AU2002301615B2 - Improved flooring product and application method - Google Patents

Description

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AUSTRALIA

Patents Act 1990 Boardwalk Floor Covering Pty Ltd COMPLETE SPECIFICATION Invention Title: Improved flooring product and installation method The invention is described in the following statement: 2 Introduction to the Invention This invention relates to timber flooring and in particular to the provision and application of solid timber flooring to an existing solid sub-floor.

Background to the Invention Traditional wooden flooring comprises the application of solid timber floor boards to a series of spaced bearers.

Solid timber is dimensionally unstable and moves constantly across and along the grain in response to changes in the equilibrium moisture content (EMC) of the wood. The EMC in turn varies as relative humidity changes. Accordingly, solid timber flooring which is applied to situations of constantly changing relative humidity must be installed in a manner allowing for its intrinsic instability. The traditional method is to form timber floor boards with an interlocking tongue and grove shape which allows movement of floor boards, particularly across the grain. In this manner solid timber floor boards fixed transversely across supporting bearers can accommodate the movement and dimensional instability which occurs during changes to relative humidity of the floors environment.

While traditional timber flooring installation remains a popular choice for floors, alternative flooring construction techniques are available which offer advantages over the traditional use of supporting bearers. Such a technique includes the use of concrete slabs for direct preparation of subfloors.

Concrete slabs provide a flooring substrate of reasonable dimensional stability, particularly when fully cured. Many flooring materials can be directly applied to such slabs including carpet, vinyl and other floor sheeting products. However, for asthetic and tactile reasons timber remains a popular choice for a floor finish. Unfortunately, the dimensional instability of solid timber make the application of traditional floor boards to stable concrete slabs difficult, if not impossible to accomplish without risking splitting and lifting of the boards from the concrete substrate due to the incompatible movement qualities of the two materials.

Many attempts have been made to address this problem including preparation of parquetry which involves the use of many small pieces of timber juxtaposed in alternative grain directions to minimise the dimensional instability which occurs principally across the grain of solid timber. Such a technique is effective but costly to install. In addition, the usual effect of traditional constant grain direction in timber flooring remains attractive to the consumer.

One method has been developed involving the application of bearing strips to a slab substrate to mimic traditional bearers. Solid timber floor boards are then applied to the bearing strips in the traditional manner. Such techniques are partially successful, however they are costly to install, involve multi stepped installation and result in substantial loss of space over the slab.

Other methods involve the lamination of timber flooring veneer to a dimensionally stable sub-floor, in the manner of a plywood, which is then adhered to the slab. Such installations are difficult to securely adhere to the slab substrate, require finishing sanding which risks damage to the top veneer, requires pre-construction prior to installation and is limited to available flooring timber veneers.

A satisfactory method of economically applying solid timber flooring to a concrete slab is yet to be devised.

Object of the Invention One object of the invention is to provide an improved flooring product and installation method.

In one aspect the invention provides a method of installing solid timber flooring to a substrate including the steps of: applying a gap filling adhesive to said substrate; providing a dimensionally stable and workable sub-floor and bonding to said gap filling adhesive; working said bonded sub-floor, provide a substantially flat sub-floor surface; applying a contact adhesive to said worked sub-floor; providing dressed solid timber floor boards having contact adhesive on one face surface thereof and bonding same to said sub-floor.

The floor boards are preferably of a thickness to provide a working and durable floor surface whilst exercising substantial dimensional restraint from the adhesion to the sub-floor.

The floor boards may be pre-finished and/or finished as required when bonded to said sub-floor.

The sub-floor may be mechanically fixed to said substrate by a fixing means. The fixing means may be nails or pins of sufficient length to engage the sub-floor and substrate.

The gap filling adhesive may be a foaming adhesive and is most preferably Selleys' M Liquid Nails T M direct stick adhesive supplied by Orica T M Alternatively, the gap filling adhesive may be a contact type adhesive with gap filling specifications.

The sub-floor may be plywood and is most preferably 3 ply pinus radiata bond sheets.

The contact adhesive is most preferably R6500HV-20 supplied by RLA polymers.

In another aspect the invention provides an improved flooring product comprising the combination of a dimensionally stable and workable sub-floor adapted for fixing to a substrate and dressed floor board material adapted for fixing to said worked sub-floor.

The substrate may be a concrete slab. The sub-floor may be a plywood product adapted for sanding and levelling. The floor board material may be pre-dressed and pre-finished and even pre-glued with a coating of contact adhesive. With suitable packaging the contact adhesive remains workable until placed in contact with a mating glued surface.

In another aspect the invention provides dressed solid timber floor boards provided with a contact adhesive on a first face thereof and a finishing coat on a second face thereof.

The pre-prepared floorboards are immediately ready for application to the worked sub-floor which has been coated with contact adhesive thereby greatly improving the efficiency of the installation method of the invention.

Any discussion of documents, acts, materials, devices, articles or the like which has been included in the present specification is solely for the purpose of providing a context for the present invention. It is not to be taken as an admission that any or all of these matters form part of the prior art base or were common general knowledge in the field relevant to the present invention as it existed before the priority date of each claim of this application.

Throughout this specification the word "comprise", or variations such as "comprises" or "comprising", will be understood to imply the inclusion of a stated element, integer or step, or group of elements, integers or steps, but not the exclusion of any other element, integer or step, or group of elements, integers or steps.

Detailed Description of the Invention The invention will now be described with reference to the following figures: Figure 1 shows an exploded view of the flooring product; Figure 2 shows the first installation step; Figure 3 shows the second installation step; Figure 4 shows the third installation step.

Referring firstly to Figure 1, the various components of the improved flooring product are shown in the exploded view, where an existing substrate 1 is provided in the form of a concrete slab or other fixed substrate. Such substrates tend to be uneven and of coarse finish, such that they generally provide unsuitable substrates for the direct application of flooring materials, particularly flooring materials adapted for taking a high polish or finish, including timber or the like surfaces. In order to address the irregularities of such a substrate without resorting to the difficult and costly operation of attempting to flatten such inherently unworkable surfaces, the substrate is spread with a gap filling adhesive 2, which is designed and adapted to fill the irregularities of the substrate surface. The gap filling adhesive, which is most preferable selected from a foaming adhesive, for example Selleys'" Liquid Nails"TM direct stick adhesive. Such an adhesive is readily applied by a trowel and provides a foaming expanding gap filling adhesive material. As an alternative to foaming adhesives, a contact adhesive may be used which incorporates gap filling specifications. One particularly preferred adhesive is

BOSTIK

TM 1484 contact adhesive. The gap filling contact adhesive would be applied to both the substance and the sub-floor materials. In a particularly preferred embodiment the gap filling contact may be pre-applied to the sub floor material, sealed in plastic or other impermeable wrapping, such that the sub floor is ready for immediate use. To the gap filling adhesive is applied a dimensionally stable and workable sub-floor material 3, the sub-floor material will most preferably take the form of a plywood product, for example 3 ply bond sheets. This product is of a workable nature, in other words, capable of being sanded or machined to a smooth and level surface. The subfloor material is applied to the gap filling adhesive 2 which provides the necessary chemical adhesion. In addition to the chemical adhesion, physical fixing can be affected by the way of pins, screws or other mechanical fixing means 4 (where necessary). See figure 2.

Referring now to figure 3, once the sub-floor 3 has been applied and fixed to the substrate 1, any irregularities in the sub-floor surface 5 can be readily corrected due to the workable nature of sub-floor. For example, the sub-floor can be sanded smooth and flat to thereby provide a flat dimensionally stable sub-floor.

Referring now to figure 4, in order to fix the timber flooring 7, the subfloor surface 5 is provided with a contact adhesive, the contact adhesive may take the form of an adhesive R6500HV-20 supplied by RLA Polymers.

Alternatively any other form of self adhesive product may be used. The timber floor material 7 is provided in the form of fully dressed timber slats of sufficient thickness to provide a workable and durable timber floor, but of a thickness sufficient such that the application of contact adhesive 6 to the first face 8 and subsequent adhering of the timber flooring to the pre-prepared and pre-glued sub-floor surface 5, provides adequate bonding of the timber flooring material to the sub-floor such that the inherent dimensional instability of the timber flooring is suitable restrained by action of the contact adhesive. A thickness of between I to 10 mm has been found to be suitable, with preference for 5mm thickness.

The timber flooring 7 can be provided in a pre-glued format and may also incorporate pre-finishing 10 on a second surface 9. In this manner, the invention provides a method of installation of a timber flooring product to a substrate in a highly economical and reliable fashion.

The timber floor 7 can be pre-machined and pre-glued and pre-finished and provided in suitable quantities for completion of a given job. The substrate can be prepared by application of the sub-floor 3 and subsequently worked and machined to provide a smooth working sub-floor surface Subsequent application of contact adhesive renders the sub-floor surface ready for rapid and accurate application of the timber flooring product 7, which can be applied for instant adhesion to the prepared sub-floor surface The pre-finished nature of the timber floor 7 provides a virtually instant flooring product which does not require any machining or sanding due to the previous preparation of the sub-floor surfaces eliminating any need for treatment of the finished timber flooring veneer.

If necessary, a final coat of finish can be applied over the installed flooring to ensure absolute continuity of the finished surface.

The invention provides for the first time, a highly reliable and stable means of applying timber strip or veneer flooring to solid substrate materials in a manner ensuring and facilitating the virtual duplication of traditional flooring materials whilst eliminating the complexities and costs of traditional flooring construction and the numerous deficiencies of the currently available methods.

It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that numerous variations and/or modifications may be made to the invention as shown in the specific embodiments without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention as broadly described. The present embodiments are, therefore, to be considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive.

Claims (16)

1. A method of installing solid timber flooring to a substrate including the steps of: applying a gap filling adhesive to said substrate; providing a dimensionally stable and workable sub-floor and bonding same to said gap filling adhesive; working said bonded sub-floor to provide a substantially flat sub-floor surface; applying a contact adhesive to said worked sub-floor; and providing dressed timber floor boards having contact adhesive on a first face thereof and bonding same to said sub-floor.

2. A method according to claim 1 wherein said floor boards are of a suitable thickness to provide a working and durable floor surface whilst exercising substantial dimensional restraint from the adhesion to said sub-floor.

3. A method according to claim 2 where said floor boards are provided at a thickness between 1 to

4. A method according to claim 3 wherein said floor boards are provided at a thickness of about

5. A method according to any one of claims 1 to 4 wherein said floor boards are provided with a finishing coat on a second face thereof prior to bonding to said sub-floor.

6. A method according to any one of claims 1 to 5 wherein said gap filling adhesive is a foaming adhesive and, or a gap filling contact adhesive.

7. A method according to any one of claims 1 to 6 wherein said sub-floor is ply wood.

8. A method according to claim 7 wherein said plywood is three ply pinus radiata.

9. A method according to any one of claim 1 to 8 wherein said sub-floor in mechanically fixed to said substrate.

A method according to claim 9 wherein said mechanical fixings are nails.

11. A method according to any one of claims 1 to 10 wherein said substrate is concrete.

12. A floor comprising a laminate of a substrate, sub-floor and dressed timber floor boards installed in accordance with the method of any one of claims 1 to 11.

13. Dressed solid timber floor boards including contact adhesive applied to a first face thereof and a finishing coat applied to a second face thereof when used in a method of any one of claims 1 to 11.

14. A method according to any one of claims 1 to 11 substantially as hereinbefore described with particular reference to the preferred embodiment of the invention.

A floor according to claim 12 substantially as hereinbefore described with particular reference to the preferred embodiment of the invention.

16. Floor boards according to claim 13 or 14 substantially as hereinbefore described with particular reference to the preferred embodiment of the invention. Dated this third day of March 2005 Boardwalk Floor Covering Pty Ltd Patent Attorneys for the Applicant: F B RICE CO m:\specifications\500000\500000\500997res1 maw.doc