only other thing you need are parquet belts in order to fit the terrace properly. In addition, B-Fix also offers a milling machine for reproducing B-Fix Classic on site. A number of new accessories will now simplify the terrace fitting even more.

Archi Wood

DeckWise®

With Növlek Archi Wood has the solutions for fitting terraces professionally. Hard Wood Clip® is the invisible fitting system for wooden terraces developed

by Archi Wood. The stainless steel fastening clip (in a top quality synthetic case) is fitted into the grooves (side) of the floorboards and is screwed into the beams using self-drilling screws (SPAX in top quality A2 stainless steel).

Hard Wood Clip® is available in 3 types (3mm/5mm/7mm) to guarantee the correct distance between the floorboards, irrespective of the type of wood, degree of moisture during the fitting, and weather conditions.

This system is particularly discreet, thanks to the black matt finish (non-reverberating) and the antique brown colour of the screw (coloured all over). Soft Wood Clip™ is virtually the same fastening system as the Hard Wood Clip®, but it is designed for thermo wood or thermally treated wood sorts, soft stable sorts, and bamboo. Square Clip is a simple and efficient system for fastening terrace tiles invisibly.

The system is efficient and universal. The Square Clip™ can be fitted or screwed onto any flat substrate. No tools are required at all. The system also allows you to remove the tiles, change the configuration of the tiles, or to replace a tile. The tiles never come into contact with the substrate. An integrated system of drainage channels on both sides of the base ensures good drainage and ventilation, and that is good for the lifespan of the terrace. Square Clip™ has been designed to allow the wood to behave as naturally as possible. The clip adapts to all wood sorts, sizes, and composites. The system is completely invisible. Apart from those fitting systems, Archi Wood also presents a whole series of accessories and aids. The new Cale Interface guarantees excellent ventilation for the terrace planks to reduce the risk of curling. There is the bitumen strip to protect the planks themselves against damp. The planks can be fitted with no trouble at all using the universal plank spanner. The ‘Cales D’écartement’ (spacers) ensure a uniform distance between the planks. Finally, wooden cover tabs ensure that the screws are nicely concealed.

INNOVATIVE INVISIBLE FASTENING SYSTEM. NO IMITATION. DeckWise® International is the European agent for the sale of the invisible systems for wooden terraces, side wall cladding, and other products to help with the construction of a wooden or composite terrace. All products are made in the USA. The American licensed invisible systems for wooden and composite terraces and sidewall cladding yield an extraordinary result with the installation of Brazilian hardwood, composite, and thermally modified treated wood. Wooden terraces can move with no problem at all, thanks to the precise and integrated spacers between the planks. DeckWise® invisible systems can be supplied with three unique and integrated spacers in order to ensure a correct distance between the planks. The ExtremeMC 2.38mm spacer with the smallest interval is ideal for use with a wood such as ipe hardwood. The Extreme 4 with 4mm spacer can be used in combination with hardwood where a bigger interval is required.

The Extreme KD, with 6.44mm being the biggest spacer, is ideal for use with hardwood which swells and shrinks a great deal by nature. All Deckwise products are made from high-quality materials and produced in the USA. They give fitters and home owners a durable, attractive, and smooth environment without any screws on the surface.

B-Fix The invisible fastening system from B-Fix simplifies the fitting of wooden terraces considerably. Actually, with the B-Fix system you don’t need any special tools for the fitting. A circular

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Exterpark At Exterpark they are convinced that as more and more tools become necessary, fitting wooden terraces will take longer and longer and become more expensive. Exterpark offers two invisible systems: Speedclip and Magnet. In 2015, Exterpark licensed its ‘Magnet’ system. There are no screws, the fitting is rapid, and dismantling is very easy. All you need is a simple push to open the terrace at any point. Exterpark Magnet takes account of the most important points for attention which fitters have to look out for: convenient and speedy fitting, cost price, lifespan, accessibility, maintenance, look, and stability. The cost price is kept low by leaving out screws and the fitting time is three to five times faster. All you need is a cross-cut saw to cut the planks to the right length. Exterpark presents various other accessories in order to simplify and improve terrace fitting such as aluminium joints (for various applications), pedestals, etc.

Special

Laminate floors : part 2

WHEN THE ‘DECORATIVE’ AND ‘TECHNICAL’ GO HAND IN HAND LAMINATE OWES ITS LOOK TO SURFACE TECHNOLOGY

Photo – Balterio

When we fall for the charms of a solid wood parquet floor, this is presumably due to the natural grain which is typical of the wood sort used to design the floor. The beauty comes from the product itself. A similar thing happens with natural stone, for instance. Obviously, some finishing techniques can refine or highlight that natural beauty. Seldom does beauty emerge from pure technology, yet laminate tells a different story. Laminate IS technology, or, at least, the fruit of technology. A hand-in-hand ensemble of photography and sophisticated surface technology, yet so real!

Perception up front We’ve said it elsewhere in this edition (see the article on multi-layer floors). Once a wooden floor is fitted and finished, it becomes extremely difficult to say what type of floor it is. Strictly speaking, a veneer floor with a top layer of barely 0.6mm of real wood looks the same as a 9mm solid wood floor. There’s no argument about that. In the history of laminate we’ve reached the point where the upper segment is celebrating ‘high tide’. Consumers shudder at the thought of ‘something too cheap’ and the middle segment has disappeared somewhat.

The great A-brands of the laminate world have ‘pulled out all the stops’

both technically and technologically to take their place amongst the elite of fully fledged floor coverings. A deserved acquisition! The result?

Laminate, just like various types of wooden floors, has managed to win the ‘battle of the perception’. In the top segment laminate, fitted with every possible technological surface novelty, is now often completely ‘unrecognisable’.

The surface does ‘everything’.

Laminate stands or falls with the surface. Obviously, other aspects also play a part, such as the quality of the click system, but consumers’ attention is drawn firstly to the durability and the ‘look and feel’.

Durable top layer Just about all laminate producers have a collection which is designed for high traffic. Those floors are exceptionally durable and scratch-resistant so they can also be fitted in shops, offices, showrooms, and such like. Most of those floors belong in classes 33 or even 34.

However, also with the laminate floors for domestic use we are seeing a radical upgrade in top layers. The classic coats of UV lacquer are increasingly being reinforced through the addition of certain ingredients.

The latest innovations mention the use of nanotechnology, which

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Floor Forum International 84

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Special

Laminate floors : part 2

makes it possible to improve the properties of lacquers (e.g. scratch resistance) via nanoparticles. Apart from durability, the top layer now also has a number of other properties to improve comfort.

The well known antis Virtually all A-brands offer laminate floors which have undergone an ongoing anti-static treatment. This means that disruptive electrostatic discharges, which could arise where computers are in use, for instance, are virtually excluded. Whilst a smooth floor normally involves a risk of slipping, most laminate floors are equipped with an anti-slip top layer. The fact that a laminate floor can be kept dust-free means that it is suitable for allergy patients. Yet there’s more; for a few years now, some trademarks have even been offering floors which, apart from their anti-allergic character, effectively kill bacteria through the addition of certain substances in the top layer.

Decorative at top level It all started with a simple photograph. In recent years, however, makers have delivered pioneering work in order to change not just the look, but also the feel of laminate floors drastically. By using various degrees of gloss or refined colour shades, makers have highlighted wood grains and patterns so that the ‘photograph’ from bygone days now looks increasingly like real wood. Nowadays, the grains are actually given a structure during the printing process, so the similarities are growing all the time and the surface also feels much more like the type of wood being imitated. This technology goes by the name ‘embossed in register’ and has certainly been the biggest innovation in recent years.

What’s on the market?

Alsapan IMAGINE, CREATE, FIT ... it’s a laminate floor!

Under this slogan, the trademark Créativ’ d’Alsapan is once again giving credibility to French laminate floors.

From now on, it’s no longer necessary to own a castle to take on at home the elegance and originality of fitting Hungarian point, a fitting range or something else. The possibility of mixing strips of three widths in the same piece breaks up the monotony of a piece which is too straight. The whole is presented in some highly contemporary decors which harmonise with all decorative styles and integrate at reasonable prices into all parts of the home. To crown it all, the 5G system joins the strips together quickly and easily in rotation on the big side and with a lock on the small side. A small click for a great effect, durable and with little effort!

Do you want to know more? Visit http://www.alsapan.com/content/sols

Balterio The EIR press technique whereby the laminate structure reflects the grain for 100% (you can literally see and feel the print) is a technique which Balterio has used since 2004. The EIR technique is sold by Balterio as True-to-Nature, and it means that Balterio laminate subjected to the True-to-Nature technique looks virtually like real wood.

One of the first collections was Tradition Quattro. This collection was the first collection with EIR and, moreover, the bevelled edge has been

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finished with a perfectly suitable foil band to create the impression that the decor runs through into the V-groove. Since 2004, Balterio has used the EIR technique on many of its other collections and refined the technique considerably (deeper, even more precise, more matt, different degrees of gloss, etc.). The idea of all those refinements was to ensure that Balterio laminate can hardly be distinguished from real parquet. A true top quality laminate stands out due to the EIR technique. Virtually 85% of all references within Balterio are now for its brand of laminate with EIR.

Parcolys Flooring Products from Parcolys Flooring have a top layer cured by electro-beam. This means that they have a top layer which has hardened through the paper and therefore can no longer be separated from the paper. A multi-component layer is polymerised through the paper and hardened by means of electro-beam. Obviously, this innovation has an effect on the class and durability of the wood. It is possible to obtain outstanding durability up to class AC5 in a thin layer of paper.

The impact class is higher due to the rigidity of the top layer. Parcolys Flooring doesn’t do embossed in register. The trademark does offer a brushed top layer in the latest products. This gives an anti-slip property which cannot be obtained technically with embossed. Parcolys Flooring has a licence for the click system, but they have developed part of the click themselves.

Nanotechnology is a fashionable word for Parcolys which sounds nice, but they do believe that polymerisation works on an even smaller scale.

Meister Since January 2016, Meister premium laminate floors have been suitable for damp rooms and they now have improved scratch-resistance. The floors are all anti-static. Moreover, the Premium laminate floors are all equipped with a class 32 and have improved scratch-resistance. The embossed in register structures are located primarily in the premium laminate floors so as to make a clear distinction between them and the Classic laminate floors. In the area of click systems, too, Meister laminate floors are worked out down to the last detail. Meister uses a Uniclic on the length and a Masterclic Plus on the short side.

Special

Skirting boards with laminate inlay

SKIRTING BOARDS WITH LAMINATE INLAY A SKIRTING BOARD FOR EVERY FLOOR

Photo – Küberit

Skirting boards are a particularly fascinating product category. They might appear to be senseless nonessentials which are recommended only for the sidelines, yet they do have a huge impact on the finish level of the interior. They are subjected constantly to rapidly changing trends as regards both sizes and materials. The extent to which they should be ‘noticed’ has also differed from period to period. The fact that new types of skirting board have barely disappeared from the scene by the time that even newer ones emerge means that the range of available skirting boards is well nigh endless. Yet it still isn’t good enough!

Visit www.floor-forum.com

‘Almost’ isn’t good enough!

On the web site of a specialist skirting board vendor we find an impressive range of skirting board solutions specially for laminate.

There is mention of hollow skirting board foils, foiled MDF skirting boards, adhesive skirting boards in laminate foil, etc. Then, the vendor announces that for each of those types of skirting boards there is ‘the right colour for almost any laminate floor!’ Surely that’s impressive? Such a wide range! But, yes, there is a ‘but’. In the almost obsessive drive for aesthetic quality and harmony ‘almost’ has long since ceased to be good enough for consumers. It’s ‘all or nothing’ where consumers totter between two trends, two extremes, as it were. There’s either a ‘perfect match’ or ‘no match at all’.

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Skirting boards with laminate inlay

‘No match’ A skirting board which doesn’t stand out from the floor at all is sometimes a trend and sometimes not. There’s certainly no lack of possible pleasant and elegant combinations. For example, the combination of a laminate in dark oak or another tropical darker wood sort with a medium-high skirting board in aluminium or stainless steel is certainly attractive. Interior architects and designers are extremely fond of a metal-look in combination with wood.

Obviously, this makes the skirting board extremely visible. It takes on a more or less dominant role; this is the exact opposite of the discreet role which people often want to give skirting boards. For instance, painting MDF skirting boards in the colour of the wall means that the skirting board virtually disappears from sight. In both cases there is no match whatsoever between the floor and the skirting boards.

The ‘perfect ‘match’ The ‘perfect match’ takes us to a realm with no room for even a single concession. ‘Almost’ isn’t good enough. The decor and colour of the skirting board are absolutely identical to those of the floor. Lots of skirting board manufacturers offer a huge range

of decors, but laminate manufacturers expand their ranges almost constantly so that the perfect match is not so easy to find.

Furthermore, it also gives retailers a headache as they consider the issue of stocks. And so, selling skirting boards is really only possible via samples. That isn’t such a problem in itself, were it not for the ‘lightning speed’ at which clients now like to be served.

Inlay skirting boards … the ingenious discovery In the case of inlay skirting boards the skirting board becomes a ‘bearer’, whatever the material in which it is designed and apart from taste preferences regarding heights and thicknesses. This means that the skirting board, as it (usually) leaves the factory, cannot be used at once. The ‘bearer’ has to be supplemented with a ‘strip’ or ‘band’ from the fitted floor. Technically, this can be designed in different ways e.g. a strip floor is slid into the skirting board, glued to the bearer, or secured using a click system or Velcro-like material. The fact is that the skirting board is a technical solution which is a completely separate matter to the chosen type of floor. The inlay skirting boards on offer usually provide for different thicknesses of floor types so that they can be used for both vinyl and laminate, for instance. This solution can be a technical step in the production of personalised skirting boards. In that case, the skirting board leaves the factory with the chosen inlay.

However, the skirting board can also be sold as a product which is ready for use or neutral since fitters complete the finish on site by applying the inlay to the skirting boards themselves. In both cases these inlay skirting boards represent a universal solution which provides an answer to every possible type of floor and takes account of everyone’s views on the interior.

A selection from the range Decruy Decruy believes that skirting boards should match the colour, scratch-resistance, and the waterproof nature of the floor as far as possible. Decruy is a specialist in making skirting boards and profiles from floor panels or floor slabs. High skirting boards could be back in fashion, depending on the type of interior. Decruy has developed a revolutionary technique to make skirting boards and profiles from DPL wooden panels. They also realise digital printing will surely gain in popularity since traders don’t want to have as many foils in stock, so order quantities are increasingly diminishing. Since Decruy makes skirting boards from the actual DPL panel, they can limit the minimum order quantity to the number of skirting boards per decor obtained from one panel. New at Decruy is the technique of making a 3-in-1 or multifunctional profile from a DPL panel. This technique and the profile are licensed by the firm Decruy NV.

Photo – FN Neuhofer

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switchable skirting boards, hollow skirting boards, and threshold profiles. A reliable long-term partner where quality, client focus, and pro-active service take centre stage.

FN Neuhofer

Depro Profiles Depro Profiles from Komen, a big name in the field of profiled surfaces, has over 25 years of experience in providing all sorts of flooring accessories. Via digital printing they guarantee 100% matches between floor and skirting board. Innovation is the driving force behind Depro’s policy. Every day, the company supplies customised client solutions. Products and processes are evaluated and adapted constantly in order to guarantee the best top quality product on the market at all times. Their white skirting boards can be painted over so that they can be harmonised perfectly with the wall or floor colour. Their assortment also includes adhesive skirting boards,

Thanks to digital printing it is now possible to make skirting boards, profiles, and all components completely in the same decor as the floor. It doesn’t matter whether the top surface is made of paper

Your complete supplier for flooring accessories

ACOUSTIC Acoustic underlays for highest demands

SPECIAL Underlays for special application areas

PROFI NATURAL High-quality products for Underlays out of natural different requirements raw material

The complete underlay collection encompasses with currently 36 sales-boosting products solutions for almost all applications.

BASIC Cost-effective underlays

ACCESSOIRES Moisture protection, self-adhesive tapes and protective sheets

January 14–17 · Hannover

Floor Forum International 84

hall H5 stand 125 hall 7 stand A14 17 www.parkettfreund.com | info@parkettfreund.com

Special

Skirting boards with laminate inlay

(as with laminate) or other printed materials such as even veneer with wooden floors. There is a special production process which makes it possible to make products with even higher wear resistance. Digital print technology enables Neuhofer to be extremely flexible. The range of printable materials is extremely extensive. Neuhofer Holz doesn’t offer any inlays for laminate, but does offer an aluminium skirting board in which a vinyl strip can be applied. For waterproof LVT, for instance, Neuhofer Holz has special skirting boards, namely the FN-Water-Pro. Finally, the KU037 profile is designed for the wall connection where a strip from the floor can be fastened to the skirting board. The profile has a sealing lip on the floor side.

Küberit presents skirting boards in aluminium which correspond to the floor. The assortment includes one model into which laminate up to 11mm thick can be inserted. These aluminium ‘bearers’ are available with both inner and outer corners, connecting pieces, and end pieces. These are available in two different metal colours. The skirting board is 60mm high. The insert is fitted on site. Floor fitters have to cut off straight pieces of 45mm in order to slide them into the bearer. Thicknesses vary from 2 to 11mm.

Progress Profiles

Küberit

we match all flooring collections send us your samples

We print digital

Hall 7 Stand B41

find us at

LVT - Wood Veneer - Metallic - Laminate

MADE IN EUROPE - Barceona

we manufacture

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Progress Profiles offers the new Proskirting INS, an innovative skirting board solution for a modern and minimalist design, perfectly in line with prevailing trends. The skirting board allows you to use the same material as the floor with adhesive or silicone to be applied to the skirting board. Laminate is obviously one of the possibilities. The bearer of this skirting board is in aluminium, stainless steel, or PVC. The inlay is fitted in the factory. Progress Profiles usually packs these profiles in packs of ten, twenty, or forty.

Perfilstar Skirting boards which correspond to the floors for 100% are the speciality par excellence of Perfilstar. Thanks to digital technology, any decor which the client submits can correspond perfectly to the skirting board, and, obviously, that’s very much appreciated. Digital printing for a perfect match is the core business of Perfilstar. The base which is used for the products is high-quality MDF, waterproof MDF, aluminium, compact PVC, and finger-jointed wood. The products can be fitted immediately as they come from the factory. Sizes and decors are fixed, but the company is extremely flexible.

Project

Bona (BE)

BONA COLOURS SPECIFIED FOR SCHIPHOL AIRPORT Bona has supplied lacquers for the wooden floors at Schiphol since the early 1990s. At first Bona Mega was used, but in 2000 the specification was changed to Bona Traffic IP.

In addition to the airport’s requirement for a fast drying time and high wear resistance, it also needed a lacquer that offered fireretardant and was easy to use. Bona Traffic HD was able to satisfy both these additional requirements.

When Bona introduced Bona Traffic HD in 2012, the company invited Mr M Stillebroer (who at the time was the Facility Supervisor at the airport) to visit their factory in Malmo, Sweden. The Bona team explained the differences between Traffic IP and new Traffic HD and, together with Mr Stillebroer, worked out a new specification for the renovation of the airport’s floors. Traffic HD has a faster drying time and an even greater wear resistance than Traffic IP which was already meeting the high demands at Schiphol.

New challenge

As Schiphol is a growing international airport which is expecting to welcome 63,000,000 passengers in 2016, it’s important to have the best possible protection on the floors. Bona Traffic was therefore specified for all the wooden floors before and after passport control (approximately 18,000m2) and also for some customized furniture and wall panels.

At the end of 2013 the airport team presented Bona with another challenge. They wanted to renovate the floors in the Holland Boulevard area using different shades of 21 colours!

Bona’s R & D and product management departments started to research ingredients and to develop a lacquer formulation which would satisfy the needs of the architect but would also create a system that was easy for the contractors to work with. After several meetings with the Bona Benelux team and reviewing more than 50 colour samples, the quality of the formulation was approved and a decision was made over the final colours.

Enjoy the pictures!

For more information visit us on www.bona.com

“Work carried out by Van Est Parketvloeren”

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Producers of multi-layer floors

GROWTH IN MULTI-LAYER FLOORS IS LOGICAL HUMAN FLAWS ARE GRADUALLY BEING ELIMINATED

Photo – Lalegno

In the case of wooden floors, wood-related floors, or imitation wooden floors it is getting harder and harder to identify a floor. As soon as a floor is fitted, finished down to the last detail, you have to be ‘ from the right background’ to discern the truth. Nonsense? Just try it! Even some laminate floors can confuse non-specialists. Why is that? The answer lies in today’s amazing technological possibilities, not least in the field of surface treatment. Will solid wood floors survive? Only time will tell.

Decorative ‘levelling’ I would argue that it is possible to fool a panel of decorators, building contractors, architects, and interior architects by presenting the various types of floor technology alongside each other on the same surface. The playing rules would have to be fair. We’d take the same sort of wood (e.g. oak), the same colour and finish (e.g. matt lacquer), and the same design or the same pattern (strip parquet), and we

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present all the floors ‘fully glued’. We’d take 9mm of solid wood (traditional parquet), two-layer, three-layer, veneer, and laminate. Then, the assignment would be to name each floor correctly. Easy? It’s worth trying it out in practice. The fact that probably one of the most well known and seasoned parquet fitters in the country recently confided in me laconically ‘that there aren’t any real parquet fitters any more’ gives us food for thought. A traditional ‘sort’ slowly dying out under pressure from a world of technological progress? Here, too, only time will tell, although there is a slightly nostalgic and traditionally-minded gut feeling which hopes that things might turn out differently. Solid parquet is part of a tree; that’s for sure. As we make the visible top layer thinner, we take less of a piece from a tree, but it is still a piece from a tree. No one can dispute that.

Technical perfection We’ve said it often enough in the past: Human beings themselves are the biggest weakness in any human craft. Not that the qualities and

expertise of those human beings are inevitably destined to be inadequate or make mistakes! Human abilities are by definition limited in any case. Just take the speed or accuracy with which a human being reacts to changing conditions.

Solid parquet – the risks What could possibly go wrong in fitting a solid wood floor? For the sake of completeness we’ll go for the ‘cream of the crop’: traditionally glued strip parquet on an oak subfloor.

- Checking and preparing the substrate: This involves using the correct products and applying them in the correct manner to guarantee good glue adhesion.

- Fitting the mosaic subfloor: You need to use the correct adhesive for the correct conditions (floor moisture content, screed, atmosphere, temperature, and draught).

- Sandpapering the subfloor: You need to use the correct sanding machine with the correct grain and preferably the machine operator should have some experience.

- Fitting the strips: The same issues as for glueing and sandpapering, but you also need the correct products for filing holes and, finally, sandpapering even more finely.

- Applying the finish: The correct products in the correct circumstances which still vary, depending on which products are used.

In other words, there are hazards lurking behind every corner and even then we might have forgotten something. At all events, the floor fitter has to measure and check constantly and at the same time realise that measurement results can change ‘somewhere’.

What about multi-layer?

To ensure a consistent comparison, we would take fully glued twolayer parquet. To enable us to cite all arguments, we opt at once for ‘pre-finished’. In particular, it is the checking and preparation of the substrate and the atmospheric conditions during the fitting which require a lot of attention from the floor fitter. Apart from that, we are working in an industrial setting. Our solid wood floor is being constructed in a protected and controlled environment. Adhesives and/or other chemical products are geared ‘automatically’ to the atmospheric conditions which are normally always identical in an industrial setting. The raw materials and products used for the manufacture improve as technology advances. Our floor is ‘monitored’ by science. Finally, the finish has to be applied. That is identical for each floorboard and is also carried out in ‘perfect’ conditions.

Conclusion This editor is a great lover and champion of solid parquet fitted in the traditional way. At the same time, this editor also realises that such feelings are based purely on emotional motives, and not on rational considerations. That’s just how it is. In the current phase of technical and production possibilities we can say that a multi-layer wooden floor is almost perfect as regards stability, precisely because of the production in a consistently identical, controlled, and industrial setting where human errors or faulty assessments are virtually eliminated. That, combined with a few other assets, means that multi-layer is still conquering more territory. Multi-layer parquet, veneer floors, and laminate (but also LVT and LVP) have the advantage of much faster

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Producers of multi-layer floors

fitting and minimal inconvenience (for just about all renovations) for the project manager, who may also live in the property.

The move to floating and pre-finished The move to floating and completely pre-finished is a fact. The ratio today between ‘rough’ and ‘pre-finished’ is 70/30 %, with pre-finished holding the upper hand. Some (well known) manufacturers still supply only finished floors which are ready for fitting. Nevertheless, supplying rough floors does have some benefits, as there are still parquet floor fitters who swear by their own colour formula. This is to be encouraged, even though we see that there are very few colours/shades missing from the colour pallet on offer from most manufacturers. However, many parquet floor fitters still regard the finish as a point of ‘added value’. Then, there’s that other phenomenon: Logically, it’s only a small step from ‘pre-finished’ to the click systems. These are available in both two and three-layer floors: Multi-layer parquet floors, equipped with a click system (usually one of the well known licences), are becoming increasingly popular. They are obviously pre-finished, and that makes the fitting similar to that of laminate, so the DIY enthusiast can fit them, too. However, we always repeat that, even with laminate, the ‘hand of the expert’ can make a difference, especially as regards a professional finish.

A selection from the range BJ Parket At BJ Parket they talk of multi-layer parquet from a top layer of at least 2.5mm. BJ Parket presents multi-layer floors with top layers of 4 and 6mm respectively. The company sells its home-made Duo Line, Solid floor, Cabbani, BJ Best Selection, and Baltic Wood. Duo Line has a highly stable birch plywood base.

Cabbani allows a choice between birch plywood or HDF. Solid floor is mounted on a block panel. At BJ Parket the ratio of finished and raw supplied floors is 50/50.

with a rural floor including knots and typical wood characteristics being even more distinctly present. To finish the product, there is a choice between oil or varnish, combined with a wide range of fashionable colors. Cabbani can be installed either floating (HDF) as well as gully glued down (HDF and plywood).

Meet the new Decospan Division Flooring at Domotex in hall 9, stand A46. www.cabbani.com

Cornilly Henk Cornilly and his staff are driven by their passion for wood, work ethic, vast enthusiasm, and sound knowledge of wooden floors.

Cornilly possesses the very latest high-tech machines for producing multi-layer parquet. Moreover, the studio is ideally suited for stocking a wooden floor in perfect conditions. Cornilly takes care of the entire process itself from branch to plank. This means they are in a perfect position to meet the client’s wishes.

Their multi-layer parquet consists of a top layer in solid wood of 4 or 6mm thick, which is glued onto a birch multiplex of 12 or 15mm thick. Multi-layer floor planks are available in set or variable widths from 10 to 30cm. The standard length is 1.5 to 3 metres, but lengths from 4 to 8m or set lengths are possible. These floors can be combined perfectly well with floor heating or cooling due to their great stability. Cornilly has about 40 sorts of wood in stock, but concentrates mainly on African wood sorts, including afrormosia, wenge, afzelia, mahogany, and padauk, plus a few attractive sorts of pinewood such as larch, douglas, yellow pine, pitch pine, etc. The finish is done according to client wishes (brushed, sandblasted, or band saw effect are also possible).

Parquet floor fitters are always welcome to come along themselves or with their clients by appointment to have a look at the entire production process.

Design Parquet Design Parquet regards a floor with a top layer of at least 4.5mm as a multi-layer floor. The company presents various floors in its range: LOFT PRO 16 x 180mm - 120 x 180mm - 16 x 220mm and LOFT PRO XXL 20 x 295mm parquet floors. For much wider floors multi-layer offers greater stability than solid parquet floors. Apart from that greater stability, the lower consumption of wood is obviously a plus. At Design Parquet about 95% of the supplied floors leave the factory completely finished.

Cabbani: architectural and tailor made parquet When you choose for real wood parquet, you also want that it corresponds to the overall interior. This is often a difficult task. But for that challenge, you can rely on Cabbani.

Thanks to the "à la carte" system a personalized floor can easily be put together. There is the choice between three dimensions with a core of HDF or birch plywood combined with a top layer of 2, 3.2 or 5.5mm European oak. There are two basic wood qualities: "Select" includes a nice mix of structures and exhibits the typical characteristics of real wood, without pronounced knots. "Rustic" brings nature into your home

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Flamingo Parket Flamingo considers top layers of 2.5mm to be parquet. The company produces solely two-layer birch multiplex parquet (glued waterproof):

FLOORING for your BUSINESS WHY TO CHOOSE FLO.IT?

1

Because it is a MADE IN ITALY floor

2

3

100% Made in Italy

4

Because it is FSC certified

ENGINEERED FLOOR

1 2

ESSENCE Oak

Because Florian fulfills the Due Diligence and the Timber Regulation

Main Features

T&G CLASSIC

SYSTEMS

CLICKING SYSTEM NEW

LENGHTS 2050 - 2350 mm (max 20% out of size)

2

THICKNESSES 15/3,8 - 20/6 mm

3

WIDTHS 142-192- 242 mm

4

Competitive quality products and a fully integrated process that offers the maximum results with the least waste

QUALITIES AB CHARACTER RUSTIC HEAVY RUSTIC

CORES

BIRCH PLYWOOD

SOFT WOOD PLYWOOD

OPTIONS

UNFINISHED

FINISHED

QUALITIES A/B Attractive grain; few pin knots; light to medium colour variation.

K Sound knots, small to medium knots allowed, occasional small filled knots; colour variation allowed; up to 10% sapwood; mineral streakers allowed.

R Knots allowed, any size filled and sanded knots; cracks and splits repaired with filler; color variation allowed; up to 20% sapwood; mineral streaks allowed

ITALIA

Info: sales.floor@florianinc.com - direzione@florianinc.com

HRVATSKA

MAGYARORSZĂ G

FRANCE

www.florianinc.com

Special

Producers of multi-layer floors

Twin Plank. 30% of floors are sold as traditional parquet floors ( 6 and 8mm thick) and 20mm solid wood floorboards. The other floors are sold as Twin-Plank. Twin-Plank swells and shrinks less than solid wood floorboards, especially when it is glued securely onto the cement covering floor. Traditional parquet floors also swell and shrink only minimally, but they do have the drawback of being extremely hard work to fit. Flamingo Parket supplies Twin-Plank from 12mm thick, and that’s ideal for renovation.

Furthermore, all types of parquet floors are ideal for fitting in new buildings, provided that the subfloor is suitable. A good preliminary inspection is essential, however. A good 80% of floors from Flamingo Parket are supplied pre-finished.

Flo.it /FLORIAN

their skill in treating the floor on site. Furthermore, Habo also offers a wide range of finishes, including the VOC distressed floors, the Top Line and Basic Line collections, and an attractive range of lacquered finishes.

Kurkfabriek Van Avermaet In view of the growing demand, Van Avermaet concentrates on its new floating Qualy Cork click Print wooden floors. The detail in the print and the spacious sizes ensure that this product now looks just like solid wood floorboards. With floating cork floors there is a choice of three variants. The first variant is just about parallel to the glued version; here, there is a choice of eight sorts of structures. There is then a choice from one of the pre-lacquered colours, so it is either a fully finished floor or a colour can be chosen from the standard range of 64 colours, including the choice of NCS-RAL colours. New techniques make it possible to produce a painted cork floor or wall, which retains all the good qualities of cork, but which looks especially flashy at the same time. Kurkfabriek Van Avermaet has a very attractive and varied selection of colours, ranging from deep-red to trendy grey. The range includes no fewer than 64 standard colours in 20 motifs and 15 sizes! The pre-lacquered floors have already been treated with a matt varnish. The floors which are painted on request still have to be finished after the fitting with four coats of lacquer, high-gloss, satin gloss, or matt varnish.

Lamett

Technically, parquet is called engineered flooring when the top layer has a thickness of at least 2.5mm. In order to be competitive and different from others, the company produces floors with top layers of 4mm or 6mm. The company can guarantee a very stable and efficient floor also on large widths thanks to the thickness of the top layer and their construction method, especially their type of core (birch plywood). Multi-layer floors represent 90% of their sales, whilst 70% of floors are sold rough. The remaining 30% is sold pre-finished because their main customers are those who import wooden flooring looking for a certified and guaranteed alternative instead of a common Chinese or Polish product.

Habo Habo produces Top Line two-layer parquet in thicknesses of 13 and 18mm with solid top layers of 4 and 6mm respectively. Top Line is available in widths of 16, 18, 20, and 22cm in four selections of French oak and an extensive range of exotic wood. Herringbone and Hungarian point are also available in both thicknesses. Traditionally, parquet floor fitters still often choose unfinished floors, so they can show

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As far as Lamett is concerned, multi-layer parquet should have a top layer of at least 2.5mm. Lamett has both two and three-layer parquet in its range.

Professionals prefer two-layer parquet, but consumers don’t seem to have a preference. Multi-layer owes its success to its greater stability as compared to solid wood. With multi-layer floors, the quality tends to be determined more by the quality of the adhesive and profiles rather than by the structure. Lamett supplies about 90% of its floors completely pre-finished. This is partly due to the price, but also the speed and simplicity of the fitting. Constructing traditional parquet from scratch is more expensive and extremely technical.

Lalegno Lalegno believes that the term ‘multi-layer parquet’ can be used for floors with a top layer of at least 2.5mm. Generally speaking, Lalegno floors have a top layer of 2.5, 4, or 6mm. Lalegno floors are available in oak, bamboo, and tropical wood sorts (wenge, doussie, merbau, teak, and walnut). The floors have a thickness of 10mm (top layer 2.5mm), 15mm (top layer 4mm), or 21mm (top layer 6mm). Most products are 1860mm long, but it is also possible to opt for extra long planks of 2200mm or even 4500mm long. There is also a choice in the width: The choices vary from 127mm to no fewer than 320mm. The fitting can be done with

tongue and groove or with a click system.

Also in terms of quality sorting, Lalegno offers its clients a vast range of options. The wood is sorted in diverse groups with their own look & feel.

Lalegno has untreated parquet, but also parquet which is oiled, varnished, smoked, or distressed. All together, in its standard programme, Lalegno offers about 120 different parquet floors. In addition, there are plenty of customised options available for clients. Lalegno sells both two and three-layer floors. Both systems are of equal merit. Traditionally, many parquet fitters have opted for the unfinished version, which they can then treat themselves in accordance with client wishes. Nevertheless, it is noticeable that the proportion of pre-finished floors is still growing. In particular, the smoked/oiled floors, including the CHABLIS, LOIRE, BEAUNE, and CHARDONNAY, are enjoying huge success.

Oosterlinck Oosterlinck produces multi-layer parquet in thicknesses of 21/6mm, 16/4mm, and 13/4mm in which the first figure gives the total thickness and the last figure gives the thickness of the top layer. The structure of the semi-solid parquet is two-layer whereby the top layer is glued onto birch multiplex. The most common widths are 160, 180,

and 200mm, but the company can produce parquet up to 280mm wide. The growing demand for engineered parquet and more flexibility has led Oosterlinck to equip itself fully with modern machinery so that they can do everything internally themselves from the sawing of the top layers to the planing, sandpapering, and packing. This means that the company can respond fairly quickly to market demands and is much less dependent on suppliers. One of the company’s very strong assets is its large supplies of raw dried wood in both oak and exotic wood sorts so that it can delivery orders quickly.

Oosterlinck supplies about 50% of its floors pre-finished.

Parketfabriek Lieverdink At Parketfabriek Lieverdink multi-layer parquet is parquet which consists of several layers, such as Kahrs Linnea veneer floor, Kahrs wood-engineered parquet, and Q2 wide with a 4.5mm top layer. The most important ones for Parketfabriek Lieverdink are the Q2 floors (Q2 classic and Q2 wide, a solid wood top layer of 4/4.5mm on a 9/11.5mm birch multiplex layer). Q2 classic is available in all sizes which are also available in traditional parquet: 7, 9, 12, and 14cm and in all wood sorts, from maple to wenge. All possible distressing options are also available from smoking and ageing to Grigio, Sherazade, and the new Pastis in five colours. Q2

heywood VLOEREN

Bespoke Hardwood Flooring

Knotting Hill ‘Lappland’

DUTCH DESIGN Wide Plank

www.heywoodvloeren.com

The Netherlands

+31(0) 412 657 428 Floor Forum International 84

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Special

Producers of multi-layer floors

wide is available with PEFC French oak in 18.5, 22.5, and 24.5cm wide and in all colours and distressed forms.

Single-layer (traditional parquet) is still the most important link in the company. In patterns, too, traditional parquet is still the preferred choice. However, herringbone and Hungarian point are emerging also in Q2. Pre-finished in a distressed version is sold regularly at Lieverdink, but most floors are supplied pre-sandpapered and pre-treated. A brief extra sandpapering session removes any final unevenness and the floor looks rigid and flat.

temperature and moisture. This means it is possible to use wider floorboards of up to 400mm and longer lengths with no risk of curling or warping.

A multi-layer version is preferable with: - floor heating and/or floor cooling - an installation in the mountains or at sea - second homes.

These Multi-layer parquet floors are being used increasingly for new buildings, not just for their greater stability, but also due to the trend for wider floorboards. The solid parquet is used more for renovation.

Van Landschoot

FPPI - Parqueterie Berrichonne At Parqueterie Berrichonne they regard a floor with a solid wood top layer at least 2.5mm thick as a multi-layer parquet floor. This is the minimum thickness prescribed by the NF EN 13756, which thereby sets out the condition for being able to talk of ‘parquet’ in Europe. And so, multi-layer parquet comprises a top layer and a so called base. Berrichonne offers parquet of 11mm with a top layer of 2.5mm and of 14mm with a top layer of 3.5mm on various bases. Sales of multi-layer (two layers) are growing strongly, partly thanks to the growing popularity of floor heating, which requires a stable floor. With similar dimensions you can imagine that, in the long term as well, a multi-layer parquet floor is more stable than a solid parquet floor. The limited thickness is also an advantage, not least with renovation. Nevertheless, in new buildings, too, people are increasingly fitting multi-layer floors. Pre-finished floors are clearly gaining the upper hand.

Parqueterie de Bourgogne We’re talking about multi-layer parquet floors as soon as a top layer is glued onto a bottom layer, even if the latter consists of the same type of wood. The thickness of the layer makes little difference. For the bottom layer we generally use poplar. In recent years, multi-layer or composite parquet has gained an increasing market share. At the moment, we also sell just as many multi-layer floors. We produce our engineered parquet floors with the same oak wood that we use for solid parquet. Once the floor is fitted, it’s impossible to see a difference. Technically, multi-layer parquet is a technical parquet which is affected less by fluctuations in

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Van Landschoot has floors with top layers of 3, 4, or 6mm in their range.

The company produces two-layer parquet floors on a birch multiplex base. The most popular type of wood is still oak in various qualities and widths. In addition, they also produce parquet in other wood sorts such as elm, walnut, afrormosia, wenge, larch, thermal oak, and brown oak. The floors from Van Landschoot are perfectly suitable for both new construction and renovation. Most of their floors are supplied raw, although pre-finished floors are gaining in popularity.

To make things easier for our clients, we’ve compiled a sample box. This box contains 20 colours, both oil and varnish. The various options for the finish are included. Lightly brushed, sawn effect, V-groove, etc.

Wood Experience / Baltic Wood /Holzexport Wood Experience is the agent for Belgium for the trademarks Baltic Wood and Holzexport, both from Poland. Baltic Wood, like most top European producers, opts for a three-layer composition with an intermediate layer of slow-growing wood (oak/epicea/spruce). The top layer is 3.8mm and the total thickness 14mm, whilst the length is always 2200mm. The middle layer is glued in such a way that the growth rings are square to the top layer for maximum stability. Holzexport is a leading producer for engineered herringbone and Hungarian point in thicknesses of 11mm (3.6mm top layer) and 14mm (top layer 6mm). The 11mm floor has two layers (oak/spruce), whilst the 14mm floor has three layers (oak/spruce/ oak for extra stability because the top layer is 6mm). Some advantages of Holzexport and Baltic Wood as compared to the multiplex composition of other producers include the better calibration and quality control. Both the bottom layer and the top layer are made by the producer itself, in contrast to producers who use multiplex as a base. These are usually purchased externally, and that means there is less control over the production process. All floors are finished. At Holzexport the ratio of rough/pre-finished is 90/10, whilst at Baltic Wood this is 70/30.

Special

Subfloors

HARD FLOOR = SOFT SUBFLOOR AND VICE VERSA SUBFLOORS IN ROLLS COMBINE DIFFERENT FUNCTIONS Obviously, the title of this article doesn’t present a universal truth in itself. There are no universal truths, but with that little sentence as ‘a rule of thumb’ you’re often on safe ground. Since flexible floor coverings are rather impressionable, any unevenness in the substrate is transferred ‘ flexibly’ to the visible floor covering. That is not the case with a hard floor covering. And so, for floor coverings such as LVT or linoleum we look for floor coverings with a higher density than for laminate or multi-layer floating parquet. Flexible subfloors often combine different beneficial functions for those harder floors.

Functional properties Levelling capacity A level substrate is necessary for the floating fitting of a wooden floor or laminate. If we fit a floor onto hard concrete or a screed, the subfloor can provide the levelling. This can be achieved by choosing a subfloor with soft material with a minimum thickness of 2.5mm and a minimum density of 20 kg/m³. And so, you should always check an official report about the density. The density of the product should also be stated on the label.

Moisture resistance capacity A good waterproof foil is necessary to prevent rising damp. This is absolutely essential in a newly built home and on the ground floor. This foil is available separately, but is integrated with various subfloors. The foil should be sufficiently thick; with LDPE foil at least 150 microns (0.15mm) and with PP/PET foil at least 15 microns (0.015mm). The foil is fitted overlapping. In the other case the joints have to be sealed.

Impact sound reduction

with floating floors and is therefore muffled. That is possible with a heavy subfloor or with a self-adhesive subfloor. After all, the mass of the subfloor and/or the removal of the layer of air help to reduce sound.

Thermal resistance Floor heating as the main source of heating is becoming increasingly popular. Thermal resistance is important if a subfloor is used in combination with floor heating. Floor heating is ideal as long as the heat resistance of the entire floor (subfloor + floor covering) is no more than 0.15m² K/W. With a low temperature or low output floor heating systems, this must not exceed 0.12m² K/W.

The versatile ‘roll’ In just about all parts of the building we see how science lies behind the origin of new forms of technology, which, in turn, lead to techniques which can be used in practice. An objective which is often strived for here is the integration of various properties into one building element and the latter has become a matter of course in the parquet sector. If we just take multi-layer parquet, which actually means an integration of all phases of the traditional parquet craft in one single floorboard: Subfloor, adhesive, top layer, and even a finish are fully integrated. This is true whether laminate floors have an integrated soundproof subfloor or even have integrated floor heating. The versatile and extremely varied demands which can be made of a subfloor mean that integration of properties is obviously the right thing to do.

If you had to fit a separate subfloor for each functionality, you would get a ‘roll feast’ in the case of floating floors. And so, most subfloors in rolls combine ‘properties’. The damp screen is integrated, they level the substrate, and they usually provide acoustic insulation.

Impact sound reduction is the reduction of sound downwards.

Reducing sound downwards is now obligatory in blocks of flats, where an impact sound reduction of 10dB is mandatory. Demands from the association of owners or announced in division charters of more than 10dB are therefore not valid. Impact sound reduction is measured by a recognised testing centre in accordance with ISO 140-8 and in accordance with ISO 717:2 and indicated by Llin. The readings are taken under pressure. All other values of expression are invalid. Look for the correct statement on product packs and labels and always ask for an official report. Always note which hard floor covering this value applies to. A subfloor certified for click laminate obviously doesn’t give the same result with engineered parquet or a solid parquet floor.

Airborne sound reduction The airborne sound of a floor is the sound which we ourselves make in the room by walking on the floor. Airborne sound is expressed in Sone value. The higher this value is, the better the sound reduction. With a Sone value of more than 20, the so called ‘clicking sound’ increases

Photo – Bona

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Floor Forum International 84

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Special

Producers of Hungarian point and fish bone parquet : solid and multi-layer

HERRINGBONE AND HUNGARIAN POINT YIELD TURNOVER CERTAINLY A PERFECT MATCH FOR THE MODERN INTERIOR

Photo – Design Parquet

Hungarian point and herringbone (and other traditional fitting methods) really do give professionals a chance to stand out. Amongst imposed tests which we’ve admired at various parquet competitions, we’ve seldom seen a simple and straight strip floor. Old fitting patterns are the acid test of real professionals and give them opportunities to make a difference. The fact that these patterns often consist of 6.2mm traditional parquet or 9mm Burgundy means using old skills in any case. Besides the fact that we’re talking about traditional fitting, the preparation also needs lots of attention and, above all, the room has to be measured for a balanced spread. For real professionals this is a market of clients who are looking for ‘that little bit extra’.

Patterns dominate A wooden floor can provide warmth and cosiness in the interior in a highly discreet manner. Take, for instance, a strip parquet floor in light (French) oak, with neat and even floorboards in the same size and

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preferably matt oiled. Such a floor can provide peace and quiet in the busiest and most pompous framework. Boisterous wallpaper, bright paintings with multicoloured landscapes, antique tables with tawdry china set out on display as if it were in a museum, and, then, that peaceful, light, and serene oak floor: ultimate impartiality as far as the styles are concerned.

The effect of patterns As soon as we start experimenting with the strips, sort of wood, sizes, and fitting method, the floor starts to play another part. Its impact increases. Whether or not the floor takes on a dominant character within the interior is directly in proportion to the extent to which we allow its ‘look’ to take priority over the rest of the room. Simply changing the width of the strips for the aforementioned serene oak floor changes its impact. Varied widths make the floor ‘move’ and bring it to life! Every deviation from the purely even takes us further away from neutrality. Just about all fitting patterns have that effect. The more complex they are, the stronger they are.

Patterns with impact Just as in the furniture trade, we have seen over the course of the centuries how parquet traders have managed to deal creatively with wood sorts, sizes, glosses, colours, and, especially, the way in which the strips were fitted in relation to each other. More or less boisterous and complex patterns have arisen, influenced partly by building styles and periods. Mosaic was prominent in a certain era. However, it was also possible to lay brick pattern, English bond, and such like with the small blocks. The pattern, together with the differences in colour between the individual wooden floorboards, ensured a certain vitality. Traders made even more impact with book form or end grain blocks or, even, a complete revolution with cross-cut, which gives the floor a completely different dimension.

Patterns pile up None of the most common patterns actually originated in ‘our’ day and age. In fact, patterns seldom belong to a specific period in time.

The reason for that is the ongoing development within the history of architecture. Just about all periods show signs of styles which, on the one hand, are innovative for their age and, on the other hand, reflect something of the past. Innovation and nostalgia, hand in hand. The procession of Echternach. The patrimony of styles comes about like a rolling snowball. The core remains, but new snow comes on board without the old snow falling away. The result? A vast pallet of fitting methods which surely provides something for everyone.

MANUFACTUROR OF SOLID AND ENGINEERED WOODFLOORS Style panels, end grain, distressed floors (different ageing techniques ‘sanded, brushed, tumbled, smoked and structured’): Customised work on simple request!

And in different floor types We can prove that all those fitting patterns have an impact on the entire interior architecture by means of the phenomenon that manufacturers of completely different types of floors such as vinyl, linoleum, PVC, and laminate also include them in their range. That phenomenon also proves at once that those patterns are appreciated by a wide target group.

And then that whirlwind Hungarian point and herringbone really are ‘mavericks’ amongst fitting patterns. Their impact is relatively great. They pierce the space like a spear! Sharp whirlwinds which mean that the room is constantly in motion. Sharp? Yes, they both have a ‘point’, albeit each in their own obstinate way. We’ll briefly outline the difference once again to refresh everyone’s memory. The name itself reflects the herringbone fitting method: The floor is made from approximately the same parts as ordinary strip parquet, but the parts are fitted in the shape of a herringbone. This means the head side is fitted square against the long side of the floorboard next to it at an angle of 90°. The herringbone comes entirely into its own when it is enclosed by a border and locking friezes (a belt of strips which are fitted square to the direction of the parquet). With Hungarian point the heads of the strips are sawn at an angle of 45 or 60°. Once the heads are fitted so that they connect with each other, two strips together form an angle of 90° (sawn at 45°) or a less sharp angle of 120° (sawn at 60°). A frieze is sometimes placed between the rows. In the 17th century, it was often necessary to apply a double beam to support the joints. Parquet floorboards in those days were fastened in place by nailing them with wrought iron nails.

Multi-layer gains ground Elsewhere in this edition we consider the assets of multi-layer floors in depth. The main ones are the stability, the speedy fitting, and the fact that with renovation the project manager, who may be a resident in the property, will experience little inconvenience from the fitting. And so, it’s no surprise that the patterns discussed here are also on offer in multi-layer.

B.J. Parket

BVBA

INDUSTRIESTRAAT 44 9240 Z ELE – B ELGIUM TEL: +32 52 44 45 57 FAX: +32 52 45 06 71 EMAIL: INFO@BJPARKET.BE WWW.BJPARKET.BE

Special

Producers of Hungarian point and fish bone parquet : solid and multi-layer

Other reasons

Design Parquet

Herringbone and Hungarian point have also made their entrance in multi-layer floors. Apart from the main reasons which we have mentioned, there is also the matter of the more limited construction heights, which often makes them more suitable for renovation. Strictly speaking, there is no reason whatsoever not to opt for multi-layer floors. After all, producers offer both solid wood and two and three-layer floors.

Design Parquet, an expert in the manufacture of special panels, has noticed a growing appreciation for these floor patterns. The company has been responsible for completing several prestigious projects. As regards the fitting, it’s essential to start in the centre of the room. Here, too, oak is the most greatly appreciated and the most suitable type of wood.

Other sorts of wood are also used, albeit less frequently, and they include doussie, wenge, and cumaru. At Design Parquet they produce the greater part of these floors in solid wood, but, over the past four years, the company has also been offering multi-layer, which now enjoys the preference.

The balance swings In spite of the above, until recently, a lot of producers greeted the entrance of these fitting patterns rather ‘reluctantly’. Solid wood was king. That could be explained by the fact that lots of clients who chose such floors also opted for a classic fitting, a (more than) lifelong lifespan, and endless renovation possibilities (endless sandpapering).

Today, the balance has seemingly swung in favour of multi-layer floors.

That is quite logical considering the development of wooden floors in general.

The move to pre-finished It’s only a short step to the next option. Today, there are also herringbone parquet floors (14mm) with tongue and groove. What’s special about these floors is that you need two sorts of strips, a ‘left one and a right one’, as the professional goes. If the groove is on the left and the tongue on the right with one strip of the herringbone, this has to be the other way round for the other strip. After all, you’re working in reverse.

Recently, Hungarian point and herringbone patterns have also become available in pre-finished and equipped with a click system i.e. for floating fitting.

Flamingo Parket

A selection from the range BJ Parket

A few years ago, there was less demand for herringbone, but that situation is changing. Hungarian point, by contrast, has always been a product with good sales. There are important points for attention as regards the fitting. Firstly, lining out the floor for the fitting is absolutely essential. Usually, the floor fitter will start laying the first strips in the middle of the room so that the strips end parallel with each other as they run towards the sides. Basically, you can use any sort of wood which is suitable for parquet floors. With Hungarian point the lanes are clearly delineated, whilst with herringbone the strips overlap somewhat so that the lanes are less clearly delineated. For a good quality result these patterns have to be perfect in terms of dimensions, and that requires some skill. Otherwise, some of the parquet will be wasted and the floor fitter may find this hard to absorb.

BJ Parket offers both solid wood and multi-layer. In recent years, the distressed versions, both Old Flemish style and style panels, have been very much in fashion.

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Flamingo Parket has certainly felt an increase in these patterns.

Ready-to-fit floors, often distressed, make things easier in terms of fitting. Flamingo Parket does believe that these floor patterns are a job for professionals. They also regard them as an opportunity for real parquet floor fitters to parade their skills. The most important point is that the floors are laid out properly starting from the middle of the room. The dimensioning has to be 100% accurate, so that there is no wastage. In the case of sandpapering after the fitting it will also be absolutely essential to follow the correct sandpapering directions.

Basically, all sorts of wood are suitable, although the weight of preference leans towards oak. As a rule, floor fitters work with a border and edging in which the edging usually consists of a different sort of wood such as wenge. Flamingo Parket produces herringbone and Hungarian point in both 6 and 8mm traditional parquet and in 16 and 18mm twin planks. In herringbone traditional parquet of 8mm still accounts for the lion share at Flamingo Parket with 60%.

Habo At Habo, too, Hungarian point and herringbone are classics which are still extremely popular. There is clearly a trend towards a return to traditional patterns. At Habo, they believe that fitting a traditional 9mm parquet floor in Hungarian point or herringbone perfectly requires real expertise. After all, a Hungarian point has to be laid perfectly square and filled and sandpapered meticulously after the fitting. Fitting the lines in relation to the incidence of light largely determines the aesthetic aspect of the floor. Habo always calculates the correct width

of the Hungarian point lanes for its clients, in accordance with the size of the room in which the floor is to be fitted. This means that the lanes are always lined up perfectly in relation to the entire width and length of the room. Hungarian point and herringbone can be produced in any sort of wood. However, a good 90% of orders are in French oak. The most commonly requested exotic sorts are American walnut and wenge. Habo offers these patterns both in solid wood (6.3 and 9mm) and in two-layer (13 and 18mm). They can produce a wide range of dimensions in solid wood. However, in multi-layer only large dimensions are possible. Solid wood is sold here most of all.

Junckers At Junckers these classic patterns account for about 2% of the total production, but that share is growing. For Junckers these patterns account for about 3% of the market. They believe that the fitting

requires special skills and that this is part of a parquet floor fitter’s basic training. In the field of production the precision of the dimensioning is primary. As regards wood sorts here, they mention oak, merbau, and beech. Junckers offers solely 100% solid wood floors.

Kerkhofs Parket We are seeing increasingly that design floors are becoming more popular. The trend is that end users like to get a ‘different’ floor to that of their neighbours and want something special, so they call upon the services of a parquet professional who can offer that. This is an opportunity for professionals to show their expertise. Hungarian point and certainly herringbone patterns are increasingly in demand and therefore Kerkhofs Parket is producing them more. For the production of these design floors they have purchased a highly accurate CNC guided sawing machine. Herringbone and Hungarian point is

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LOFT PRO

Cotton Cotton parquet flooring brings refinement and elegance to a room with its white and glossy varnished

Loft Pro Semi-solid Oak Prime/rustic grade 16 x 180 x 1500-2200 mm 2 bevels, Tongue & Groove

www.designparquet.fr Floor Forum International 84

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Producers of Hungarian point and fish bone parquet : solid and multi-layer

together, the collection numbers 12 variants, 6 naturally oiled herringbones with a somewhat rougher terra cotta look and an irregular joint and 6 more modern matt lacquered herringbones for the somewhat more rigid home.

available in all possible sorts of wood and thicknesses. Oak is one of the most popular sorts, but people are increasingly choosing other sorts such as wenge and afzelia. We offer these in solid wood, multi-plank and pre-fab. Hungarian point is often calculated tailor-made in accordance with the size of the room in question or, for example, the length size. The photograph below shows a herringbone floor in various widths, planed three-sided, and finished with the Tover Essenza, which gives a natural look.

Oosterlinck

Lalegno At Lalegno they have noticed that year by year interest has grown in wooden floors in which design plays the main part, as is the case with Versailles panels and herringbone parquet. There really is a trend in choosing, in combination with very rigid design furniture, the unique line play which makes these parquet floors so splendid.

The Lalegno DESIGN series is a range of stabilised multi-layer oak parquet floors which houses all our design floors. Apart from the 20-CLASSIC-80 x 80-BRUT-VERSAILLES and the 15-ABC-122-BRUT – VG, splendid oak floors such as the FINE LINE, the LINE, and the CUBE, are also enjoying lots of success and are well spoken of by parquet professionals and (interior) architects. At the end of this year, the Lalegno DESIGN will be extended to include a multi-layer Hungarian point parquet in oak.

Meister Premium herringbone Residence PS 500 In the Longlife parquet Residence, they are highlighting the new product PS 500: an exceptionally wide herringbone (size: 710 x 142mm) with opportunities for all sorts of patterns which brings the classical ‘herringbone’ theme into line with the present time. And it’s completely natural, homely, and timelessly attractive, with light colours and pure shades, but also in darker oak variants. The new Quadroclic Plus is applied as a click system with PS 500. This Fold-Down system makes it possible to work simply, quickly, and safely and, apart from classic herringbone, it is also possible to fit various other patterns such as irregular bond, regular bond, or block, ladder, and plait patterns. All

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Herringbone and Hungarian point are fitting patterns which have been in existence for a long time. In bygone days, they were generally fitted in castles and mansions due to their luxurious character. Since the 1970s, herringbone and Hungarian point have largely been displaced as a result of the emergence of wooden floors. However, in recent years, demand has started to increase modestly once again.

Oosterlinck, too, is witnessing a growing demand. Producing both herringbone and Hungarian point requires a very precise setting of the machines because even the slightest deviation causes severe problems with the fitting. That is why, six years ago, Oosterlinck purchased an expensive but extremely accurate machine to saw planks perfectly in the width, length, and in the angles. So far, both fitting patterns are made solely in solid wood in thicknesses of 6.2, 9, 14, and 21mm. Apart from classic oak, there are also scores of exotic wood sorts available. The two most commonly requested dimensions are 355 x 71 and 450 x 90mm, but there is a trend towards wider and longer planks.

FPPI - Parqueterie Berrichonne Traditional fitting patterns have never been away and are now even gaining ground. They’ve come a long way through history via the finest houses and castles to emerge again in contemporary homes. These patterns are doing well in both classic and modern interiors, so there’s clearly a good market for these floors. At Parqueterie Berrichonne they believe fitting these floors is a job for experienced parquet floor fitters.

Trap Flooring

The start is absolutely crucial because the correct reference line has to be set out. For historical reasons oak is the most popular wood sort.

These floors can trace their origin back to the most attractive castles from an age when the French had oak as their preferred wood sort. As far as production goes, it is mainly Hungarian point which is more intricate and expensive due to the oblique sides. They result in a certain loss of wood. Parqueterie Berrichonne makes these floor patterns in multi-layer. Multi-layer is gaining ground, partly due to its great stability.

Parqueterie De Bourgogne

Trap Flooring has noticed a growing demand for patterns such as herringbone and Hungarian point, not only in Belgium but also on export markets. This is coming mainly from the commercial market (e.g. hotels and restaurants), but demand from end consumers is clearly noticeable and striking.

In their new factory in Hungary they are concentrating extra on this. Trap Flooring has invested in extra machines for perfect dimensioning of these pattern floors, four sides of tongue and groove and with left and right elements, both in multi-layer parquet (multiplex birch) and in solid wood. There is Hungarian point with angles of 45 or 60°. Trap Flooring provides the following standard sizes: 70 x 350, 90 x 450, and 120 x 600. Other sections are possible on request. Trap Flooring offers both herringbone and Hungarian point in a wide range of over 20 wood sorts. Apart from oak (in 30 colours!), it is particularly popular in American walnut and exotics. It is oiled in the factory in advance, but it can also be supplied in a lacquered version. The floors finished in the factory have a microbevel around them, whilst the unfinished floors have no bevel. A correctly laid floor in herringbone or Hungarian point gives the room extra character as well as giving the floor fitter extra satisfaction.

Van Landschoot

Until a few years ago, fitting Hungarian point and herringbone was reserved for the renovation of old parquet floors, Haussmann flats, prestigious homes, and such like. Nowadays, however, there is a growing demand for design projects. These are always projects in the high range. To have these parquet floors installed, you need to approach a professional floor fitter, who is capable of drawing up a design which takes specific account of the site. Fitting rules must be respected. For example, the fitting must consider the position of the windows, the axis of the paths if there is a chimney, the widths of the paths, and such like. In terms of wood sorts there are no specific requirements, since the requirements are the same as for fitting classic parquet with English pattern. They produce these parquet floors to order, as required by the client. The production has to be absolutely precise. After all, a tenth more or less or the slightest variation in the cutting angle can give rise to major anomalies in the fitting. The biggest part of their production of these floors is formed by solid wood parquet floors, but, in order to go along with modern requirements such as floor heating, demand for long floorboards, and such like, they also produce these parquet floors in multi-layer designs.

Visit www.floor-forum.com

At Van Landschoot they have the impression that old patterns such as Hungarian point and herringbone design are coming back strongly into fashion. There is talk of a renewed interest. At all events, they are convinced that fitting these floor patterns should be part of every professional parquet floor fitter’s basic training. The fitting certainly requires some special points for attention. With Hungarian point in particular, the first fitted row is vitally important. All types of wood are suitable for these fitting patterns, certainly with multi-layer, yet it is still oak which has the upper hand along with walnut, afrormosia, or elm. It is important for the production that the shape is perfect, especially for Hungarian point. Van Landschoot produces only multi-layer floors.

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Project

Blanchon (FR)

RENOVATED SALLE PLEYEL IN PARIS GETS 2000M² OF BASRALOCUS HARDWOOD BLANCHON SOLID’OIL™ ENSURES DURABLE AND LOW-MAINTENANCE PARQUET

The renovated Salle Pleyel presents the City of Lights with a completely renovated concert hall within walking distance of the Arc de Triomphe to attract contemporary music lovers. During the renovation, the workers paid a lot of attention to the acoustics and, to that end, they used a sumptuous amount of wood. On the floor we find FSC approved solid basralocus hardwood from Design Parquet, which is impregnated and protected with Solid’Oil™ hard wax oil from Blanchon.

All together they fitted 2000m² of basralocus hardwood in the Salle Pleyel. About 1000 square metres were set aside for the concert hall itself, whilst the other 1000 square metres are found in the places around the concert hall, namely the entrance, restaurant, and foyer. The concert hall interior has been designed by the

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Paris design bureau DVVD. Typical is the voracious use of dark wood on both walls and floors. The colour of basralocus, its availability in FSC, and the wood’s renowned durability made it the ideal choice for this location.

Absorbent materials for acoustics Salle Pleyel was erected almost a century ago by piano maker Pleyel (see also frame) and was given a large-scale renovation after the holding Fimalac concluded an operational agreement for the next 15 years. The idea is to make this hall the location for all performances of modern and contemporary reinforced music. This means that the other major Paris concert hall, Cité de la Musique, can be devoted fully to classical music concerts. The acoustics in Pleyel have also been geared to reinforced Music in which everything revolves around absorption. This yields really pure sound acoustics.

Solid’Oil™ from Blanchon protects parquet completely The choice of floor fell to a solid 10mm thick basralocus floor from the French manufacturer Design Parquet. The wooden floor with planks 230cm long and 35cm wide in multi-strip was finished with two coats of Blanchon Solid’Oil™. The bottom coat was Solid’Oil™ Antic, which nourishes the wood deep down and preserves its sober colour. This ensures a dark colour which reminds us of wenge. This was finished with a second coat of Solid’Oil™ Natural. That ensures the wood is fed deeply and is exceptionally well protected against the intensive use to which the floor will be subjected.

Vincent Lepais, purchasing manager at Blanchon says: ‘The access zone of the hall has to cope with about 3000 visitors for each concert.

With rock or pop concerts, when the detachable seats are removed, the floor has to cope with the dancing and shuffling of an exuberant crowd. The remarkable durability of Blanchon Solid’Oil™ ensures that we can face such things with confidence. Since we finished the parquet floor in the MUCEM museum in Marseille with Solid’Oil™ over five million visitors have been to the museum, yet there, too, the parquet floor still looks in good condition. That reference helped us to persuade the clients to go for Blanchon Solid’Oil™.’

Refined joinery in combination with parquet The hall has two balconies at the back and on the sides (which were given a refreshing wood finish by the joinery Luso PP) and pit section with a gently sloping section towards the stage. For the gradient of the stage the workers used solid wooden crates onto which the seats were mounted. The different heights of the wooden crates created a gradual slope. Vincent Lepais from Blanchon explains: ‘The Paris parquet specialist Gaucher, led by Mr Moreira, installed the parquet immaculately on the sloping floor. The use of laser recording ensured a perfectly level slope. Floor sections were milled at the point where the detachable seats come.’

For more information visit us at www.blanchon.com

Salle Pleyel – a great name restored to glory Pleyel is a maker of pianos and design Furniture with a history going back over 200 years in making pianos. Almost one hundred years ago, the director of Pleyel decided to build a concert hall with 3000 spaces. The central idea in the creation of the hall was that all the knowledge then available in the field of acoustics would be applied to ensure fantastic sound and also to allow the quality of the Pleyel musical instruments to come fully into their own.

From the very beginning, the acoustics of the hall enjoyed a fine reputation. Big names such as Stravinski and Ravel were present at the inauguration. In the subsequent decades, the Salle Pleyel has received lots of famous names, including Louis Armstrong, Django Reinhardt, Miles Davis, Keith Jarrett, Ray Charles, and Leonard Cohen. In the 1980s, the Paris Orchestra started performing there, led by Daniel Barenboim. In 1999, the old Salle Pleyel welcomed its last celebrity in Charles Trenet. Since this autumn, it is now possible to add to that list of musical greats again.

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Maintenance and cleaning products for floors in vinyl, PVC and LVT

ADAPTED MAINTENANCE PRODUCTS FOR VINYL, LVT, AND PVC FLOORS OFFER ADDED VALUE parquet. Anyone who wants to use an office chair on vinyl floors should ensure the chair has soft wheels.

Follow the maker’s instructions The maker will have some maintenance advice for any brand and type of vinyl floor. Never ignore the maker’s instructions. They know best how their products should be maintained over the years.

Extra polyurethane protection Manufacturers sometimes recommend giving vinyl floors an extra protective layer of polyurethane. This can prove its worth because it makes it easier to remove dirt and to repair minor scratches, which occur as the floor is used. Furthermore, any shoe-sole marks are also easy to remove. Moreover, this also provides a better seal for the joints between the strips and tiles to make the floor even more waterproof.

Photo – Bona

LVT, PVC, and other vinyl floors are well known for their easy maintenance. However, easy maintenance doesn’t mean no maintenance! To keep the hard top layer in the best possible condition, proper treatment and regular maintenance are the only guarantees for a long and attractive lifespan.

Vinyl is a floor covering which consists of a flexible and resilient synthetic. It is a synthetic material which comprises several layers. The bottom layer is covered by a reinforcement and protective layer of glass fibre, and then the decorative layer on top. The thickness of the transparent top layer determines the durability of the vinyl.

Prevention is better …

Faulty maintenance and incorrect usage can damage vinyl floors, even though they look quite strong. That’s why it is necessary to draw clients’ attention to a number of risks. Dirt and dust which is not removed regularly can cause the floor to age and wear out more quickly. A good doormat can prevent a lot of problems. It’s also a good idea to put coasters under furniture and chairs. If you want to move the furniture, it’s best to lift the furniture rather than sliding it, as is the case with

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Useful tips for keeping LVT, vinyl, and PVC floors in top condition - Remove loose dirt easily with a vacuum cleaner or squeegee.

- Mop the floor only with a well wrung mop. (A micro-fibre cloth system is recommended.)

- Replace the water regularly. This prevents streaks and doesn’t leave any dirt residue behind.

- Don’t allow splashes to dry into the floor. Mop them up as soon as possible.

A selection from the range: Bona Bona Spray Mop for Tile & Laminate and other hard floors enables you to clean and maintain your floor in no time at all. The Bona Spray Mop has a convenient design and is easy to use. It can be assembled and filled quickly using the specially developed Bona Floor Cleaner Cartridge. Just spray and wipe! • For hard floor coverings such as laminate, tiles, ceramics, PVC, linoleum, granite, and other hard floors • pH neutral cleaner • Refillable cartridge • Convenient design • Swivel foot to reach even the hardest places • Machine-washable micro-fibre Cleaning Pad • Bona Spray Mop • Micro-fibre Cleaning Pad, machine-washable up to 300x – also available separately • Cartridge Tile & Laminate Cleaner 0.85 litres – also available separately.

Blanchon At Blanchon they point out that ‘those who can cope with hard work can also cope with easy work’. And so, a product developed for parquet can also be used on soundly prepared ‘plastic’ floors. That means ‘metallisers’ for regular cleaning and power cleaners for the ‘restoration’ of worn top layers, and this for different types of floor. Blanchon also makes the aforementioned important distinction between ‘nourishing’ and cleaning. The range of products from Blanchon goes under the name of Blanchon Maintenance’ (‘Blanchon Entretien’). This range is offered in a handy showcase. One of the star products is Lagoon, a rapid cleaning product with spray and micro-fibre cloths. This combination appears in kit. The cloths can be machine-washed up to 500 times. For maintenance and renovation, they offer a full range, including two metallisers, namely Gloss Renovator (‘Rénovateur Satiné’) and Metamatt Renovator (‘Rénovateur Metamat’). These products are for renovation. For regular cleaning there is Lisabril Cleaner (‘Nettoyant Lisabril’) to complement the above-mentioned metallisers. Finally, two products perfect for cleaning and preparation for renovation are ‘Scouring Anti-Ageing (‘Décapant Dégraissant’) and the Superactivity Cleaner (‘Nettoyant Suractivé’).

Briançon Briançon recommends using the detergent for parquet and laminate. This universal product is suitable for parquet, laminate, vinyl, and PVC floors. To restore floors to look as good as new, Briançon also offers a renovation product ‘Renovateur Parquet Métalissant’. This product adds a protective layer on top of the top layer and this film repels dirt and prevents black marks from shoe soles. Both products are used together for maintenance and they ensure perfect maintenance.

Ciranova Ciranova recommends the use of HARD FLOOR FRESH, a universal cleaning product, for cleaning all types of varnished floors regularly. HARD FLOOR FRESH degreases and cleans the floor. There is also the UNICARE X-MATT, which can also be used for laminate and LVT. UNICARE X-MATT provides an extra protective film and removes micro-scratches to preserve the original look of the floor. For parquet traders and retailers Ciranova offers an attractive display case for maintenance and other products. They also have maintenance folders

for oiled, varnished, and laminate floors with an extra flyer for the UNICARE X-MATT.

Devo®/DevoNatural® All vinyl, LVT, and PVC floors can be maintained perfectly well using a number of adapted DevoNatural® and Devo® products. For daily cleaning and maintenance the DevoNatural® Soft Cleaner is perfectly suitable as it preserves the natural colour and gloss of the floor. The neutral domestic universal cleaner Devo® Softclean can be used for this purpose. Anyone who wants extra protection for their vinyl, LVT, or PVC floor can use the DevoNatural® Polish. For severe contamination they recommend the Devo® Strongclean or the DevoNatural ®Intensive Cleaner for intensive cleaning and the removal of old polymer layers.

Floorservice PVC floors are becoming more and more a trend when it comes to floor covering. You can find three maintenance and cleaning products for PVC floors in the Floorservice product range.

PVC Cleaner Floorservice PVC Cleaner can be used for daily and periodical cleaning of PVC, Linoleum and Marmoleum floors. Stubborn dirt can be removed easily, while the original colour and appearance of the floor is being protected.

PVC Polish PVC, Linoleum and Marmoleum floors can be perfectly maintained and protected with Floorservice PVC Polish. It creates a matt finish. The applied protective layer is very durable.

PVC Polish Remover This PVC Polish Remover removes old layers of Floorservice PVC Polish, or other water based maintenance products.

Floorboy XL 300 For removing Polish on large areas the Floorboy Xl300 is a very capable and handy machine. The colour and structure of the floor won’t be affected.

IRSA

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IRSA recommends the Aqua Cleaner 7001 for maintaining all vinyl and elastic floor coverings. This is a highly concentrated product (5 to 10cl per 10 litres of water), which is waterproof and cleans floors effectively. It prevents matt floors from turning glossy, even after heavy use. Moreover, it also has an anti-slip effect. For severe contamination it is also possible to use the IRSA Grundreiniger G88 (floor cleaner). IRSA also provides specific POS material for floor specialists.

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Special

Sanding machines : part 2

VERSATILE WORKHORSES FOR PARQUET FITTERS ROTARY DISC SANDERS IN ALL PHASES OF THE PARQUET CRAFT

Photo – Pallmann

Professional parquet floor fitters usually have at their disposal a sturdy arsenal of sanding machines, which are deployed in the various phases of fitting a wooden floor.

Sandpapering is one of the hardest and most crucial parts of fitting a wooden floor, and sanding machines, apart from company vehicles, represent by far the biggest item of expenditure for floor fitters. Within that ‘array’ of machines, the rotary disc sander is something of a maverick, if only because it can usefully perform a variety of greatly different tasks. Some specialist manufacturers see the rotary machine as the only one which could replace all the others, although such talk does their own shops out of business.

the cooking facilities are nicely fitted into or on an attractive wooden work surface used for intensive work. You can lay out salads on it, but also vinaigrettes, which invariably leave a mark on the wood. You can roll pizza pastry out on it or cut meat. However, sooner or later, that work surface is in urgent need of sandpapering. Moreover, a work surface of 1.60m by 70cm is just about small enough for you to do the job manually. You notice at once that for deeper and stubborn stains you tend to make straight movements over the stain whereby you use your free hand to put extra pressure on your working hand so that you can press the sanding tool even harder. After that, you voluntarily make round motions (and it happens almost automatically!), rotating movements, and you reduce the pressure on the plank.

From a ‘natural’ reflex

Analogy with sandpapering parquet

The logic which is applied to build up the arsenal of parquet sanding machines responds in some respects to a ‘natural feel’. To understand that, we have to examine a specific and fairly commonplace sandpapering task at close quarters.

It’s the same logic as for the successive actions with (firstly) the belt sander and (then) the rotary disc sander. Firstly, there is the straight and heavy movements for ‘rough’ work followed by the lighter rotational movements for the more precise finish. The lighter rotation movements should also more or less gloss over the marks left by the powerful straight movements (lane markings left by the belt sander).

Nowadays, some people are convinced that, if you make the rotary disc sander heavy enough to increase the pressure on the sandpapering

True to life Imagine you possess a modern outdoor kitchen where you may have installed both a barbecue and a small pizza oven as well as a sink. All

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tool, the machine will be perfectly suitable for carrying out the rough sandpapering as well. Not everyone agrees with that.

A selection from the range

Rotating – what exactly is it?

If the floor is finished with lacquer, the sanding machine is used for sandpapering between coats of lacquer. After the first coat of lacquer, different sorts of wood (certainly tropical sorts such as merbau) tend to swell up considerably. If this is the case, intermediate sanding is necessary. As soon as the lacquer has formed a film, sanding is no longer necessary. The rotary disc sander can be used to apply oil and wax and for polishing.

As official dealer of both Frank and Wolff, Alvaket Belgium bvba can recommend (and supply) the machines below for jobs like sandpapering parquet. The various motors of these two trademarks are induction motors, so they work without carbon brushes. These machines possess every imaginable technical gadget to promote work quality, efficiency, ergonomics, and convenience. We outline them with their ‘power’ and ‘weight’.

The Frank Spider has an extremely powerful 2000W motor with a soft start. Its own basic weight is 42kg. Then we have to consider the driven satellite disc (11.5kg) plus a detachable weight of 15kg, which is supplied as standard. It is also possible to order one or even two extra weights of 15kg in order to exert even more pressure on the floor. The Frank Mambo Evo has the same motor with a soft start as the Frank Spider, but it has a higher centre of gravity and runs even as fast as up to 450 revolutions a minute. Its own basic weight is 52kg plus a detachable weight of 18kg, which is supplied as standard. The Wolff Samba has a powerful 1700W motor. Its own basic weight is 44 kg and there is an option of a detachable weight of 11kg. A great variety of discs and sanding tools makes these machines suitable for a broad range of tasks. For efficient dust suction Alvaket offers the Wolff Vacuclean 2 and the Vacuclean 2 LP. Both achieve an air flow of 360m³/hour) and are dual-motor fine dust vacuum cleaners.

The difference between these two versions is the dust absorption. The one has a detachable chamber which is emptied whenever necessary, whilst the LP (Longo-Pac) has a 22-metre long plastic dust bag. If the visible section is full, it is tied up twice with a few centimetres in between using a cable tie and then cut in between. The bag in the cassette should be pulled down and it is then possible to carry on working.

Maintenance

Bona

We can identify three sorts of motions. Rotation is the circular motion of a body around one (central) point of that body. An eccentric motion is, in simple terms, a turning motion (rotation) combined with a motion up and down. With eccentric sanding machines you can make this motion by attaching round sandpaper to a flat sole with an elastic layer. Finally, oscillation is when the direction of the motion is repeatedly reversed from time to time. We get combined turning motions if we use several discs. You can reinforce the effect of the rotation by using (usually) three discs rotating in opposite directions. Strictly speaking, we are then combining rotation and oscillation.

‘Jack of all trades’ Disc sanders can be used in all phases of parquet fitting, from substrate preparation to the maintenance afterwards.

Substrate preparation We all know that a screed isn’t always ‘ready for glueing’. With new constructions it might be necessary to level the surface (due to tolerances permitted in the building industry), whilst in the case of renovation there might still be traces of old floor coverings. The rotary disc sander is used to polish a self-flowing levelling agent. If these machines are fitted with very hard sanding materials (e.g. brushes or heads), they can, as it were, ‘scour’ the screed. This removes old carpet or adhesive residue, putty, and such like with no problem at all.

Sandpapering parquet As we’ve already said, the heavier versions of rotary disc sanders can be used for levelling mosaic subfloors. Generally, they are not used until the endless belt sander has been deployed first.

Finish

The lighter versions of the disc sanders are used to apply oil or water and to maintain or renovate oil or wax floors. They are then transformed into ‘buffing machines’.

Renovation lacquer For lacquered floors the heavier versions of these machines are used to sandpaper the floor completely pale. At this point the rotary disc sander enjoys a clear preference over the belt sander. After all, it isn’t necessary to remove a (valuable) layer of wood in order to level the surface. Only the coat of lacquer has to be removed. This can be done both with floors fitted in the traditional way and with pre-finished floors.

Terrace renovation Apart from the various tasks involved in fitting indoor floors, this sanding machine also proves its versatility for renovating wooden terraces.

Fitted with the correct (hard) brush, the rotary disc sander can be deployed to clean terrace wood thoroughly and even to renovate it.

Visit www.floor-forum.com

Alvaket/Wolff /Unipro

For some years now, Bona has been selling the Bona Flexi Sand (1.5 and 1.9), the ultimate all-round parquet sanding and preparation machine. It can be used to refine subfloors with the (optional) Diamond or PCD Disc, sandpaper floors bare with the (optional) Power Drive (driven satellite disc), polish floors with the (optional) ‘traditional’ satellite disc, or apply oil with the standard supplied drive pad. The 1.9 version is 25% more powerful and 11% heavier than the 1.5 version.

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Sanding machines : part 2

Good dust suction is also absolutely essential with these machines.

The dust is removed from the floor so that the sandpaper can do its work efficiently. No dust in the room means less inconvenience for the client. Discharging the dust into a sealed bag is much simpler. The most important thing, as always, is that dust doesn’t get into people’s lungs! Here, too, Bona obviously has an adequate machine, the professional Bona Dust Care 70, for powerful and effective dust suction.

Devomat Industries The new Woodboy 4000/32-3 is the workhorse of Devomat Industries in every respect! The new 1500W motor has 50% more capacity than the previous Woodboy model! The cog wheel case, which is filled with oil, ensures perfect transmission. The machine is equipped with an easy fastening system for assembling various accessories. Each accessory turns the Woodboy into a different machine. Depending on the chosen application, it is also possible to fit the Woodboy with a dust suction unit or a water tank!

Moreover, by fitting a weight of 10kg to the machine, you can

NEW! Color Hardwax-oil 2K Lanai 071

The VOC-free finishing product with fast curing and full chemical and mechanical resistance after 24 hours.

Janna 170 Denali 175 Kamet 179 Pago 770

Available in 12 colours!

Pinta 773 Tanna 776 Savo 872 Rossing 875

Easy maintenance with

Floorservice Maintenance Oil!

Koro 972 Taupo 975 Sakar 979

Overmat Industries B.V. | Scharlo 11 | NL-5165 NG Waspik | The Netherlands Tel. +31 (0) 416 31 77 88 | Internet: www.overmat.nl | E-mail: info@overmat.nl

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improve its performances considerably. Furthermore, the new Woodboy model is fitted with an ATC system (automatic torque control). This is an electronic setting to absorb peaks and troughs in the power supply.

Devomat presents various dust suction solutions. Devomat industries also has the Devo Master 3D in its range. This three-disc machine for sandpapering and removing adhesive residue can also be used for many other tasks. Unique features include the strong casing in high-quality steel, a specially designed Lönne motor driven by an ABB frequency regulator, round cog wheel casing with double serrated Contitech belt, and a base drive plate with three Flexinav segment holders. They rotate in opposite directions on the base drive plate. The diamond segments are slid into a conical groove on the segment holders. Click, clack, and ready to start! The renewed zirconium parquet sanding discs, with fast adhesion, are fastened in place and removed in no time at all! The machine is designed to be connected to the Jumbo Finedust NDD-900 Finedust NDD-570 suction units.

Janser Trivo-Disc – the new star on the parquet horizon

All parquet floor fitters strive for a perfect parquet finish. A combination of the right machines, sandpapering tools, and finish products.

The Janser TRIVO-DISC is a drive plate with three sanding discs, which are self-driven by means of a belt. This can be used on 1-disc sanding machines.

Features of the TRIVO-DISC - Driven plate discs with the help of serrated belts, silent operation, fewer vibrations, and less wear and tear. Pressure rollers ensure the required tension of the drive belt.

-• Perforated Velcro discs and sandpaper ensure a good discharge of the dust and ensure thermal conduction.

- Wide openings in the drive plate for efficient dust suction.

- Simple and speedy assembly of the Trivo-Disch onto the Columbus or Numatic machines. (min. 1500W ) - A turn around of one out of four ensures an equivalent of 600 revolutions a minute, the ideal speed for sandpapering.

The weight of the Trivo-Disc has been chosen carefully to ensure that the machines don’t dance around and that they operate silently and with no vibrations. Connected to the Multivac II or III suction ring, it gives perfect dust discharge and a clean parquet floor at all times.

Since the Trivo-Disc can be assembled at lightning speed, floor fitters lose no time at all when they have to exchange the drive disc, so your machine is multifunctional. The Trivo-Disc was introduced for the first time during Domotex 2016 and, in the meantime, it has already acquired over 350 clients, who make use of this innovative

system. If you, too, would like to join the club of the convinced TrivoDisc users, contact us for more information or a demonstration with no obligation.

Klindex Klindex presents the Maxi Orbi.

This high-tech and professional single-disc machine is multifunctional and makes sandpapering easy, irrespective of the type of substrate. The number of possible tasks is well nigh endless: wax-removal, polishing, crystallisation, and light sandpapering on marble, concrete, stone, parquet or terra cotta, but also cleaning assignments on delicate surfaces such as carpet are possible. The oscillating disc head adapts to all surfaces and works easily even on uneven substrates with no trouble at all! The work is now even more simple due to the vast number of accessories and the big wheels. The complex high-speed rotation movement (rotational/orbital) gives the machine an exceptional stability and mobility to make crystallisation with steel wool child’s play. The sturdy chassis, the big wheels, the ergonomic grip, the light weight, and the release system for the most important parts (option) make the Maxi Orbi a strong, but easily portable machine. All the machine’s assets ensure that even less experienced professionals can handle the machine.

Lecol Amongst other things, Lecol sells the Lägler Single, the Cleanfix Powerdisc 165, the Floormac, and the Cleanfix R44-180. The Cleanfix R44-180 is a heavy and powerful single-disc machine. It is an all-round machine for all jobs such as buffing, cleaning, oiling, intermediate sandpapering, and subfloor treatment.

The Cleanfix Powerdisc 165 is a relatively light large single-disc machine. It is ideal for lighter jobs such as buffing, cleaning, oiling, and intermediate sanding. The PE 300 Floor Mac has been specially developed for cleaning and maintaining small to medium surfaces. The Floor Mac stands out from other traditional single-disc machines because of the oscillating motion of the brush. Lägler Single is a versatile machine which can be deployed not only for fine and intermediate sanding, but also for maintenance work and heavy subfloor operations. The efficiently constructed drive system guarantees an outstanding fine sanding result as well as a very effective result with heavier jobs. The sturdy and modern materials guarantee a virtually indestructible machine with a long lifespan. In

terms of sandpapering tools, the Multihole is the new tool for intermediate sanding and polishing a treated or an untreated wooden floor. The many holes in the disc in combination with the absorbent effect of the purple dust pad mean that the sanding dust is removed at once so that no new sandpapering scratches are caused by the sanding dust. Apart from the Cleanfix Floormac, all machines can be connected to the external dust suction unit Lecol Dust-control DC 2800A external dust.

Overmat Woodboy For decades our Woodboy has been the most multi-functional single-disc machine in the market. This machine is (a.o) being used for sanding, cleaning, buffing and polishing of floors. Also for floor preparation such as residue-removal, the Woodboy is the perfect machine.

HTC assortment In the Benelux Overmat is exclusive dealer of the high quality machines of HTC. They introduced new machines in September: DURATIQ 6 and DURATIQ 8. With more than 100 new features and up to 54% higher productivity these machines are born to set new standards. They are suitable for as well concrete, floor prep and wooden floors.

Frank assortment The Overmat belt sanders Frank Viper C and Frank Cobra Classic offer a high output. This is ensured by its powerful engine and robust construction. They are the ideal machines for professional sanding of parquet and plank-flooring. For edge grinding our edge-grinders Frank Gecko S, Frank Gecko L and Frank Gecko Star offers the solution.

Pallmann The Pallmann Spider has an extremely powerful 2,000W motor with a soft (silent) start. The basic weight is 42kg. We also have to add the weight of the driven satellite disc (11.5kg.) plus a detachable weight of 15kg., which is supplied as standard. It is also possible to order extra weights (15kg.). In order to exert more pressure on the floor.

The three-disc plate of 400mm makes it possible to sandpaper very close to the wall to render edge sanding largely superfluous. The endless adjustable variations in the handle mean users can adjust the machine as required. The open construction makes cleaning very simple. The large wheels leave no marks. The dust barrier and stainless steel adapter ensure that the Pallmann Dust vacuum sucks up dust efficiently.

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Floor Forum International 84

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UV lacquers and oils

TIME IS IMPOSSIBLY DEAR IN BUILDING UV FINISHES MEAN ‘PURE GAIN’

Photo – Decorad

Time is impossibly dear and that obviously applies to the building industry as well. After all, ‘time’ is just about the only precious commodity here on earth which you can’t buy. This means that any action in which you can reduce your use of ‘time’ as a raw material or as a production factor immediately gives you extra profit. The good thing about UV finishes is that they dry in no time at all. ‘Dry’ in this context doesn’t just mean dry to the touch, but fully cured and therefore ready for use. In some cases this can be a floor finish requirement demanded by the project itself or it might simply be ‘a pleasant bonus’ for the project manager and the floor fitter.

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The wonder of ‘fast drying’ In its most classic form ‘drying’ means a process in which moisture escapes from a more or less fluid material. This ‘escape’ can be speeded up to some extent through ventilation. Ventilation removes damp air so that there is more space for ‘escaping’ damp. This can best be illustrated by the operation or effect of a hair dryer (i.e. ‘air-drying’). In the case of finishes for parquet or other building products the second step involves the substances in the liquid substance staying put and entering into a reaction with each other under the effect of the surrounding air. This is called ‘setting’ or ‘curing’ and a classic lacquer provides solid protection in this way.

UV drying With UV drying it is not necessary for the damp to ‘escape’. If a paint consists of monomers together with a photo-initiator, the coating will set within a few seconds once the coating is applied and treated with UV light. Since monomers have low viscosity, there’s no need for the use of solvents or for dispersions to be made in water. This means there is no evaporation of solvents or water. Monomers form the basis of most binding agents used in the paint industry.

Not only UV At present, UV drying is the most advanced way of drying coatings quickly. And so, this technology is also applied frequently in an extensive number of domains (e.g. dentistry, printing, etc.). We can expect other systems to emerge within a relatively short space of time. After all, there are other forms of radiation which can be deployed to dry coatings quickly e.g. electro-rays, infrared light, radio waves, and microwaves. LED-lamp drying is also now emerging.

The value of ‘speed’ Saving time and space In production conditions (e.g. for parquet or laminate) rapid drying obviously has the advantage that you don’t need anything like as much space to allow floorboards to dry once the finish is applied. With UV drying the process can simply go ahead up to and including the packing with much less space. That’s a saving which can count.

On the site Now that UV is being applied increasingly on site, we’re also looking to see what gains are possible here as well. These can be found on two fronts. A particular deadline may be a condition for taking on a project (otherwise the project doesn’t go ahead). A hotel room which is renovated and fitted with a parquet floor can only remain ‘out of use’ for a short space of time, whilst you can hardly leave a school without a gymnasium or sports hall for a whole week. If you are unable to guarantee a speedy completion, the renovation probably won’t go ahead.

However, ‘speed’ can also generate profit for floor fitters in another way. If floor fitters have to spend less time on a particular site, they have more free time to work on another site. Projects don’t take as long and the end result is comparable in terms of quality. With ‘the cost of labour’ nowadays, that’s a gain not to be sniffed at.

Better protection UV lacquers and oils simply offer better protection. A product can stand out by yielding a better result with the same amount of that product than with other products. However, a product can also stand out if you can use it to achieve the same result with less product.

This is certainly the case with UV finishes. For a comparable quality (depending on the brand and composition) a quantity of 8 to 50gr/m² of UV product can compete with 100gr/m² of a traditional product.

That’s a difference which can count. Another important aspect is the fact that (industrial) UV lacquers and oils contain neither solvents nor water and consist (usually) of 100% solid components, something which is beneficial for the strength and durability. The resins used are harder in themselves and in the final analysis offer better protection for the product. Moreover, the fact that these finishes make it possible to add inorganic ceramic elements to the composition mean that they offer considerably more abrasion resistance.

UV for resilient floors The resilient floor market is a big one, that’s for sure. So big that just about all players who operate in other floor segments are also interested in resilient floors. The biggest surfaces can be found in

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schools, health care, and commercial premises such as shops and showrooms.

Not much UV The strange thing is that most of these resilient substrates are not given a coat of lacquer for protection (PU lacquer is used to a small extent), whereas that would be perfectly possible. We all know about the polymers (waxes) from the Linoleum cleaning companies.

According to some people, this would be much better and easier with a UV lacquer. After the customary preparation process, a single coat of lacquer is usually enough. With older linoleum floors, which, for example, are being treated for the first time, two coats will be applied on that one occasion.

Comparable benefits Protection with a UV finish offers the same benefits as with other types of floors. The main benefits are as follows: - The speed of the finish - Good chemical resistance.

- No ‘early damage’ to the floor if it is used before it is cross-linked (with UV this is instant) - Cleaning is easy (e.g. as compared to polymers/waxes for a floor) - No discolouration (as with polymers or PU lacquers) - Less interim maintenance.

A vast market A major player on the UV finish market has calculated for us approximately how big the market is. In short, the answer was as follows: ‘Each year, over two billion square metres of resilient floors are laid for the first time worldwide, with Europe accounting for 500 million square metres. I’m often asked how attractive this market is for lacquer producers in bulk (as we’ve already said, at present, hardly anyone uses lacquers, so there’s plenty of opportunity in this segment.’ To give an indication of what the volume could be, we have received the following calculation: - 500 million square metres laid annually - Lifespan of a floor between 10 and 20 years: 10 years => 5 billion square metres - Average of one renovation every three years with a new coat of lacquer (the interval period can be longer) => 1.7 billion square metres - Average coat thickness: 75 microns => 127 million litres - Each 1% share for UV on location is therefore 1.25 million litres of UV lacquer for Europe.

In view of developments particularly in hospitals a percentage of 20% in three to five years has been quoted, and that could be realistic for the share of UV on location within the elastic segment. Yet if it were merely a few %, even this means several million litres of UV lacquer.

What’s on the market?

Blanchon According to Blanchon, there are different levels of quality in the field of UV lacquers. Depending on the raw materials, composition, and type of industrial application, the lacquer will give the wood another degree of protection (e.g. against impressions, chemical resistance, or abrasion resistance). Due to the latest development of nano-particles, you get exceptionally strong lacquers. The big differences with a traditional lacquer are the raw materials used and, obviously, the drying method.

UV lacquers are geared to the client’s machines. And so, for example, the fluidity is adapted to the client’s infrastructure. According to Blanchon, the number of coats applied is important, but also the total amount of lacquer. With the Ciméthane UV, Blanchon has moved

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towards UV drying on site. In recent years (partly due to new machines), they’ve had highly satisfactory results (15,000m² in 2014).

Blanchon does warn, however, that you cannot use this application automatically as a matter of course, but the time-saving which it brings means it is certainly worth developing it further.

Ciranova Apart from elements such as coat thickness, the extent of cross-linking of a lacquer system is decisive for the chemical and mechanical resistance of a parquet finish. UV-setting lacquer systems have a high degree of cross-linking and exceed the resistance of a traditional finish system. The chemical composition of UV-setting systems is completely different as compared to traditional lacquer systems. The drying is an irreversible chemical process which starts after the UV exposure. UV oil is still an oil, but has more positive properties as a result of the exposure to UV rays. The various suppliers of machines and rollers all

have their specific points. Ciranova lacquer systems are suitable for this purpose and, if necessary, are adapted, often in consultation with machine manufacturers. UV lacquer is a declining trend for Ciranova as compared to UV oil. UV Oil is leading the field of protective products in Ciranova Industrial Finishes. Ciranova Industrial Finishes also enjoys a worldwide reputation with turnover from traditional finishes with stains, lye stains, and oils to solutions for industrial processors, the same look and appearance, but with adapted compositions and extremely good UV oils. Applying UV finishes on site is still quite rare, with a lot of advantages, but with lots of drawbacks and restrictions as well.

The technology is there, but it’s not something that they are promoting at present.

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Floor Forum International 84

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There is a growing use and acceptation of UV on site. The biggest challenge is to inform floor owners of the possibilities and benefits of using UV lacquers for their floors. The benefits are almost too good to be true: curing in a tenth of a second, very good quality, ecological, and easy to clean. The comparison which people often make is how it’s done in industry, but a better example for most people would be a dentist filling; the benefits here are the same. Apart from wood and concrete, there is a third segment where the use of lacquers is relatively new and where the use of UV on site offers particularly great benefits. This resilient segment (including linoleum, VCT, LVT, and vinyl) can be compared to concrete in terms of size and to wood in terms of complexity; the best of both worlds. The biggest surfaces within resilient (and attractive for the use of a UV lacquer) are health care, education, and retail. In recent years, following lengthy research and tests, more and more hospitals, for example, have opted to renovate the floor with a new UV coat of lacquer (as it is often applied in the factory) instead of working continually with a traditional coat of wax.

Big (university) hospitals have started and many others are expected to follow. The most important reasons for hospitals to work with a UV lacquer are the speed (patient rooms can be used immediately afterwards and there is very little inconvenience) and the quality (e.g. it is resistant to alcohol, so you don’t get any white marks with hand disinfectants). Yet, increasingly, people are realising that cleaning is easier and cheaper when a UV lacquer is used. The segments reinforce each other and we’re also seeing more and more players who operate in several segments.

Profiline UV Oil a surface is created with the looks and feel of an oiled floor, but with the benefits of faster production and packaging. Of course ensured with a high resistance against wear-and-tear, scratching and moisture influences. Floorservice Profiline UV Oil is available in different colours.

Floorservice Profiline Nature Protect UV In 2014 Floorservice introduced the invisible finishing product Nature Protect 2K. Now this waterborne product, to create an unfinished look on wood, is available for industrial use and UV-hardening. The optimal composition of Floorservice Profiline Nature Protect UV makes easy appliance on an industrial line and perfect hardening in almost all types of UV drying tunnels possible.

The additional maintenance product Nature Care is an unique product that retains the ultra matte look of the wood in a very easy way. Even after heavy use of the floor.

All the UV Oil products have a cured surface which is free off VOCemissions and therefore save for operators and environment.

Hesse Benelux Each finish product has its own specific benefits and drawbacks. The biggest advantage of a UV finish is the rapid drying time and thereby the short processing time. The resistance of the floor treated with UV products will therefore also be up to standard faster than the resistance of a floor treated with a ‘traditional’ waterborne parquet lacquer. UV lacquers set because radicals are present in the wet lacquer (highly reactive parts) which react to each other immediately after treatment with UV rays. There’s no evaporation whatsoever since the lacquer sets in a few seconds and is ready to be sandpapered or walked on. If necessary, the lacquer be adapted on the maker’s production line, but usually this isn’t necessary. UV finishes at Hesse comprise a considerable part of the turnover, not just in parquet, but also in the finish of panel materials and doors. For application on site Hesse offers the Herkulite programme.

Floorservice

Floorservice Profiline UV Oil The UV-curing Oil is suitable for all industrial production of parquet and wooden floorings, and can be applied on all regular oiling lines containing UV curing. After finishing with a second layer of Floorservice

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UV lacquers and oils

Lecol

development of these lacquers isn’t devoted to resistance to chemical abrasion, dirt, and scratch resistance, against which they are highly resistant. Pallmann doesn’t have any UV lacquers for industrial application. Pallmann has the Pallman X-Light system, a solvent and ozone-free system for the portable drying of UV lacquer on site. This system consists of a dual component primer X-Light Aquabase, a single-component lacquer X-Light Coat, and the X-Light Mobil, which has been developed specially for drying this lacquer. The result of the treatment is solid protection for the floor, which can be walked on immediately.

Plastor

Lecol sells a UV lacquer from Loba (in the Netherlands, Belgium, and the UK). This is the LOBACURE WS Rush. LOBACURE WS Rush is the new generation of finish products. This 1K waterborne UV lacquer really is ideal with projects where the floor has to be ready for use again on the next day (time is money!), such as hotels, restaurants, pubs, shops, and such like where top quality is required. The lacquer dries immediately when subjected to a special machine with a UV lamp so that the floor can be stepped on at once. And so, there are no waiting times!

Pallmann

UV lacquers don’t change the physical properties of the wood, certainly not the impressionability. And so, attention in the

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UV lacquers offers excellent resistance to abrasion, scratches, and marks. Traditional finishes such as dual-component PU lacquers form a constant film which arises more or less from strong connections between the molecules. This gives them a certain resistance.

With UV finishes this bond is much stronger as a result of the formation of bridges between the countless molecules. The formed film is stronger and provides better protection against abrasions and stains. The UV finishes from Plastor are adapted to the machines which are on the market. The star product is the UV Time®. Thanks to the instant setting, the treated floors can be used at once. This finish offers a previously unseen protection for the most intensively used floors. UV Time® contains no isocyanates. And so, there is no mixing with a hardener. With just 3g/l of volatile organic compounds, this finish is EC 1+ and it bears the quality label A+ as regards the indoor air.

Rigo Verffabriek As with any oil or lacquer finish, apart from the aesthetic aspect, the most important goal is to protect the floor from external influences. UV lacquer and oil are absolutely ideal for renovating floors which have to be ready for use again within a short space of time. After all, the drying time is considerably shorter than with oxidation drying lacquers.

Technically, the most important difference is that the setting/drying

of a traditional oil or lacquer sets/dries by oxidation in the air, whether or not in combination with hardeners/cross-links. With a UV lacquer or oil the setting/drying is brought about by photo-initiators built into the lacquer or oil, which are activated by UV light/rays. In the case of LYGHT UV OIL (Rigo), as with the very strong ROYL oils (Rigo), one coat is plenty. This builds up the protection from within the wood. In the case of LYGHT UV FINISH (UV lacquer), as with all other coat-forming systems, it is true that a second coat always offers extra protection. Unique is the combination which RIGO Verffabriek supplies with both products. A floor which is equipped with an initial protective coat and, if necessary, colouring by means of LYGHT UV OIL can be finished with LYGHT UV FINISH after it is dried with the UV lamp. The products LYGHT UV OIL and LYGHT UV FINISH have been developed specifically for use on site. To this end, Rigo Verffabriek Works in close co-operation with a manufacturer of mobile UV equipment. And so, these two products are absolutely ideal for the renovation market.

Rubio Monocoat

The mobile LED curing unit for working on site

now has one very beneficial and user-friendly alternative for both the industrial market and floor fitters who treat floors on location. The floor is dry and can be walked on immediately after treatment, whilst colour and protection meet the highest Vesting standards. Vesting supplies SOLELY the revolutionary LED hard wax oil for on site. With maximum protection and an extensive choice of colours as well as huge savings on energy consumption, low temperatures during the production process, a long lifespan for the lamps, low maintenance costs, and ecological processing due to the lack of ozone emissions, the LED hard wax oil is the star product at Vesting.

Rubio Monocoat Oil UV R2 is a UV-catalysed finishing oil for application on wood in industrial application lines. Just like the manually applied RMC Oil Plus 2C, this UV R2 oil is based on our signature molecular binding technology. Because Rubio Monocoat UV R2 is a natural oil, it is compatible with our standard series of products. Following the industrial application of Rubio Monocoat Oil UV R2, the wood may be easily reconditioned with Oil Plus 2C, the unique oxidative oil. The curing of RMC Oil UV R2 occurs by means of photoinitiators, in contrast to the manually applied Oil Plus 2C which sets via an oxidative process.

Anyone operating an industrial assembly line can conveniently switch to the use of Rubio Monocoat Oil UV R2 with a UV dryer installed at the end of the oil application line. In projects in which the flooring undergoes intensive traffic, Rubio Monocoat offers UV Topcoat. This oil serves as an additional protective layer for the wood and is available in different levels of gloss, so we have a solution for every market and taste.

Vesting The use of UV lacquer or oil has no different influence on the strength of the floor than, for instance, with the use of oxidation-drying finishes. The advantage of using a UV lacquer or oil lies in the faster drying. Vesting has an alternative for UV lacquer: Apart from the rapid drying the LED hard wax oil has lots of other benefits such as considerable savings on energy and maintenance. UV finishes at Vesting make up only a modest proportion of the total turnover. With the development of the LED hard wax oil, the company

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Producers of elastic adhesives

ELASTIC PARQUET ADHESIVES THE ART OF KEEPING MOVEMENTS UNDER CONTROL

Photo – Rubio Monocoat

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The towers of Dubai are wobbling. That was the title of an article in an international architecture journal in 2009.

The point of the article was that the megalomaniac project of Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, which, amongst other things, is part of an architectural race to build the highest towers on the planet, is almost financially ‘grounded’. Figuratively speaking, of course! Yet there’s more to it than that. The tallest towers on earth actually do move, even literally, and so they should. Everything around us moves. The extent to which that happens depends on lots of parameters. At all events, when we use building materials, we have to take those movements into account.

the same thing about five minutes later, you get a different view. The level where the restaurant is housed rotates on its axis. Surely that’s a unique piece of architecture? However, the experience gets just a little hair-raising when the guide/architect explains that at that height the flat never stands still. Of course, we all know that everything ‘gives’ a little, but this is a trajectory with the outermost points 10 to 12m apart. The initial reaction is to think that perhaps it would have been better for the entire structure to rotate a little ‘more securely’, but, obviously, nothing could be further from the truth. Without those sideways movements the tower would invariably break in half. This article is obviously about ‘elasticity’, a quality in materials which plays an absolutely crucial part in construction.

A restaurant in motion

The moving parts

From time to time, you witness a sublime experience. This was certainly the case when we had lunch at a restaurant ‘in the sky’ in the centre of Dubai (United Arab Emirates). We were sitting about 350m from the ground. The surprise? If you look outside through the panoramic window, you get a magnificent view of the city. However, if you do

Now what does all that have to do with a wooden floor? Answer: the point where we establish that a wooden floor, just like a tower block or any other building, is a combination of different parts, materials, and accessories with their own specific features. It will be clear that the composition of the different elements has to be as solid as a ‘rock’. It’s

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just that all those parts of the entire system ‘move’. Moreover, they all move in their own different ways: the steel of the nails, the concrete structure, the screed, the wood, etc. Of all those used materials wood is the most sensitive to fluctuations in the surrounding temperature and humidity (which are closely related for that matter). Moreover, as we’ve often said, in the past, we limited ourselves to oak wood, but nowadays all combinations are possible; and that brings us to the binding agent which has to hold all those parts together. A parquet adhesive has to be highly versatile. In the course of time, adhesive technology changes constantly, not least through the constant emergence of new building materials.

Elastic versus plastic The elasticity of a material indicates the extent to which a material exercises a counterbalance (the so called resilience) when it is distorted elastically (i.e. not permanently) or the extent to which a material is distorted through the application of a certain external pressure. And so, a material is defined as elastic if it returns to its original shape as soon as the external force disappears. Rubber is an example of a highly elastic material. Plastic or ductile distortion or deformation is also a term from materials science, which says something about the behaviour of a material whenever it is subjected to force. For example, a material can be distorted plastically if compressive force or tensile strength is exerted on it. In contrast to elastic distortion, plastic distortion remains even when the exerted force disappears. Plastic distortion often goes together with elastic distortion. In this case distortion is only partially permanent once the force disappears. The maximum pressure which a construction element can bear without becoming plastically distorted is called the elasticity limit or yield point.

Elasticity and parquet adhesive Elasticity is actually a crucial factor in glueing parquet properly. Over the years, producers have constantly gone down a road of trial and error which has led them to new insights and increasingly better compounds. The old solvent and emulsion adhesives are usually called ‘hard-plastic’. This means that those glues were able to withstand brief and limited forces, but they could not always retain their shape in the face of greater pressure over a longer period. If the wood is likely to move a lot (e.g. with major fluctuations in the humidity), we can prevent the exerted forces from having an effect on the substrate, especially the screed, by using a high-elastic adhesive. The glue absorbs the movement of the wood and always returns to its original shape. The drawback: With a high-elastic adhesive you more or less get a ‘floating’ floor. And so, the truth must lie somewhere in the middle.

Supple or stiff EN 14293 provides a simplified choice between supple and stiff adhesives. These two groups provide a solution to a specific expectation.

The key question is whether you want to counter the movements of the wood or give them some leeway. A stiff adhesive has strong physical and mechanic properties, weak elasticity, and high breaking resistance.

With straight-edged floors (e.g. traditional parquet) the wood shouldn’t normally be allowed to move. If, however, you do want to allow the wood some movement, you should use an elastic adhesive. Since less force is involved here, such an adhesive doesn’t need to have great strength.

Elastic glues put less pressure on the substrate.

Combining forms of technology The high-elastic adhesives available on the market nowadays can be divided as a rule into two main groups, namely silane adhesives (SMP) and PUR adhesives. Amongst silane adhesives we draw a distinction between MS polymers (modified silanes based on prepolymers from

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Kaneka), SPUR (silane and polyurethane), STP (silane terminated polyurethane), and STP-E (a variant of STP). In recent years, combinations of technology seem to have provided the best (safest) solutions. Taking the best of what is good or creating hybrids. Frequently considered forms of adhesive technology are PU, epoxy, and silane. Combinations of these have yielded the ‘new generation adhesives’.

A selection from the range Adesiv Adesiv offers here the Adeprime MS. This is a waterproof adhesive to make newly built terraces or balconies or renovated balconies waterproof.

Adeprime creates a waterproof surface so that new floor coverings can be glued easily onto existing ceramic tiles or cement or anhydrite substrates. The product is 100% based on MS technology and ready for use. Adeprime MS also helps with acoustics and can be used to level uneven substrates. The product contains neither solvents nor water.

Bona Elasticity isn’t the only important value when we consider the suitability of a glue. The strength and maximum stretch capacity are also important properties which determine the quality of the glue. On the basis of ISO 17178 Bona has the following adhesives in its range: Hard = R870, Hard-elastic = R850 and R850T, Elastic = R848 and R860. Bona R850 is a genuine all-round adhesive, which can be deployed for just about all wooden floors and for just about all substrates, whilst the other variants all have their specific fields of use. Bona R870 stands out; this can be used in combination with the latest version of the Bona Optispread, which makes glueing possible from a standing position. There is a distinction as regards application. R848 is suitable for engineered parquet and narrow strips with a minimum ratio of 1:5 between the thickness and width of the strips. R850/R850T are ideal for glueing engineered parquet and 6mm traditional parquet 70 and 90 wide and 9mm traditional parquet with a maximum width of up to 18cm. Finally, R870 is suitable for all parquet, including solid wood sections.

Bostik There are several elastic adhesives on the market. Some of them are based on PU (polyurethane) and others on SMP (MS polymers), but they all tend to be single component systems. These adhesives all set by means of a reaction to humidity. For an elastic parquet adhesive the shear strength of the glue needs a value greater than 1N/mm².

Bostik offers a whole range of adhesives, including Parfix PU 1K, Parfix Classic, Parfix Eco Plus, Parfix Elastic, Superfix 009, and High Tack.

Parfix Eco Plus is an example of a multi-purpose glue. This

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Producers of elastic adhesives

new and innovative 1-component parquet adhesive is based on elastic SMP (silyl modified polymers) adhesive technology. The durable and low-emission glue contains no softeners and is suitable for almost all parquet and substrates. This ‘ingenious’ elastic parquet glue has very good cross-linking, so the parquet is glued firmly in place like the roots of a tree in the soil.

Chimiver Chimiver offers Unisil, an adhesive based on MS technology. This flexible an elastic adhesive is a ready to use product. UNISIL is a prepolymer based, single-component adhesive with a silanic termination (MS technology), totally free of water, solvents, amines, tin, isocyanates and epoxy resins. It hardens with atmospheric humidity and becomes resistant to water, temperature and ageing in approx. 36-48 hours. Recommended for gluing prefinished parquet onto marble, grit, tiles, ceramic or marble-chip floor, etc. Also suitable for gluing parquet onto underfloor heating and cooling system. CERTIFICATES: EC1R; ATTESTATION CCA Environmentally Compatible Product (Certificate issued by Department BEST - Politecnico of Milan CCA Registration No. 201216); Sound Reduction (CSI Test Report No. 0056/ DC/ACU/06); Heat conductivity (CSI Test Report No. 0020/DC/TTS/06). Unisil is available in buckets, sausages and cartridges. In addition to Unisil, Chimiver has also Adesiver Elastic which, as Unisil, is EC1 very low emissions certified adhesive.

Both adhesives can contribute to the achievement of QI CREDIT 4.1 according to the parameters of the GEV dated 03 March 2009, because they meet the certification LEED protocol (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design).

Devo® Amongst other things, Devomat presents Devo® Glue MSP 150 1C. This is a single component semi-elastic hybrid MS polymer glue for stable multi-layer parquet and it contains neither silicones nor isocyanates. There is also Devo® Glue

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MSP 200 1C, which is a single component, soft-elastic hybrid polymer parquet adhesive; this, too, contains neither silicones nor isocyanates.

Devo® Glue MSP 250 1C is the best-seller at Devomat Industries. It is suitable for glueing all types of wood (solid wood up to 20cm wide) and is recommended particularly for fitting pre-finished parquet. It contains neither water nor VOC and spreads excellently. Devo® Glue MSP 250 is a hard-elastic glue (about 70 Shore) with great adhesive strength, it complies with CSN EN 14293, and has the EC1-Plus (EC1-R) classification. Devo® Glue MSP250 is packed in bags of 5kg.

Devomat also has some dual component adhesives in its range. Devo® Glue PU 570 2C is a waterless dual component polyurethane-epoxy, and semi-elastic parquet adhesive specially for glueing wooden floors onto cement-bound substrates or existing floors (tiles, marble, wooden floors, etc.). Devo® Glue PU 650 2C is also a waterless dual component epoxy-polyurethane parquet adhesive, but it is a hard-elastic product.

Henkel Henkel presents P675 Elast (for pre-finished parquet), P685 Elast Universal (for solid wood and pre-finished parquet) and P695 Elast Universal Strong (for all wooden floors). These adhesives are based on a form of Flextec technology developed by Thomsit. This Flextec TM technology protects the wood against shearing pressures. P 675 and P 685 are soft-elastic adhesives, whilst P 695 is a hard-elastic product. At Thomsit a hard-elastic glue is an extra strong and fast-working adhesive so that it is also suitable for more critical sorts of parquet, which could normally be glued only with a dual component PU adhesive. A soft-elastic glue is not suitable for this. The show pony par excellence is Thomsit P685 Elast Universal. This is an elastic 1-component parquet adhesive based on Flextec TM technology. It is easy to spread and can be applied to both absorbent and non-absorbent substrates.

For most substrates there is no need for a primer.

Lecol As regards elastic adhesives, Lecol offers two glues under the Wakol trademark, namely Wakol MS230 and Wakol MS260. Wakol Parquet Adhesive MS 260 is a hard-elastic MS polymer adhesive specially developed for glueing chipboard or industrial mosaic subfloors, solid parquet up to 16cm width, end grain blocks, mosaic parquet, distressed Burgundian traditional parquet, and multi-layer ready-to-fit parquet (wood-engineered parquet) on absorbent and non-absorbent subfloors. Wakol Parquet

Adhesive MS 230 is the parquet adhesive which is particularly suitable for fully glueing multi-layer parquet with a tongue and groove construction.

Pallmann Hard/Hard-elastic silane adhesives offer greater security if it is necessary to counteract swelling and shrinking in wood and minimalise distortion of parquet. These adhesives offer greater scope than soft silane adhesives. Pallmann presents the single component STP parquet adhesive PALLMANN P5, a hard-elastic parquet adhesive for glueing parquet. It contains neither solvents nor water and complies with DIN EN 14293. This glue is suitable for strips of parquet 19-22mm, end grain strips 16-22mm, solid parquet, and exotic wood. This 1-component STP adhesive combines strong elasticity with the benefits of modern STP technology. It contains neither solvents nor water, so it is convenient to use and has no harmful effects on the parquet.

Rubio Monocoat Rubio® EasyBond is a high-quality alternative for 2K PU adhesive and has the same strong points such as solid setting, very good adhesion, and a hard-elastic character, and all that without the inconveniences of a 2K PU adhesive. It consists of one component, there are no odours, adhesive residue can be removed from the floor easily, the user doesn’t end up with dirty hands, and there are no isocyanates in the glue, so there are no allergic skin reactions. Rubio® EasyBond parquet adhesive contains no softeners, but has high polymer content; that makes the glue more expensive, but also more durable with a higher adhesion capacity. Since Rubio® EasyBond doesn’t contain any softeners, there is no migration, so the composition of the glue doesn’t change. And so, you don’t need to be concerned about damage to the finish layer afterwards because there is nothing in the adhesive which could migrate to the wood. The hard-elastic composition of Rubio® EasyBond parquet adhesive gives the wood just about enough space to move, but not so much that the wood begins to warp or curl. Moreover, this type of adhesive is easy to sandpaper and can also be used as a filler paste.

Rectavit Rectavit presents one of the widest ranges of elastic parquet adhesives on the market. The 1k PU 247 is based on PU, whilst the 248 Multilayer, 249 Polymer, 255 Fibretech, and 249 Express are based

on polymer.

According to elasticity and classified in line with the EN ISO 17178/EN 14293, they have the 247, 248 Multilayer, 249 Polymer, 255 Fibretech for elastic adhesives and the 249 Express hard elastic. Amongst other things, Rectavit presents Rectavit 255 Fibretech, the fibre-reinforced elastic parquet adhesive. This parquet adhesive is one of Rectavit’s very latest generation of adhesives. The Fibretech technology ensures a considerably stronger glue with a faster build up of strength. The parquet can be walked on after three hours and can be sandpapered after 16. Rectavit 255 Fibertech can be used to glue all common types of parquet and wood directly onto a cement-bound or anhydrite screed, mosaic subfloor, levelling compounds, and even onto a tile floor. Floor heating poses no problem at all. This simple spreadable parquet adhesive can also be used to glue bamboo. Furthermore, the width of planks can vary up to 25cm with semi-solid/multi-layer parquet and up to 19cm with solid parquet.

Soudal Pioneer in elastic hybrid parquet adhesives Soudal was one of the first traders to launch MS polymer elastic parquet adhesives and has refined its expertise and know-how in the years since then.

With MS20 Plus, MS30 Plus, and SMX® 30 Plus, Soudal has a full range of glues which contain no water, solvents, or isocyanates and combine excellent spreadability and universal usage. The strong adhesion capacity of the glues yields adhesive grooves which don’t collapse immediately after application with a notched trowel. This ensures ideal adhesion, even if the subfloor isn’t level.

The elastic character obviously ensures a perfect spread of strength in the wood over the entire substrate. Just about all sorts of parquet can be glued onto various, including existing tile floors or screed, usually without pre-treatment.

They all stand out for their strength development, end strength, open time, and emission. All three parquet adhesives bear the EMI code EC1 plus. This feature has only gained in importance with the recent upturn in airtight construction and within the context of sustainability labels such as LEED® and BREEAM®. MS 20 Plus is suitable for multi-layer parquet and narrower planks, MS30 Plus is the all-rounder, and SMX 30 Plus is the strongest and fastest of the three.

It goes without saying that these adhesives meet the European EN14293 and International ISO17178 relevant standards.

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Producers of profiles

VISIBLE PROFILES TAKE ON A DECORATIVE ROLE RENOVATION CREATES MORE TRANSITIONS THAN NEW BUILDINGS

Photo – Küberit

There is less and less space now available for building.

Availability in some regions is almost ‘nihil’ (nothing), and that immediately affects the cost price of land and, therefore, the price of building. As regards the renovation market, we know there’s still lots of work to be done, but things are starting to happen on the European market. It is precisely the high cost of building and the (old) age of many houses which are boosting the renovation market.

Amongst other things, renovating means acting creatively with existing space. This usually means encountering various technical obstructions which are crying out for a solution.

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New building versus renovation Building or renovating? Although those are the two major areas of work in that same building industry and they are covered more or less by the same ‘players’, they are really two completely different disciplines.

Building When you design a new building, you start from scratch. In a manner of speaking, the architect doesn’t even have to leave his or her office to plan the project from A to Z. The entire development process of the building emerges from the creative spirit of the designer, who largely

controls matters from the very beginning. ‘Pro-active’ and ‘anticipating’ are key words here. There shouldn’t be any surprises, or even any problems. There might possibly be a need for solutions only if architectural ambitions get ‘out of hand’.

Renovation Renovation of an existing building is a completely different story. In this case the creativity has to ‘link up’ with an existing situation. The building dictates the rules. The further one wishes to depart from the rules, the greater the need for technical solutions. If you want to convert two small rooms into one big room, you know that the place where the wall once stood will constitute an obstacle, not least for fitting the floor covering.

Obstacles – wanted or unwanted When we enter the domain of ‘construction profiles’, we’re also walking down the path of ‘solutions to problems’. Profiles have a technical function first of all. They absorb ‘something’. They take on ‘obstructions’. Once again, we see that in the case of new buildings those obstructions are generally a conscious choice on the part of the architect, whereas with renovation they tend to emerge as ‘a problem’ and, often, this happens unexpectedly. For the design it is impossible for the architect to stay at his or her desk, if only because the plan on which his or her work has to be based (if there is one) might not correspond to the building as it is finally completed. Tolerances in construction, you know how it is? Differences in height are a good example to illustrate the difference between ‘intentional’ and ‘unintentional’ obstacles. There was a time when ‘platforms’ in the living room or ‘wells’ (for the lounge) were in fashion. Such measures to break up the space are planned in advance and the architect knows that he or she will have to deploy various ‘technical’ solutions (read: profiles) to achieve that. If walls are to be demolished in an existing building, it is essential to investigate the differences in height thoroughly and, importantly, to do so on site. A different approach; similar solutions.

Profiles are ‘solutions’ There are profiles available for most obstacles in buildings. There are also profiles for extremely diverse functions. Those functions change as the floors develop. Increasingly thinner floor coverings (certainly in

renovation) mean that the heights to be bridged with threshold profiles and expansion profiles are becoming smaller and smaller. We will clarify the various functions briefly. The fact is that multifunctional profiles are still in fashion, even if producers have different opinions on that point. Some producers think that multifunctional profiles are still very much a necessity because they reduce ‘mistakes’ on the part of the user. There is certainly less chance of buying the wrong profile, but that argument should inevitably be less applicable to professional experts. By contrast other manufacturers are indicating that profiles are once again becoming extremely specific. In other words, there is a special profile for every use.

Expansion profiles Expansion profiles are used for thresholds to other floors at the same height. Expansion profiles or cover profiles give floors room to swell and shrink.

Corner profiles Corner profiles are for use with convector wells, doormats, or stairs.

Threshold profiles Threshold profiles are used to bridge two floors at different heights e.g. from a laminate to a PVC floor.

End profiles End profiles are for use with convector wells, doormats, or stairs. An end profile encloses the wood, even on the underside.

Stair profiles These profiles are deployed for staircase steps which are refurnished with either a laminate, parquet, or PVC floor covering. There are diverse strips available to finish the nose. These can be sawn quite simply to the required size and mounted on the stairs. They also serve as an anti-slip element. The profiles can be supplied for wood, laminate, PVC, vinyl, etc.

Profiles take on a decorative role There’s design in floors, so there’s also design in skirting boards and profiles. As regards profiles, this expresses itself in both the choice of

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We make binding connections.

Floor profiles and underlay sheeting for hard, elastic and textile flooring.

www.proline-systems.com

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Producers of profiles

material and in ‘decors’. Here, too, the rule is that profiles must follow the development of the floor both decoratively and technically.

Materials As regards materials, metal variants are certainly growing in popularity. This is also reflected in skirting boards and other accessories.

Profiles in aluminium or in other metals which have an ultra metal look are causing a furore. Furthermore, HDF profiles are also all the rage because of their strong mechanical qualities (hardness/impressionability/durability) on the one hand, but also because of the infinitely possible range in terms of colours on the other.

Look An important development, not to mention a ‘milestone’, has been the emergence of digital print facilities. As a number of major producers have rightly said, it is possible for the first time to equip profiles with a 3D structure (e.g. wood grains and patterns) on all impressionable materials: paper, plastic, metal, etc. Moreover, profiles can also be made in all sorts of degrees of gloss. Another step forward!

A selection from the range Depro Profiles

Sixpack in aluminium or HDF is a good example of that. That profile can be used to transform reduction profiles or T-profiles into end profiles. This can be done using an end piece supplied in the pack.

This profile can provide a solution for all floors, partly because of its flat structure. As regards the fitting, adhesive has the upper hand here. A major challenge on the market are thinner floors and therefore profiles, a segment on which Neuhofer is working (from 2mm for glued floors and 5mm for floating floors). Major innovations can be found in LVT. Digital (direct) printing is obviously attracting a lot of attention here, too. Neuhofer Holz is also working on 3D printing, embossed rather than engraved. More generally, digital printing is a revolutionary form of technology for Neuhofer Holz to open up a world of (hitherto non-existent) possibilities. They are also paying a lot of attention to durability, especially increased wear resistance with FN pro-tect, a coating which is ultra-solid thanks the addition of Corundum particles. Further inspired by the success of floors such as LVT, FN has devised the FN Sealing lips, which protect skirting boards and profiles from damp by creating a perfect joint. Another major innovation is the FN Cut –Pro, a skirting board which is equipped with grooves and is easy to fit.

Küberit

Depro Profiles from Komen, a big name in the field of profiled surfaces, has over 25 years of experience in providing all sorts of floor accessories. A spokes person comments: ‘Multifunctional profiles are still the favourite. These profiles are printed digitally to guarantee a 100% perfect match in decor and colour between the floor and accessory. The latest trend in profiles is the 3-in-1 trend.

Here, consumers themselves choose which sort of profile they need and they cut the profile themselves as required using the supplied knife. The 3-in-1 profile can be used as an end profile, an adapter profile, or as a threshold profile.’

Wear resistance is extremely important for the company. Class 32 is the absolute minimum here, so they always deliver top quality products. Depro Profiles is a reliable long-term partner that gives a high priority to quality, client focus, and pro-active service.

FN Neuhofer Neuhofer has seen a strong increase in ‘design’, even in profiles.

Technically, multifunctional profiles are still important here. The FN

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Trends in profiles are very strongly linked to the market. Generally speaking, they have noticed at Küberit that there is a demand in some countries for profiles which ‘suit’ the floor. Multifunctional profiles are greatly coveted by ‘odd jobbers’. Experts use them as well, but mainly for floating floors. The fastening technique also depends on the region. Germans opt for screws, in the Netherlands they use self-adhesive profiles, whilst in Southern Europe clip systems are very much in fashion. Differences which depend on the type of floor relate mainly to the thickness of the floors. For instance, a lot of attention is paid to durability in commercial rooms with high traffic. At present, Küberit are working on a number of innovations which will be introduced at Domotex. The latest innovation is a two-part system for floating LVT floors, namely the PPS Champion Star.

Perfilstar

Proskirting Covecap is a series of flexible and non-toxic vinyl profiles . The Proskirting Covecap provides a neat finish for more flexible floor coverings, for instance, where they are designed against the wall. The visible part is finished and is available in white, light or dark grey, dark brown, brown, and black.

www.progressprofiles.com

Each market has its own specifications. However, there is a growing demand for quality and service everywhere. Another trend is the growing demand for ecological products. And so, Perfilstar doesn’t use any EPS in its products. Multifunctional profiles are extremely popular here, especially simple and user-friendly versions.

Adhesives seem to be the most popular means of securing floors, although Perfilstar also offers clip systems. Recently, the company has developed profiles with a self-adhesive strip. A recent product is the PVC Compact Skirting, which is 100% waterproof and designed for LVT. They have some innovations in the area of digital printing to ensure that profiles match the floor perfectly. The latest innovation is a two-in-one self-adhesive profile in MDF and Aluminium.

Progress Profiles Aluminium, stainless steel, and other metals are selling well at Progress Profiles. Colour, too, is important. That’s why Progress Profiles offers an extensive range of finishes. According to the company, multifunctional profiles are useful, but they do lack design, whilst people attach great importance to functionality, combined with elegance. Self-adhesive clips are the favourites. Durability is regarded as essential. Progress Profiles has a very extensive range.

A recent innovation is Prolistel Channel, a new profile for decorating wall and floor covering in mosaic, ceramics, or natural stone.

The F-shape facilitates several possible applications. The profile is designed in anodised aluminium or polished chrome aluminium.

Masterpieces to highlight

T 21 - 2 HE BIG 5 4 Nov D embre ubai Stand 2016 6C27 1

Skirtings and Listello strips

Only Progress Profiles offers you a full range of skirtings and trims meeting every single need. When beauty makes the difference.

New series have enriched our wide range of finishes:black line, with anodized, polished, brushed and crepè finishes and tuscany line, dedicated to modern country style. Eye-catching details, it’s difficult to overlook them.

P ROFILES & SY STEMS

Progress Profiles SpA

Certificated company UNI EN ISO 9001:2008

PROFILES & SYSTEMS

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Producers of veneer wooden flooring : what's new ?

VENEER FLOORS UNITE EMOTION AND RATIONAL USE OF MATERIAL The days when wooden floor lovers swore by solid parquet and dismissed any alternative as second rate are, thankfully, long gone. Obviously, solid parquet still offers something special, but, veneer floors, like multi-layer floors, can also present some very strong selling points and unmistakable benefits. The fact is that veneer floors, too, always give you a sight of real wood, not just a good imitation, but the real natural material! It also has unique arguments such as efficient use of a valuable raw material, a whole range of exceptional wood sorts within an acceptable budget, and, last but not least, a floor which is harder than solid parquet, thanks to the HDF base.

Thin veneer The thickness of veneer wood varies from 0.5 and 2mm and depends on the wood sort and/or use. In the wooden flooring sector, floors with a real wood top layer of up to 0.7mm are regarded as veneer floors.

Whilst thick veneer panels up to 2mm are used in the furniture industry and interior design, this wouldn’t benefit veneer floors at all. On the contrary, it would make the floor more vulnerable.

A specialist : Par-ky: authoritarian specialist in veneer flooring

Diverse range – trendy colours

Decospan is known as the European market leader in wood veneer processing. Next to its panels division, Decospan also developed a flooring division and wrote a new chapter in its large history. Thanks to the integration of the French company Cabannes, Decospan is able to offer a full range of engineered floors, divided into 2 brands.

Par-ky is a friendly, high-quality wooden floor with an ultrastrong core of HDF, the Uniclic® system for a fast and easy floating installation and 8 layers of lacquer, which protect the top layer of real wood and make Par-ky easy to maintain.

Every Par-ky board has a top layer of thin wood. That's why they look like solid parquet. But the difference is the use of the raw material: by slicing it into thin flitches the use of wood is optimized. Next to the well-known 0.6mm veneer flooring, Par-ky is also available with a 2 and 3.2mm top layer. The Deluxe+06, Royal+20 and Twist+06 collections have a 2mm layer of cork on the back. This makes them quiet to walk on, just like a solid, glued down wooden floor.

A second brand, Cabbani, bridges the warmth and beauty of an oak parquet floor with contemporary architecture. Thanks to the “a la carte system”, one can design a floor based on a top layer of 2, 3.2 or 5.5 mm, HDF or birch plywood core and a wide range of attractive colors.

When veneer floor manufacturers develop their collections, they have at their disposal a wide range of wood sorts and they can give the wood some colours which are equally trendy as those of their solid or

Meet the new Decospan Division Flooring at Domotex in hall 9, stand A46.

Harder than solid parquet The fact is that with veneer floors there is an ultra-hard coat of lacquer on the veneer layer (sometimes up to 8 micro-layers on each other) which protects the floor from dirt, impressions, and wear and tear. This coat is even so effective that the floors are much less likely to suffer impressions than multi-layer or solid parquet. Moreover, that detail takes on extra importance if you opt for a soft type of wood such as cherry. Since veneer floors are usually fitted on top of an HDF (High Density Fibre) base, the plank is also much more stable and harder than a solid parquet plank.

Efficient use of raw materials One of the big challenges facing us here on earth is to make our society sustainable. The ultimate goal is that each raw material used is deployed as efficiently as possible and that the article produced can be fully recycled after use or be used to produce another article. Veneer floors are absolutely ideal in terms of renewability.

The figures speak for themselves because the surface of floors obtained from a tree trunk are many times bigger with veneer than with any other wooden floor. An oak branch with 5.5m³ of wood supplies about 95m² of solid parquet, 700 to 850 square metres of Multi-layer parquet, and no fewer than 3,600m² of veneer. The base, the HDF panel, consists of pressed wood fibres, a waste product from the timber industry.

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multi-layer parquet colleagues.

The range is equally diverse and up-to-date. We’re living in the glory days of oak wood, so it goes without saying that there’s also a wide range of oak wood available from veneer floor producers in diverse selections, colours, and finishes. From natural to smoked, coloured in shades of grey or warmer metal colours, with a matt or oiled look.

Furthermore, the range of veneer floors from manufacturers also allures clients often thanks to the superior wood selection of the veneer floors. Magnificent and specially exotic wood for floors such as jatoba, wenge, rosewood, santos, or teak have now become affordable for a wider public thanks to veneer.

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Top Italian companies focused on export

ITALIAN ECONOMY DEMANDS PERMANENT ATTENTION EARTHQUAKE RESULTS IN SERIOUS MEASURES IN ‘CONSTRUCTION’

Photo – Chimiver

No one could ever deprive the Italians of their sweet Italian life. The best wines on the planet, delicious ham, Mortadella, cheese, pasta, and Limoncello to round it off. What a wonderful country. The Italians are relatively ‘wealthier’ than the state. Everyone on the peninsula has always had the chance to pick up the crumbs. Sometimes and at some levels the latter can be taken literally. The economic storm of recent years, just like the sharp refugee issue, has left lots of pieces to pick up. Reforms are starting to bear fruit. A visit to one of the strongest industrialised countries in the EU.

Industry conquers the North After World War II, Italy was transformed into a modern industrialised nation. Between 1950 and 1980, gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 200% per head of population. After 1980, the economy slowed down completely and growth fell to an average of 1.3% per annum. In recent

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years, Italy has had to face a severe economic crisis and the economy shrank by 2.4% in 2012 and by 1.8% in 2013. Consequently, unemployment rose to 12.4% in 2013 and government debt increased.

Industry versus agriculture What stands out about the Italian economy is the big prosperity and development gap between the industrialised north and the still largely agricultural south. This is due to differences in historical development, geographical location, and physical environment. Since 1950, with the establishment of a development fund for the south (‘Cassa per il Mezzogiorno’), the government has tried to close the existing prosperity gap. Initially, most of the huge investment funds were used to modernise the agricultural sector and improve infrastructure.

However, when it emerged that the modernisation of the agricultural sector, far from creating more jobs, had actually reduced the number of jobs, more emphasis was put on investments to foster rapid

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industrialisation. Although this has helped to raise the level of income in the south, considerably, there is still a big deficit in comparison with the north.

Changing government role The Italian economy has also been characterised by government domination. Not only does the state own the local utility companies, railways, and airline companies, but also it has had a major stake in petroleum and natural gas companies, the steel industry, ship and train construction, the machine industry, and the blast furnaces. Largescale privatisations were designed to make trade and industry more efficient and reduce government deficit. In 1997, it was decided to dismantle the state holding company IRI over a period of three years in order to facilitate the sale of various state companies.

Small and medium enterprises The remarkable feature about Italy as a modern industrial state is the fact that 90% of Italian (family) businesses have between 11 and 500 employees, so there are a lot of small and medium enterprises. On the other hand, 40% of companies with 50 employees depend mainly on exports.

Industrial sectors – a brief survey Iron and steel industry Machine industry is found mainly in the north, especially in Turin (cars/ Fiat, engines, and aeroplanes), Milan (electro-technology, locomotives, cars, scooters, and engines), and in Genoa (shipyards). Other major industrial cities in the north include Bologna, Vicenza, Ivrea (Olivetti), Brescia, Pavia, and Legnano (textile machines).

Chemical industry The chemical industry in Italy is one of the biggest in the world as a result of the presence of raw materials and ports where imported raw materials such as petroleum, coal, and phosphate are processed.

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Rubber and plastics (Pirelli tyres) are processed in Turin. Milan accommodates petrochemistry (Montedison), whilst Palermo, Crotone, and Porto Empedocle process mainly chemical manure due to the local cattle breeding industry.

Textile industry The north-west is well known for its textile industry. Como houses the silk industry, which is still the most important in Western Europe. We find the cotton industry in Varese-Bergamo-Milan and Val Seriana.

Lombardy, Piedmont, Naples, and Calabria are renowned for local yarns and synthetic fibres.

Food and luxury food industry The companies in this line of business are spread over the entire country. Southern Italy and Sicily have lots of pasta factories; Naples and Salerno are centres of the food industry due to the presence of vegetable and tomato cultivation (pasta sauces). Perugia is renowned for its chocolate, whilst the ‘panettone’, a sort of Christmas cake, comes from Milan.

Other industries In Como, Brescia, and the south of Piedmont we encounter a lot of cement industry due to the presence of plaster and marl. Milan, Como, and Pisa make up the centre of woodworking and furniture manufacture. The shoe industry is the speciality in Vigevano in the province of Varese.

Import and export The most important import products are petroleum, raw materials for the metal and textile industries, wood, machinery, cars, and food (including meat). In 2013, the major import partners were: Germany (12.6%), France (8.4%), China (8.4%), Russia(6.3%), the Netherlands (5.8%), Spain (4.5%), and Belgium (4%). The major import products are textile goods, citrus, wine, machines, cars, computers,

plastics, and petroleum products. The leading export partners in 2013 were: Germany (12.6%), France (11.1%), the Unites States (6.3%), Switzerland (5.7%), the United Kingdom (4.7%), and Spain (4.5%).

The Italian construction industry The Italian construction industry accounts for 4.8% of Italian GDP. The industry has been badly affected by the economic recession of recent years, with GDP falling in the years 2012, 2013, and 2014. Since the global credit crisis in 2008, the Italian construction industry has lost almost 50% of its production value and 69,000 jobs as a result of the fall in GDP, lower government expenditure, the fall in private investment, and a severe lack of credit. However, not all companies have been affected to the same extent by the recession. Most of the big players in the construction industry have proved resilient thanks to the fact that they have diversified their portfolio with infrastructure works and thanks to their focus on exports. In 2014, for example, turnover in construction rose by 9.7% as a result of exports, and that partly offset the slowing down of national turnover, which was down by 6%. This rise benefitted mainly the bigger players. Building co-operations and consortia which concentrate on the national market and depend on public works have been badly affected by the drop in demand and the fall in the provision of bank credit. Another big problem are the late payments by government institutions, with an average payment period of 177 days and eight billion euros of unpaid invoices in 2015. Small and medium enterprises which concentrate on building homes have been hit hardest as a result of the fall in investment in the construction of private homes and the harder access to bank credit. The only exception has been renovation work, which has been supported by stimulating measures from the government. The prognosis for 2016 is that the Italian economy will grow by 1% and that construction production will shrink by a mere 0.5%. Investments are expected to increase by 3.2% thanks to government investment and investments in special maintenance of existing buildings (+1.5%), whilst investments in new homes will fall again (-3%).

A disaster with serious consequences Whether or not that shrinkage in construction will occur as forecast is no longer certain. The devastating earthquake at the end of August in Central Italy could have serious consequences for the construction industry. Amongst other things, the Italian government wants to deviate from the European budget rules so that they can erect buildings which cope better with earthquakes. That’s what the newspaper ‘De Standaard’ has reported.

Such a programme will cost a few billion euros. That’s what two Italian government officials have heard recently. ‘It’s not a matter of spending money just like that,’ said deputy minister for the economy Enrico Zanetti to the newspaper ‘La Stampa’. ‘It would be a serious, specific, and gradual demand to tackle seismic risks with the necessary investments.’

The cost price of repairing the damage caused by the earthquake in recent weeks has not yet been ascertained. However, it appears that the price tag will be a few billion euros, whilst the work will also take several years. Moreover, more than 50% of existing private homes in the country do not comply with the standards for withstanding earthquakes. Bringing buildings in the areas most at risk up to those safety standards would cost almost 36 billion euros, according to the national engineering council.

The European Union rules, which obligate countries within the euro zone to strive to balance their budgets, already contain various exceptions, such as expenditure for emergency aid and reconstruction after natural disasters. Rome would like to extend that clause to cover costs for the prevention of earthquakes, according to Claudio De Vincenti,

junior secretary in the cabinet of prime minister Matteo Renzi, who made those comments in a different interview with the newspaper ‘Il Messaggero’.

The former Italian government leader and president of the European Commission, Romano Prodi, has also argued in the newspaper ‘Il Messaggero’ for a thirty-year plan for his country. He has made the critical observation that buildings have been erected ‘without due consideration and provision’ in the area which is susceptible to an earthquake. Prodi has demanded specific rules for programmes and financial resources and clear responsibilities from the central government, the regional governments, and local authorities.

About forests, wood, and wooden floors It is clear that they will need wood in order to implement future building plans, and they have wood in abundance. After all, about 22.7% of Italy is covered with forest. The most woody regions are Trentino Alto Adige (46.5%) and Liguria (53.2%). In those regions we also find the most woodworking companies. However, in contrast to other sectors in Italy, the woodworking sector is less inclined towards cluster formation.

A lot of woodwork is still done in a traditional atmosphere. Apart from a number of renowned parquet manufacturers, we find a lot of supplier companies for the parquet industry, especially in the chemical industry and the manufacture of woodwork machines and tools.

Parquet production The total production in the FEP countries fell in by 4.7% in 2012 to 68,266,133m². The total parquet production with the non-FEP countries included was estimated at 75 million square metres. Italy

To quote thousands of users worldwide,

“a truly great choice!”

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DOMOTEX 2017

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2017

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accounts for 4.83% of FEP production. That means 3,208,508 square metres of wooden floors. In 2011, 3,569,922 square metres were produced. The share then was still 5.48% of total FEP production.

Nevertheless, this has been a considerable drop, which corresponds perfectly to the general financial and economic situation.

LECHNER SpA

Parquet consumption Parquet consumption, too, also fell sharply in FEP countries in 2012 by 5.88% to a level of 87,509,000m². In 2011, Italy had a 10.33% share in the total consumption. In that year, the country consumed 9,449,367m² of parquet. The share in 2012 was 9.32%. The total number of parquet floors at that time still totalled 8,155,838m². That, too, shows how sharp the fall has been.

An introduction

KLINDEX

Lechner is a family business, which was formed in 1920 by Ernesto Lechner and specialised originally in the development of resins for quality paints.

The range has grown a lot over the years due to intense R & D efforts and acquisitions of other companies. In 2013, Lechner introduced a revolutionary solution for outdoor floors, namely Drenatech®. Today, Lechner has three divisions: shipping, construction, and Drenatech. The company operates on four continents and in no fewer than 28 countries. The selection now includes a full range for fitting various floors: levellers and selfspreading levellers, primers, adhesives, sealants, varnishes, oils, and cleaning and maintenance products. Adapting constantly to client demand and changing market situations is one of the secrets of their success. The top product at the moment is Sipol Plus, an odourless epoxy-polyurethane glue for all wooden floors. It contains no water or solvents. Lechner employs 30 people and has an annual turnover of nine million euros (2014). +39 (0)143 636 103 - www.lechnerspa.it

CARVER/BLANCHON Klindex was formed in 1988 by the Bibiano brothers, who already had years of experience in the sale of cleaning machines. It all started with a licensed new system for polishing natural stone with diamond pads.

The brothers had to counteract a certain scepticism for many years, but due to their perseverance and the quality of the machines they were able to promote the trademark to a permanent fixture. The Levighetor machine proved to be a global success. The ‘Expander’ appeared later for sandpapering and polishing bigger surfaces. They were nominated at the Amsterdam Inter-Clean 2000 Convention for the Most innovative Product Award with the Unika brush machine. Klindex also launched the sandpapering machine Timba around the turn of the century. At the start of this millennium, they put efforts into research and development of sandpapering and polishing machines for concrete. That resulted in Klindex being one of the few companies with a system for transforming an ordinary concrete floor into an attractive floor comparable to marble. The company has continued with its efforts and offers solutions for cleaning, sandpapering, polishing, and such like in all conditions and even in places which are difficult to reach. In 2015, they achieved a turnover of about 15 million euros with just over 80 employees. Turnover has increased year by year and that applies also to exports. +39 (0) 85 859 546 - www.klindex.it

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Since 1957, CARVER has specialised in products for fitting and treating parquet and they have also enhanced their range with finishes and decors for wood. Thanks to an integrated R&D laboratory and production in Italy, CARVER can guarantee the quality, traceability, and conformity of its products. Since 2015, CARVER has been a filial of the BLANCHON Group, the number one in France and number two in Europe for parquet and wood finishes. Blanchon, which was formed in 1832, operates a strong philosophy and its success is based on the quality, reliability, and performances of its products. The synergy of both brands enables them to have a stronger commercial presence in terms of exports in Europe, the United States, Canada, and Latin and Central America. BLANCHON supports CARVER with its commercial and technical expertise in marketing, its knowledge of the finishing industry sector for parquet floors, and its innovative force. +39 (0) 2 95 00 17 1 - www.carver.it

ADESIV Adesiv was formed in 1971. The company produces adhesives for various industrial sectors and has established a fine reputation thanks to its ongoing product development. The company has always set great store by quality, image, and care for the environment.

Adesiv exports a lot of products, and export figures are rising each year. The company has its own network of distributors in more than 40 countries to ensure that its clients always receive excellent service. The clients are mainly wooden floor fitters who purchase products from dealers, but also parquet industries buy products and much importance is given to the ‘private label’ sector. In fact, many international companies have been turning to Adesiv for a long time to have a range of customised products.

The company is well known for its high quality adhesives, but has also made significant progress in coatings and wooden floor maintenance products.

Given that pre-finished wooden floors are becoming much more popular, Adesiv is ready with its varnishes for the day when all those floors need renovating. At all events, Adesiv is fully convinced that wooden floors have a great future.

What many clients do not know is that Adesiv, ever since its opening, has been producing with increasing success adhesives for the footwear industry and paper converting. It is in these fields that the company is investing in R&D laboratories and advanced machinery. +39 (0) 424 566 406 - www.adesiv.it

BRUNO The word ‘adventure’ is certainly not out of place when it comes to the history of Bruno. The company was formed in Mondovi in 1929 and soon grew into a well respected sawmill and timber trade. In 1976, Mario Bruno embarked on a daring project. He built the first factory in a completely uncultivated area on the edge of the tropical rain forest in the Ivory Coast. Mario Bruno had to overcome lots of obstacles, but his courage and perseverance won the day. Today, the company is led by the third generation of the family, namely Maurizio, Marco, and Gabriele. The company is greatly appreciated thanks to its endless quest for quality, but also because it is distinctly client-friendly.

The focus on service in terms of logistics and after sales and the constant communication with its clients form the basis of its success. Bruno attaches great importance to sustainable forest management. The core business is Bruno Parquet (and has been since the beginning) and Paviker Italian Flooring Innovation. The best-seller is ‘Le Valli brio’, a hand-made collection of pre-finished wooden floors with irregular sides. Various distressing treatments make these floors unique. Paviker introduces a new generation of floors: a pre-finished floor with a ceramic top layer (3+/5) and a WPC base with tongue and groove on the four sides. Paviker is the big innovation for 2016-17. Bruno exports to all countries in Europe. +39 (0) 174 562 714 - www.brunoparquet.it

PARQUET IN The limited company Parquet In Srl was formed in 1970 and is based in Barletta in Italy. The company specialises in the production of exclusive parquet floors, which are Made in Italy. Years of experience and trained workers make the difference here. Wood is cherished and processed in accordance with the old processes.

Parquet In provides floors for any style and interior. Old traditions from marquetry are reinvigorated in multicoloured and versatile variations. Parquet In has also recently added a satin finish to its Elegant Collection.

With this new finish, the company has achieved a unique gloss and look. It is confirmation of the lively creativity of Parquet In. Apart from the satin gloss, Parquet In also presents a number of modern colours for this collection. Colour takes centre stage in the New Mosaics Collection. These floors give a totally new expression of colour with black and white as dominant shades and grey as a mysterious background. Young and functional! The new mosaic collection presents a vast range of material combinations (e.g. ceramic or glass mosaic). The entire philosophy of Parquet In can be found in the Old Chic Collection.

For the first time, designer and manager Eliana Delatte has devoted her creative energy to furniture. The Old Chic Collection is brushed and pre-finished with UV oil and ready for fitting. +39 (0) 883 536 726 - www.parquetin.it

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Top Italian companies focused on export

IMPERTEK Since 30 years Impertek is an Italian company leader in the building sector, specialized in the production of fixed and adjustable height supports for external raised floorings. His motto, Change is possible, defines the company choices, which always aimed to the continuous innovation to support the design and the realization of the construction. In 2016 alone the company has increased his design sector with a specific area for the prototyping, putting on-line the web-app MegaPro and it is realising a new series of jack supports accessories, essential to facilitate and simplify the work on site.First of all among them there is Balance, self-levelling head that permits a slope correction up to 5% on the whole range of Jack supports and thanks to the anti-shock rubber, ensures the absorption of the noises. PrimeUp, is an adjustable support starting from 10 mm which can be used with all MegaMart heads. Thanks to two extensions it can reach 25 mm. Among the new products we can find also MiniBalance, the lowest self-levelling adjustable support ever made which goes from 25 to 40 mm in only three steps. Finally, Impertek last new project are the vertical wall clip and the clip for steps which permit to create the joints between slabs and walls and to realize the vertical line with excellent aesthetic results everywhere. MegaPro, is a web application to design laying for external floating floors with jack and MegaMart supports. The web-app offers a workspace with traditional technical drawing tools (drawing board, ruler, etc.), the entire range of Impertek supports, the option to show heights and the characteristics of each section of the flooring and, above all, to save projects and generate specifications with details of the supports used. +39 (0) 421 322 525 - www.impertek.com

PROGRESS PROFILES Lino Bordin, founder of Progress Profiles, crossed the ocean after World War II in search of a better life. In the early 1980s, he returned to Italy after he had built up a strong company in the extrusion of plastic and metal profiles.

His son Dennis, who has led the company since the 1990s, has gone down the road of technological innovation, encouraged by his brother-in-law Fanio Pontin, who entered the company at the same time. Progress Profiles produces scores of accessories for interiors, including skirting boards and profiles.

The company supplies numerous licensed systems for all types of floors from the installation to the finish. Additional products include LED lights, terrace insulation, balcony protection, and floor heating. The company continues to invest in the latest forms of technology. Progress Profiles produces over 12,500 products in stainless steel, aluminium, bronze, PVC, and real wood. The company employs over 100 people and the network includes 120 agents. The annual capacity is about 10 million metres. New for 2016-17, amongst other things, is the PRODESO HEAT GRIP, which improves the performances of the Prodeso Floor Heating system even more. Prolistel Channel is a new decorative profile for ceramics, mosaic, and natural stone. For vinyl there is a new range of profiles with Proskirting Covecap. And there are some more innovations. Progress Profiles exports to over 50 countries worldwide. +39 (0) 423 950 398 - www.progressprofiles.com

SEICOM Italian company SEICOM delivers portable floors for FIBA VILLAGE 2015 For the traditional biennial event FSB Cologne, the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) has chosen a floor made in Italy: the well-known model Bormio manufactured by Seicom. All main partner companies of FIBA Equipe & Venue were hosted within Fiba Village and black was chosen as the color of Fiba Village 2015. Right in the center of the village, the SEICOM portable floor Bormio hosted athletes taking part to small competitions and animators involving people in challenges. A portable 100 m2 SEICOM BORMIO was also installed on the stand of BODET, a well-known French manufacturer of scoreboards, clocks and sports accessories. The yellow and black colored floor was highly appreciated and enhanced the booth, making it warmer and well coordinated with the big floor on the FIBA main court. All together 450 m2 portable floor model Bormio was installad at FSB 2015. This confirms the status of Bormio as an internationally much appreciated floor with numerous references worldwide. In 1999 SEICOM was supplier for FIBA FINAL FOUR in the OLYMPIAHALLE in MUNICH and in 2004 for the Athens Olympic Games. +39 (0) 342 512 573 - www.seicom-italy.com

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LA SAN MARCO PROFILI La San Marco Profili is an independent family-run company founded in 1989. Its headquarter based in Treviso, Italy.

With almost 30 years of professional experience in developing and manufacturing skirting and outdoor flooring, La San Marco offers a full product portfolio of skirting and outdoor flooring and it serves clients around the globe thanks to its well-recognized products quality and services efficiency. In fact, thanks to our increased flexibility and our large and well-furnished stock, we guarantee optimum quality, offering a vast range of outdoor flooring like Ipè, Teak, Angelim Amargoso, Iroko, Heat Treated Ash and all sorts of skirting for every need.

Furthermore, our company’s FSC certificate guarantees a sustainable forest management. Indeed, the unique feature of our products lie in the fact that they have been designed to perfectly preserve the beauty and elegance of natural wood whilst meeting the highest and various market demands. What distinguishes the company is its particular attention in working with details. Well knowing that small particulars make the difference, we are accustomed to search for perfection in small things that however stand out. Our mission is to harmonize the place without overcome it. Following this thought we created all our line accessories, both veneer and solid, in different woods and colours. Among our product news, there is the-flush-with-the-wall system, a skirting studied for a particular installation system that is able to catch it with an elegance that always distinguishes la San Marco Profili. The company is expanding into many international markets very aggressively, and is actively looking for distribution partners in the new developing markets. +39 (0) 438 980 106 - www.lasanmarcoprofili.com

www.lithos.it

Wood the natural stage for your lifestyle.

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RESILIENTS Visit us: Hall 8, Stand F11

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“THE VENETIANS” SKIRTING

MAINTENANCE

INIMITABLE PROFILES

OUTDOOR

14 - 17 January 2017 - Hannover - Germany

CUT SAW. AN ORIGINAL RANGE IN LINE WITH CURRENT TRENDS A RANGE OF PROFILES THAT BRINGS OUT THE TRUE FEEL OF WOOD IN A NATURAL WAY.

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For professionals

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by CHIMIVER

Viale Europa 63 - 31010 Soligo, TV - Italy - Tel. +39 0438 980106 r.a. - Fax +39 0438 980176 info@lasanmarcoprofili.com - www.lasanmarcoprofili.com

Chimiver + Chimiver ChimiverChannel Chimiver

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Top Italian companies focused on export

Flo.it/FLORIAN Flo.it is part of the Florian group, main producer of European hardwoods, founded in Italy, but located mainly in Croatia. Due to the availability of raw materials, especially oak, they decided in November 2014 to create the Flooring division in their headquarter in Vazzola (TV) Italy. It has a covered surface of 26,000m². Their goal is to produce a certified two-layer wooden floor (e.g. FSC, CARB, or TAS) in order to be competitive against flooring importers. They have standardised their product in order to achieve our aim: - One essence: Oak - Two top layer thicknesses: 4mm and 6mm - Three widths: 142mm, 192mm, and 242mm.

- Two lengths: 2350mm and 2050mm.

They are able to achieve their goal through standardisation, the automation of their machineries, and large amount of raw materials. 38 worker are currently employed at Flo.it, section Flooring. Flo.it will produce approximately 250,000m² in 2016. Thanks to investments, the company will grow in 2017 and production will reach 500,000m². At the moment, their main trade is in Italy, which represents 65%, while the remaining 30% is abroad: Belgium, the Netherlands, France, the UK, Turkey, and the USA. In 2017, we expect to export 50% of our production. +39 (0) 438 442 195 - www.florianinc.com

GARBELOTTO Passion for wood, ongoing technological research, Antonio Garbelotto’s vast experience, and the partnership with Francesco Dalla Colletta, who formed Master Floor in 2003, have together resulted in Garbelotto/Master Floor offering an outstanding range of wooden floors and accessories. The company is growing constantly through investment in new machines and new production sites. Their philosophy: a combination of skill, fashion, technology, and the natural beauty of wood. Garbelotto wooden floors are 100% Made in Italy.

The range consists of an extensive array of (pre-finished) two and three-layer wooden floors in various sizes and an endless number of finishes. An impression: 40 colours/treatments, 22 wood sorts, and 19 product lines; in short, 999 possible mixes of colours, dimensions, finishes, etc. An outstanding example of innovation is the Line Noblesse, a pre-finished floor in Hungarian Point. Here, too, there are various dimensions, thicknesses, and finishes. Another example is the new range Creator with timeless inlays and designs. Garbelotto achieved a turnover of 16 million euros in 2015 with 60 employees.

Their innovations for 2016 include the revolutionary Clip Up System. With this system you can remove and re-use planks and clips! +39 (0) 438 580 348 - www.garbelotto.it

CHIMIVER Chimiver Panseri S.p.A. is a family business with 51 years of experience in making varnishes, glues and related products for parquet floors, resilient, syntethic turf and floors in general.

The company was started up by Giovanni Panseri and is now still run by him and his 2 sons Oscar and Nevio. Key words at this Italian company based in Bergamo are a strong work ethos and excellent customer service. Other concerns in this company are the environment and quality through research. Nowadays Chimiver employs 58 people. The company is based on 11.000 m2 of surface and has a capacity of 40.000 kg of glue production per day on 2 different plants and 10.000 liters of varnishes in 1 plant. Apart from traditional parquet products, thanks to long experience, since more than 20 years Chimiver offers on the market also a wide range of UV products supplying the Italian and European leading producer of pre-finished or engineered parquet. Chimiver can satisfy any need in the UV line and its actual range is including fillers, primers, finishing lacquers and complete UV treatment of UV-oils. As Chimiver values the environment, its range include also a complete UV water-based treatment. Chimiver has excellent lab technicians who watch over the quality of the products and who try to develop them even further. Each Chimiver product is a mix of several factors: from the exhaustive research into how it functions to the investigation of any aspect that could make it more effective and longer lasting. This is the way of thinking and research that leads Chimiver into choosing components to use from among all the raw materials available, and into taking notice of suggestions from users. Chimiver is recognized as the biggest player in Italy for parquet products and is now trying to focus even more on export. At present 60% of the company’s turnover is made in Italy and 40 % abroad. Chimiver already exports all over the world from Europe to South-America, Africa and Australia. +39 (0) 35 795 031 - www.chimiver.com

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∂ Industry news Ciranova Industrial Finishes The brand CIRANOVA is known worldwide because of the high quality finishing products.

Besides the products in small packaging, our products are also used for industrial purposes and delivered in larger packaging. To continue the Ciranova line, our industrial products will be systematically packed in new Ciranova cans. This for 5 L, 20 L and 25 L cans. By the end of 2016 all industrial products of Ciranova will be converted to the new packaging.

reaching over 41 million, the airport required an abrasion resistant flooring for some 400m2 of the baggage area floors. Mapei’s Ultratop Industrial was specified because of its excellent abrasion and wearing resistance to the high volume of traffic in the area. To prevent staining the Ultratop Industrial was sealed with one of the products from our Mapefloor range.

For more information on Mapei resilient products, other products or training days, please visit www.mapei.co.uk, email info@mapei.co.uk or tel. +44 (0)121 508 6970.

Change of owner at Parador: Nord Holding acquires flooring manufacturer Coesfeld, 30 September 2016 – As of 1 October 2016, Nord Holding Unternehmensbeteiligungsgesellschaft mbH acquires Parador including its subsidiaries

Mapei UK products used for refurbishment of gatwick Airport’s North Terminal Departures Mapei UK have recently helped complete a flooring refurbishment project in Gatwick Airport’s North Terminal Departure costing approximately £2million. DMC Contracts carried out the installation, leading the design between Mapei and Gatwick Airport to deliver a robust flooring system that would tolerate the demands of a busy airport terminal.

As the UK’s second largest airport and the most efficient single-runway airport in the world, Gatwick Airport required a screed that could endure the high volume of footfall which it encounters daily. Mapei specified a screed containing their Topcem binder, also including Mapefibre NS12 polypropylene fibres, to replace up to 9,000m2 of the previous flooring in the North Terminal Departures.

Topcem, which carries an EC1 rating, produces a perfect screed to use prior to the installation of any flooring where rapid drying is required – allowing light foot traffic after just 12 hours, ensuring the airport experienced minimal disruption. Mapefibre NS12 helps to create a strong matrix within the screed which is more resistant to the stresses induced by the setting and hardening process. Once laid, the floor was left for 28 days before it was drop-hammer tested, where it received a Category A rating.

400 x 400 porcelain tiles and 600 x 300 conglomerate tiles were then laid with Mapei’s grey coloured Granirapid (which also carries an EC1 rating) – a rapid setting, high strength, flexible tile adhesive suitable for a busy airport environment. The floor tiles were grouted with Mapei’s popular Ultracolour Plus Grout in the ‘Cement Grey’ shade (113).

With Gatwick’s moving annual total passenger numbers recently

from the previous owner, the Hüls group of companies.

“We are pleased to have a renowned investor by our side in the form of NORD Holding. Together we want to continue the growth path embarked upon and develop our position in the market considerably,” explains Lubert Winnecken, Managing Director of Parador. The company is continuing to grow and is expected to achieve a double-digit turnover increase in 2016.

NORD Holding Unternehmensbeteiligungsgesellschaft mbH from Hanover is one of Germany's oldest investment companies and invests in small and medium growth companies over the long term.

Machines for Parquet finishing DOMOTEX NEWS:

Saw effect

LED dryer

Solcamastraat 25, 9262 ND, Sumar, The Netherlands +31 512 510035 | info@trivec.eu | www.trivec.eu

Find more info on: www.trivec.eu

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∂ Product news ADESIV PELPREN 153: NEOPRENE ADHESIVE FOR STAIR FURNISHINGS, SKIRTING BOARDS, CORK, ETC. Pelpren 153 is a multifunctional neoprene solvent adhesive for double glueing. It is ideal for securing stair components, skirting boards and profiles, rubber, linoleum, cork, and carpet. Pelpren neoprene adhesive is applied in a thin layer to both the substrate and the material to be glued using a brush or a fine notched trowel. The surfaces to be glued should be free of dirt, dust, and grease and should be pressed outwards from the middle to prevent the formation of air pockets. The glued surface can be walked on within two to three hours and it sets fully between 24 and 36 hours.

IMPERTEK: SUPPORT TO THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY IN DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION SITE Since 30 years Impertek is an Italian company leader in the building sector, specialized in the production of fixed and adjustable height supports for external raised floorings.

His motto, Change is possible, defines the company choices, which always aimed to the continuous innovation to support the design and the realization of the construction.

In 2016 alone, for example, the company has increased his design sector with a specific area for the prototyping, puting on-line MegaPro (web-app to design raised floorings) and it is realising a new series of jack supports accessories (self-levelling heads, millimetrical adjustable supports ecc.), essential to facilitate and simplify the work on site.

CARBON, BLACK OAK BY DESIGN PARQUET Design Parquet, which specialises in high-range parquet, has extended its Design Deco collection to include a new shade, namely carbon. The very deep brown provides a tangible experience which is almost mineral and reminds you of brick. Thanks to a clear finish with lots of texture, this unique parquet highlights even more remarkably all elements which are present in a room

.

KLINDEX: 3 HEADS INNOVATIVE SINGLE DISC MACHINE New Klindex® Triple K, Triples single operator’s productivity.

3 heads innovative single disc machine with oscillating heads and variable speed.

Triple K The top of the technology applied to single disc machines, amazing handling suitable for beginners, folds up in seconds and easily passes through standard interior doors in homes and offices. Perfect to work in large areas, effortless crystallization thanks to adjustable and floor-touching wheels.

OSMO : POLYX®-OIL EXPRESS The new Polyx®-Oil Express is a clear, very fast drying wood finish for professional craftsmen. It is ideal for protecting all wooden floors as well as for furniture surfaces. It increases the colour intensity and durability of the wood surface. It is also resistant to water, dirt and abrasion and is extremely hard-wearing. In combination with the Hardener 6632, Polyx®-Oil Express is also suitable for the clear surface treatment of hardwoods laden with oils and resins, such as Wenge, Merbau etc.

O MONOCOAT SPRAY AND

Another special feature: a matt surface finish is also possible.

RUBIO MONOCOAT EXTERIOR RANGE:

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