Vinyl Plank Flooring Floating Vs Self Adhesive Reviews

Are you because luxury vinyl plank floors for your dwelling house? We've got a ton of feel with it, and today I'm breaking downwardly our experience with floating, gum down, and skin & stick vinyl floors.

If you've been hither for a while, then you lot'll know that Corey and I accept a deep and constant love for vinyl plank flooring. We first discovered information technology in our start firm when nosotros installed information technology in Jackson's nursery. We loved it and so much that we somewhen brought it out to the balance of the house, and when we moved into our second home we didn't waste a minute replacing all of the carpet throughout the house with more vinyl plank floor.

Well, information technology should come every bit no surprise that when we were making plans for the flooring in this house, nosotros once again went with vinyl plank. It's durable, it's beautiful, and information technology honestly tricks then many people into thinking it'due south the existent bargain (without having to stress about the scratches and other maintenance issues that can come up with hardwood!).

In each of our three houses nosotros take had three different types of vinyl plank, then I thought it would be helpful to practise a little breakdown of the differences nosotros've noticed. If you've been considering vinyl plank floor in your ain dwelling house, hopefully this analysis will be helpful to you!

Hither'southward a rundown of what we have experience with:

• In our first home, we used this peel & stick vinyl flooring and installed it ourselves.
• In our second home, we used this gum-down flooring and had a pro install it.
• In this home, this floating vinyl plank was installed when the business firm was built.

So, let's go into some detail on the differences betwixt peel & stick, glue-down, and floating vinyl plank flooring.

Peel & Stick Vinyl Plank Flooring

Peel and stick vinyl plank flooring is also chosen "force per unit area sensitive" flooring in the professional person flooring world. Basically, it just means that the agglutinative has already been applied to the flooring (either in long strips or all over the back of the floor), and it's applied to your flooring with force per unit area (either from a big roller or, if you're me, just from your trunk weight) and forms a bail that way.

Pros

Skin & stick vinyl plank flooring is very intuitive to install yourself (despite some serious prep piece of work) and is the most affordable of the options. The stuff we used was only $1/foursquare foot, and I installed all of it throughout out house entirely past myself.

I really loved the await of this flooring (despite the fact that it was super thin and basically a sticker, information technology fooled tons of people!), and the texture was probably my favorite of all the floor we've had. It has a actually neat texture to it that really did mimic the feel of bodily wood – we've tried to find a similar feel in other types of vinyl over the years and haven't been able to notice anything that was quite the same.

Of all the types we've had, this flooring is too the easiest to repair on the off-run a risk information technology gets damaged. All you have to do is peel up the damaged plank and stick a new one downward! We only ever had to supersede one plank in the two and a half years nosotros had this flooring (and information technology was due to a broken glass that scraped the summit layer of the floor off).

This stuff is waterproof and tin can handle just just about anything that might get thrown its way. I've even heard from people who installed this exact stuff in a basement that afterwards got flooded, and the floor remained perfectly intact!

cons

While this 1 is the about affordable and simplest to install, it besides is probably the least durable option in terms of staying stuck (which, reminder, is nevertheless incredibly durable!). Since information technology'south only fastened to the flooring with the sticky adhesive on the back of the planks, it can skin up in corners over fourth dimension if the flooring isn't perfectly prepped. Information technology's probably a not-result if you accept a pro practice it, merely we did take a few pieces that peeled up over time at our business firm – never enough to carp united states or even demand replacing, merely it wasn't perfect.

Due to how thin this flooring is, you'll also feel every tiny imperfection on the subfloor underneath it. Nosotros had one area in our hallway where the wood subfloor was uneven and I didn't take the time to skim coat information technology (I should accept!). Information technology was pretty obvious in the finished product when you lot walked on it, and I ever wished I would have taken the time to peel information technology up and fix it.

We didn't live with this flooring long enough to feel this, just my sis has had something similar throughout her house for more than a decade and there are some spots where the color has worn off and the white bankroll is showing through (information technology's mostly on the ridges that add that texture we loved so much!). All the same, that hasn't stopped her from using it in other parts of her home she has renovated, and she still has only dandy things to say about it!

the bottom line

This is such a fantastic option if you're on a major budget and are willing to tackle some hard work yourself. It's cheap enough that information technology could fifty-fifty be a temporary mensurate if y'all're drastic to get rid of some nasty rug or damaged tile.

Would I use it over again? In a heartbeat, simply I'd just make certain to take the fourth dimension to prep the subfloor extremely well to ensure it sticks properly.

If y'all want some farther reading on peel & stick vinyl, here are a few posts I've written:

• A look at our get-go always experience with these floors.
• A detailed tutorial for how to install peel & stick vinyl floors.
• An honest look at how we felt about this floor after 2 years of living with information technology.

Mucilage down vinyl plank flooring

When we moved into our 2d home, the carpet was in pretty atrocious status (holes, stains, and smells!), and nosotros knew that we would need to replace it correct away. We originally planned to do it ourselves, but we were moving in right around the holidays and didn't desire to spend the showtime month or so in our new house living in chaos.

Then, nosotros decided to rent the task out – it was our start time hiring out something similar that, and I take to say it was really nice to have someone else doing all the hard work for me!

The flooring guy that nosotros used had a specific flooring he liked to work with, and so we decided to try glue-downward flooring this time around.

pros

Glue down flooring is as well sometimes referred to equally difficult set up floor, and is installed by applying an adhesive to the subfloor, then laying the floor on top. Nosotros had absolutely no issues with peeling or damaged tiles in the two years we lived with this flooring. It looked just as good on the day we moved out as it did the solar day nosotros had it installed!

Of course, information technology'due south hard to say if that'southward thank you to the flooring itself or the fact that it was professionally installed, but I practise retrieve it's safe to assume that glue is going to be a more than long-lasting option than just a pre-applied adhesive!

Gum down flooring is also very easy to replace or repair and can be washed one plank at a time (since it isn't interlocking).

Of all of the options I've researched, everyone seems to hold that mucilage down floor is the most durable, long-lasting, and reliable type of vinyl plank floor.

Glue down flooring is besides a very affordable option, mostly coming in under $2.00/foursquare foot.

Cons

The installation process for glue-downwardly flooring is a little more intensive – you have to apply the glue to the floor versus it already being on the back of the flooring, and information technology requires a lot more than precision than a floating floor.

Our flooring guys practical a skim coat to the entire concrete subfloor before laying any flooring – I'one thousand not sure if this was a totally necessary step (and they honestly probably would take also done it for the peel and stick stuff too!), but watching them work definitely made me thankful I wasn't the 1 installing information technology!

the bottom line

I think that as a whole, Corey and I would both agree that the gum-down flooring was probably our favorite in terms of the durability and feel. I liked how solid it felt underfoot, I loved that it was so incredibly durable, and I could encounter it lasting more or less forever. However, I wouldn't install a glue down floor myself due to the prep work required in a good install, and so the total cost would probably end up being the most expensive of the options.

Here's some further reading on our experience with glue downwards vinyl plank floors:

• A review of our Mohawk vinyl plank floors + experience having information technology installed

floating vinyl plank flooring

And that brings us to this house! Nosotros purchased our dwelling house as as spec home as it was in the process of being congenital – so, we had a scrap of say in a few things about the home (similar the floor), only not anywhere well-nigh as much as we would accept if we had come in at the get-go of the process.

Our choices in brands were express to those available through our builder, and all of the vinyl plank options were floating. We (obviously) didn't install them ourselves, as they were installed as the house was congenital.

pros

I don't have experience installing floating vinyl plank floors, but my enquiry tells me these are actually the most DIY-friendly of the options! Since they're thicker and sit on top of the subfloor, they're much more than forgiving when it comes to a less-than-perfect prep task, and it'south a chore nearly beginner DIY-ers should exist comfortable taking on.

This flooring is much thicker than the gum-down options generally are and is less probable to accept problems with the elevation layer coming off over time. Many floating floors will also have an acoustic backing built into them and are better for reducing noise.

Floating vinyl plank is probably the closest in nature to a laminate or wood flooring, just it's far more durable. It's generally considered waterproof, just like the other options, and really seems to be more or less indestructible.

cons

Since the flooring interlocks rather than being but laid next to each other, floating vinyl plank flooring doesn't allow for quite as unproblematic repairs as an adhesive pick would. It's still considered pretty like shooting fish in a barrel to fix (and incredibly durable so the frequency of repairs is very low), but a little more complex than the other options.

Of the options, floating vinyl plank is also the nearly expensive pick, though it'south even so very affordable. Our current flooring comes in at most places right around $3.00/square foot.

The feel of a floating floor is besides naturally a scrap different than one that adheres directly to the subfloor. In certain spots it tin can take a bit of a "hollow" feel to it, which for u.s.a. took a bit of getting used to.

the bottom line

Despite the fact that we prefer the feel of glue down flooring, if I was going to exist installing something myself I would absolutely choose floating floors in the time to come. They're by far the easiest and most forgiving and they also require the least amount of prep. If you gene in probable wanting professional installation for an agglutinative flooring, they also volition likely end upwards being more affordable than the other options as well.

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In the end, no thing which type you cull, I highly recommend vinyl plank floor and tin't imagine ever choosing annihilation else for my home. I love how durable information technology is, I think information technology'south absolutely beautiful, and you tin can't beat the price!

Let me know if you take whatsoever further questions and I'll exercise my best to respond them!

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Source: https://www.loveandrenovations.com/vinyl-plank-flooring-showdown/

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