GB2124267A - Plastics skirting board or rubbing strip - Google Patents

Abstract

This is provided with a number of grooves 17, 18 in its inner face. These grooves indicate lines along which the board may be trimmed to reduce its depth or the depth of a lip 11. The board may also have additional grooves 13, 14 which co- operate with snap fit pegs 15, 16 to attach it to an existing skirting board or wall. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Plastics skirting board or rubbing strip The invention relates to the construction and use in buildings of skirting boards and rubbing strips.

Skirting boards and rubbing strips are traditionally made of wood and are nailed into place against the surface of a newly-constructed wall inside a building. Until recently wood has been plentiful, and therefore cheap, and this cost advantage over other materials has helped to disguide the inherent drawbacks of wooden boarding. Some of these drawbacks are that wood is easily damaged, that it has to be painted in order to preserve it, that the traditional nailed fixing of wooden skirting boards and rubbing strips makes it difficult to remove them once installed and requires extensive making-good before replacement boards or strips can be installed, and that wood requires tools capable of cutting it accurately before it can be trimmed and mitred.

In recent years wood has become scarce and is now losing much of its previous appeal as a cheap building material. This makes its drawbacks more apparent.

It has previously been proposed to use plastics materials instead of wood for skirting boards. This however requires the removal of existing wooden skirting boards followed by their complete replacement by an identically-sized plastics board. Solid plastics boards are still relatively expensive to mould or extrude, and it is wastefull as well as time-consuming to remove what might be perfectly sound existing wooden boarding and then discard it.

The present invention seeks to combine the advantages of plastics with the economies inherent in not removing the existing skirting boarding from a conventional building. To that end the invention envisages using the existing boarding as a surface against which to fasten a new skirting board (which term is henceforth use to cover both skirting board and rubbing strip) which has a plastics outer facing and which is removably affixed either by a snap-fit or by other adhesive means against the existing wooden boarding or, alternately, against an unboarded wall surface in a new building.

According to the present invention there is provided a skirting board which comprises an outer face of plastics material and an inner face which has one or more longitudinal grooves, each groove indicating a line along which the board can be trimmed to reduce its depth.

Preferably the inner face of the board is provided with one or more additional grooves each adapted to co-operate with respective pegs when they are fixed in a line along an existing board or wall.

An edge of the board may be lipped to space the board in use, from an existing board or wall.

Alternatively a lip member is detachably connected with an edge of the board to space the board, in use, from an existing board or wall.

In such a case the lip member has a U-shaped longitudinal recess with resilently deformable legs, the recess accommodating an edge of the board in a snap-fit manner.

Preferably the recess is provided with an abutment which co-operates with a lip groove in the inner face of the board adjacent the edge.

Advantageously a lip groove is provided adjacent each edge of the board and adjacent each groove which indicates a trimming line.

The lip of the board provided on its inner face with one or more longitudinal grooves, each groove indicating a line along which the lip can be trimmed to reduce its depth.

The lip and the board itself may be trimmed by cutting along the base of the groove with scissors or with a sharp knife such as a Stanley (RTM) knife, or where the groove is deep enough, by flexing until the plastics breaks.

The board could for example be curved around one longitudinal edge to define a top edge of a skirting board. Alternatively or additionally it could be curved around the other edge, and whilst the board will normally be substantially flat across its outside surface it could, especially when used as a rubbing strip, incorporate decorative profiling on its outer surface.

In any of the forms outlined above, the plastics outside facing of the board could be self-coloured rather than having to be painted. It may for example be given a woodgrain effect, or a marbled effect, or a stone effect, all of which are readily and most realistically imparted to modern plastics materials. It might simply be coloured white, to reflect the modern trend to white interior "woodwork".

A skirting board embodying the invention has many advantages over the traditional wooden boards or strips. It can be extruded in convenient lengths rather than having to be sawn from imported timber stock. It can be made much lighter than a wooden board of similar depth and length. It is far more resistant to attack by damp and insects. It can readily be cleaned and needs no maintenance. It can equally readily be removed and replaced with an identical board having different outside surface colouring. It can be removed again if the walls themselves are to be repainted or replastered, or if carpets are to be laid, and in all those instances the necessary work can be carried out without the well-known need to work accurately to an edge of a permanentlyfixed skirting board or wall-mounted rubbing strip.

When lipped it can, unlike most conventional wooden skirting boards, or rubbing strips, effectively box in pipes and cables.

Embodiments of the present invention will now be more particularly described by way of example and with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: Figure 1 shows in separated condition and in perspective, part of one board and pegs embodying an aspect of the invention; Figure 2 shows diagrammatically how two overlapping boards are fitted; Figure 3 shows diagrammatically again how two non-overlapping boards have a bridging piece inserted into them; and Figure 4 shows in perspective, a part of a board embodying another aspect of the invention.

Referring now to the drawings, the board shown in Figure 1 is intended for use as a skirting board, It is elongate and is extruded integrally from a suitable hard plastics material. It is of uniform thickness throughout, except where it is grooved, and it curves around one of its opposite longitudinal edges to form a lip which is referenced 11 and which defines the intended top edge of the skirting board.

On its outside face 12 the board is smooth and substantially flat, and is coloured to suit the preference of the purchaser.

The inside face of the board has two partcircular grooves 13, 14 formed in it. These grooves extend along the length of the board and run parallel one to the other and to the oppositetop and bottom longitudinal edges of the board.

Each groove is shaped to snap-fit onto pegs 1 5, 1 6 which are themselves made of resilient plastics material and which are secured by respective screws 1 spa, 1 6a to the existing skirting board (not shown) or direct to the new wall surface (not shown) which the plastics board is intended to cover.

An alternative method of fixing would be to attach the board by means of double sided adhesive tape or other adhesive means, e.g.

Velcro (RTM), either directly to the wall or existing skirting board or to pegs or battens standing clear of the existing surface.

V-shaped grooves 1 7 are formed in the underside of the lip 11 and extend along the length of the lip. They run parallel one to another and to the back edge 1 a of the board. In this particular case the board is to stand well proud of the existing board, or new wall surface, which it is intended to cover. The grooves 1 7 form guide lines along which the lip 11 can be trimmed if it is desired to bring the board closing to the wall surface.

A simliar V-shaped groove 18 in the inside face of the board runs adjacent and parallel to the bottom edge 1 2a of the board. This groove 18 acts as a guide line along which the board can be trimmed if it is desired to reduce its depth.

In an alternative embodiment shown in Figure 4, the board is elongate, has a substantially rectangular cross section, and is extruded from suitable hard plastics material.

It is similarly provided with V-shaped grooves 1 8a in the inside face to act as guide lines along either of which the board can be trimmed, if it is necessary to reduce its depth. There is an additional V-shaped groove 1 9 which can be used if necessary as a guide line to halve the depth of the board.

A separate lip member 20 has a longitudinal recess dimensioned just to fit over an edge of the board, and a longitudinally extending abutment 21 within the recess co-operates with an arcuate groove 22 in the inner face of the board. The legs defining the recess are resiliently deformable so that the lip member 20 may be easily connected to and removed from the board. The lip member 20 has V-shaped grooves 1 7a, for reducing its depth if necessary.

So that the board may be used upside down or alternatively may be used as a rubbing board with two lip members 20 another arcuate groove 22 is provided at the opposite edge of the board.

Further arcuate grooves 22a are also provided so adjacent each V-shaped groove 1 8a that if one particular V-shaped groove is used to reduce the depth of the board, the possibility of adding a lip to each edge and thereby form a rubbing board will not be lost. For the same reason two arcuate grooves 23 are provided, one on each side of the central V-shaped groove 1 9.

Ideally the arcuate grooves are semicircles of radius 0.5 mm and the V-shaped grooves are 1 mm deep.

The arcuate grooves and V-shaped grooves or edges are spaced one from another by approximately 3.2 mm.

The board illustrated in Figure 4 may be additionally provided with part-circular grooves 13, 14 for fixing it to a wall, or alternatively it may be adhered thereto.

It is currently envisaged that boards embodying the invention will be sold ready-mitred at one end, since it is well recognised that accurate mitring is the most difficult part of installing a skirting board or rubbing strip around the meeting corners of any room. The boards would be sold in lengths of say 6 feet, 3 feet and 1 2 feet or their metric equivalents, and Figures 2 and 3 show the ways in which, firstly, the overlap "o" of two boards can be removed to fit the combined board into a given length of wall, and conversely, the gap "g" between two boards of insufficient combined length can be filled by cutting a third board and fitting it into the gap.

In each case, because the boards are readymitred, only straight cuts are needed to fit the combined lengths of board together. Most users can more easily achieve a clean straight cut than an accurate mitre. Where the board must go around an outside corner, e.g. around the corner of a chimney breast, the boards may be manufactured with an oppositely directed mitre at each end. This is particularly useful when applied to the symmetrical board shown in Figure 4.

Claims (9)

Claims

1. A skirting board comprising an outer face of plastics material and an inner face which has one or more longitudinal grooves, each groove indicating a line along which the board can be trimmed to reduce its depth.

2. A skirting board as claimed in claim 1, wherein the inner face of the board is provided with one or more additional grooves each adapted to co-operate with respective pegs when fixed in a line along an existing board or wall.

3. A skirting board as claimed in either claim 1 or claim 2, wherein an edge of the board is lipped to space the board, in use, from an existing board or wall.

4. A skirting board as claimed in either claim 1 or claim 2, wherein a lip member is detachably connected with an edge of the board to space the board, in use, from an existing board or wall.

5. A skirting board as claimed in claim 4, wherein the lip member has a U-shaped longitudnial recess with resiliantly deformable legs, the recess accommodating an edge of the board in a snap-fit manner.

6. A skirting board as claimed in claim 5, wherein the recess is provided with an abutment which co-operates with a lip-groove in the inner face of the board adjacent the edge.

7. A skirting board as claimed in claim 6, wherein a lip groove is provided adjacent each edge of the board and adjacent each groove which indicates a trimming line.

8. A skirting board as claimed in any of claims 3 to 7, wherein the lip of the board is provided on its inner face with one or more longitudinal grooves, each groove indicating a line along which the lip can be trimmed to reduce its depth.

9. A skirting board substantially as described herein with reference to any Figure of the accompanying drawings.