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How to remove a bubble on linoleum. Linoleum is swollen, what to do. Removing bubbles on glued linoleum

Linoleum is a floor covering that has gained popularity in our country due to its attractive performance, ease of installation and, of course, low cost. But there are situations that swellings appear on the linoleum - the so-called bubbles. First of all, it spoils appearance the entire room, and, secondly, in these places linoleum is wiped and worn out faster. There can be many reasons for the appearance of bubbles.

Why bubbles appear on linoleum

To begin with, this coating is installed in two ways:

  • ordinary flooring, followed by pressing the edges with skirting boards;
  • glue installation.

Depending on this and the causes of swelling are different.

Low quality linoleum

The lower the price of linoleum, the more likely it will warp, swell and crack. The fact is that cheap linoleums do not have a base, or it is, but of insufficient thickness. Therefore, during operation, after a while such material expands in some places, contracts in others, and bubbles and folds appear on the border of these zones.

uneven floor

It is impossible to lay any floor covering without preliminary preparation of the base, and even more so, such soft material like linoleum. Any depression and elevation, even the garbage left behind, will very soon appear, as they say, “obvious”.

The best option when laying linoleum on concrete is to level it with mortar and sand it. The easiest way is to make a self-leveling floor - perfect smoothness and horizontality are guaranteed. If the floor is already covered, the same old linoleum, then we advise you to simply lay a ready-made even base on top: plywood, fiberboard (chipboard) or some kind of synthetic substrate.

Installation errors

Despite the apparent simplicity, this work has several specific nuances, the non-observance of which leads to undesirable consequences. Therefore, do not trust the laying of linoleum to dubious hacks, albeit very cheap ones. And if you take it yourself, study what is called materiel.

Laying errors also include such a factor as improper installation of skirting boards.

Even if the coating itself is laid perfectly, and the skirting boards are pressed to the surface under force, swelling will appear along them soon enough, in a month or two. The solution is simple - reinstall the plinth above.

Moisture

If the coating is installed on glue, there are two reasons for the appearance of bubbles: again, illiterate installation, when the material is skewed, or moisture ingress during work. The second reason is the most common.

Furniture

Another common cause of blisters on any styling – improper use of furniture. If you constantly move it along the floor, then sooner or later the coating will lag behind in these places.

Do not be lazy to pick up the chair each time and shift it to the right place. You don't drag it along expensive parquet, do you?

What to do?

Places of bubbles become noticeable not immediately. Initially, when oblique sunlight hits the floor, it seems that a dark spot has appeared on the floor. In fact, this is already a noticeable shadow from a small elevation. And then, every day this elevation increases and turns into such an undesirable bubble.

The problem is that at the initial stage it is rarely possible to identify the beginning of the process, and even eliminate bubbling if the reason for their appearance is not clear. After all, it depends on the way in which you can do it.

How to remove bubbles on linoleum if it is not glued

Method 1. Linoleum is an artificial material made from PVC (polyvinyl chloride) and, like all such products, shrinks from heating. There is a big BUT! Just guess the temperature - and that's it. Instead of a not very noticeable bubble, a very noticeable melted spot will appear. But if you still want to try - follow our advice. Put a bag of salt or sand in an empty saucepan and put it in a water bath. Heat to a warm state, but so that the hand does not burn. Spread a rag on the bubble itself and put the bag on top for 5-10 minutes. Check - and if the bubble has shrunk, but not all, repeat the manipulation. You can take a heating pad with water, the temperature is about 38 degrees. Another option is a regular hair dryer. Just do not blow hot air on the coating itself, but spread any dense fabric. In addition, it is allowed to stroke the swollen place through the fabric in several layers, and the iron must be turned on at the lowest power.

Heating is effective only if the material is stretched. It won't help with air bubbles.

Method 2. We will expel it by extrusion. Choose the direction in which it is easiest to do this - where it is closer to the wall and there is no overall furniture. Find a board about 1 meter long, wrap it with rags and drive this harmful bubble to the wall. Simple and effective. It remains only to attach the plinth.

Method 3 is the most time consuming. It is recommended to use it when there are several bubbles. Demands to free the room from furniture as much as possible. Linoleum just needs to be re-layed, after removing at least 3 skirting boards. And in places where there were bubbles, we recommend using glue mastic.

By the way, the coating canvas should not touch the walls closely - it is imperative to leave a gap of up to 1-1.5 cm. It will be hidden under the plinth. But this will allow the material to expand and shrink from temperature influences. Otherwise, the formation of bubbles cannot be avoided. Therefore, when removing swelling - cut off the edges of the linoleum.

Removing bubbles on glued linoleum

If the reason is improper laying or water ingress, and you do not want to cut it (more on this below), then there is only one option: remove and lay again. This is not easy to do, but you may need helpers, preferably two, and a building hair dryer.

The work algorithm is as follows:

  • remove 3 skirting boards and slightly heat the linoleum against the wall from the central side;
  • then two take it by the edges and lift it up, and the third softens the mastic with a hairdryer from below;
  • having reached the places of bubbling, it is necessary to raise the coating another 15-20 cm further, and then lay it again - 15-20 cm each, carefully smoothing.

The method of squeezing the air bubble through the incision is used if it is not possible to re-lay the coating.

For work you will need such tools and materials:

  • sharp clerical knife or construction cutter;
  • small spatula;
  • glue for laying linoleum;
  • plywood sheet, chipboard or wide short board;
  • cargo, preferably soft, such as a sandbag. You can use a large pot of water. You can not take a load with sharp edges: a bucket (it always has an edge at the bottom, or a stone with a rough surface) - they can leave dents on the coating;
  • gloves, clean rags.

Remove the bubble like this:

  • cut the linoleum crosswise in the middle of the bubble (the length of the cut depends on the size of the swelling - it should be approximately 2/3);
  • carefully open the incision by cutting the adhesive base and remove its remnants from the floor and the bottom of the linoleum with a spatula;
  • apply new glue both on the floor and on the wrong side;
  • press the cut pieces to the floor - excess glue will come out through the joints. Remove them first with a damp sponge, and then wipe dry;
  • spread a clean cloth over this place and place the load. It is best to put another sheet of plywood on the fabric and already load on it. This will help distribute the load evenly.

After the glue has hardened (the time is indicated in the instructions for it), remove everything. And the seam can be easily eliminated by cold welding.

Cold welding is performed as follows: buy a tube of special glue in a hardware store and use a needle (it comes with the kit) to carefully apply it to the seam. A chemical reaction takes place there, as a result of which the seam blurs and becomes invisible. All the details are in the instructions for the glue.

Another way to remove flat bubbles on glued linoleum is to make a puncture in the center with a thick needle and squeeze out the air. And then, with a syringe, inject glue into the same puncture, squeeze out its excess from the edges of the bubble to the puncture, wipe it and press it with a load until the glue hardens.

With improper installation or active operation, and usually with a combination of these factors, air bubbles or even whole bumps appear on linoleum. With a small size, they are almost invisible, except if you look at the ebb of linoleum in the sun. Over time, they begin to grow, linoleum looks flabby and uneven, the floor begins to “play” underfoot. Bubbles are dangerous that linoleum on them and next to them wears out faster than in other places.

You need to eliminate bubbles based on whether the linoleum was glued to the floor during installation, if so, then you have only one repair scenario, it will be described at the end of the article. If the linoleum was not glued, then there are several options. Let's start with universal tools.

Let's make the bubble on the linoleum retract

Any PVC and linoleum in particular shrinks when heated. You can heat in a water bath a rag bag of salt or sand, and put on the bubble. This method is effective mainly for household soft linoleum, I would classify it as traditional medicine, because the effect of it may not be, or maybe deplorable, use it at one's own risk. The main thing is to start with low temperatures.

If the linoleum is NOT glued

At the beginning, before other repair work you should try "kick out" the bubble to the walls. To do this, loosen the fastening of the skirting boards or remove them altogether and drive the bubble to the nearest wall with a long rule or board. After that, the bump can appear 1-2 more times, also “kick out” him and only for the third time proceed to other options.

Very often bubbles on non-glued linoleum arise due to the fact that the linoleum did not lie down for the right time. To eliminate, open the plinth on the two walls closest to the bubble, the distance between the linoleum and the wall should be 0.5-1 mm, if this is not the case, cut the linoleum. I also advise you to read the material about.

If the bubbles are located along skirting boards, there are 2 options:

  • Skirting too firmly pressed to the floor if so, then on the linoleum, under the plinth, dents are very often formed. It is necessary to rearrange the plinth a little higher or even with a small gap.
  • Next to the wall irregularity on the floor, usually a recess. It is necessary to remove the plinth, unscrew the linoleum and putty or fill the recess with a solution, the bump can be knocked down with a chisel. Then wait for the solution to dry completely, further level this place with sandpaper. If the recess is small and located along the wall, you can fill it mounting foam and then cut off the excess with a knife.

Bubbles may occur due to furniture that often moves, we are talking not about rearranging the room, but about small shifts that occur, for example, when you lay out a sofa or a chair-bed, exercise on an exercise bike. A hillock on linoleum arises from its stretching, in this case, you need to glue the linoleum to the floor, or at least that part of it that is under the furniture, if you glue only the place of the bubble, it can form nearby after a while.

If linoleum is glued to the floor

In this case, poor styling or moisture under the linoleum is to blame (which, by the way, is also part of poor styling). It is possible to eliminate these violations, but only by re-laying the linoleum again. And here get rid of the annoying bubble is possible without extra spending time and finance.

Will be required tools and materials:

  • glue for gluing linoleum to the floor,
  • construction or clerical knife,
  • small spatula,
  • gloves,
  • hardboard sheet or board (something flat to cover the bubble),
  • something heavy.

Eliminate a bubble on linoleum step by step:

  1. Cut the bubble from one edge to the other into 2 halves or crosswise.
  2. Fold the pieces of linoleum back and press them to the floor, if they overlap, cut them off. To do this, lay 2 pieces of linoleum on top of each other and run a knife along the edge of the top, while cutting through the bottom layer.
  3. Use a spatula to carefully scrape off the old adhesive under the bubble.
  4. Put on rubber gloves and apply a thick layer of new glue under the bubble.
  5. Firmly press the pieces of linoleum to the floor. Wipe off excess adhesive that has come out through the incision with a damp cloth.
  6. Place a clean cloth, board, and something heavy on the glued area.
  7. Wait for the glue to dry, disassemble the structure and carefully inspect it. If the edges of the linoleum go butt to butt, then you can further strengthen the structure with cold welding. If they parted, then the instructions for repairing cuts on linoleum will help you.

If bubbles on glued linoleum appear often makes sense to buy special syringe for applying glue, without cutting linoleum. It leaves behind a small puncture that can be repaired

Sometimes, during the operation of such floor covering, like linoleum, defects in the form of bubbles form on its surface, which only grow over time. Since it is quite expensive to change the entire floor, there is nothing left but to remove the bubbles on the linoleum. The unpleasantness of this phenomenon is not only in the aesthetic aspect, it is also of a practical nature. The coating in places of such swellings wears out and wears out very quickly.

  1. Wrong styling. Linoleum, especially if it was brought from conditions with reduced temperature regime, before the flooring should be covered in a folded form for some time. If this condition is not taken into account, kinks may appear. The floor surface must be perfectly flat and clean. For gluing linoleum, a special leveling mortar is used if the concrete screed serves as the basis.
  2. Poor quality glue.
  3. The low quality of the linoleum itself.
  4. Intensive use.

This article will help you deal with this problem and tell you how to get rid of bubbles on linoleum.

Before starting work, establish what technology was used to lay the coating. It can be glued and glueless. This will depend on the method of correcting the defect.

Removing bubbles on loose-laid linoleum

If the linoleum has not been glued, proceed according to the following instructions.

1. You can squeeze the bubbles towards the walls with a small rule or spatula, after wrapping it with a piece soft tissue so as not to damage the surface even more. To do this, remove the plinth from the wall towards which you will disperse the unevenness and run the above tool along the linoleum with a little pressure several times in the right direction. Then install the plinth in its original place.

2. If swelling occurs due to the fact that the linoleum is not sufficiently covered, you need to remove the plinth and cut off the edges of the coating so that a gap of about one centimeter forms between it and the wall.

3. Sometimes such a defect can appear as a result of strong pressing of the linoleum with a plinth. In this case, it is enough to simply reduce the pressure on the surface of the coating.

4. Irregularities in the floor, due to which bubbles have arisen, are eliminated as follows: the bulges are cut off with a chisel, and the cavities are sealed with a special solution.

5. Defects resulting from the movement of furniture can be eliminated by heating (putting a bag of hot salt on the problem area), or by gluing with special glue.

When thermally leveling unevenness, make sure that the temperature is not too high. Usually sixty degrees is enough ( Maximum temperature at which the hand is touched).

Attention! When thermally or adhesively removing the blister, be sure to press it down with something even and flat, such as a piece of plywood.

So, we have dealt with glueless linoleum, now let's consider the option if bubbles appeared on glued linoleum.

Removing bubbles on glued linoleum

To eliminate small bubbles, proceed as follows.

1. Take rubber glue and a medical syringe with a fairly thick needle (10 or 20 milliliters).

2. Pierce the swelling with a needle and deflate the air from the swelling.

3. Fill the syringe with the required amount of glue (determined approximately, by eye).

4. Pump glue from a syringe under the linoleum and evenly distribute it there.

5. Squeeze excess glue through the hole from the needle and wipe it off the surface with a piece of rag.

6. Press this area firmly with something flat and heavy.

Attention! To avoid contamination of linoleum, before starting work with glue, stick several strips of masking tape on the problem area so that they adjoin each other butt-to-butt, and at the end, simply remove them along with the pollution.

But how to painlessly remove the bubbles formed on the linoleum, if they have already become noticeable ?! This could lead to some stretching of the coating, which means that simply removing the air will not help, and the bubble will stick out. There is a solution for this problem too.

Do not forget to pre-protect the surface by sealing it, as in the first case, with masking tape.

1. Using a sharp clerical knife, make a cross-shaped incision at the site of the bubble.

2. We fold the edges of the cuts one by one and see how much the linoleum is stretched.

3. Along the ruler, carefully cut off the excess from the edges.

4. We remove old glue and other possible contaminants from the base.

6. We apply a new layer of glue and join the edges of the cuts.

7. Squeeze out and remove excess adhesive from the surface of the linoleum.

8. Firmly press the incision site for at least a day.

Probably, few people are pleased at one fine moment to see swollen linoleum in their apartment. The danger of blistering in this material lies mainly in the premature wear of the material. Therefore, for the owner of the dwelling who has such a problem, the solution of the issue is especially acute. about cleaning bubbles from linoleum. After all, not only the service life of the flooring depends on the successful completion of this task, but also its appearance, and with it the overall interior of the room.

The appearance of bubbles on linoleum depends, first of all, on the way it is laid - whether it is glued to the floor or simply laid on it.

If the linoleum is on the floor.

So, if the swelling of the material occurred when it was simply laid on the floor, then this may be due to the following reasons.

  1. The presence of a foreign object under the coating. The solution, in contrast to the object, which is called “on the surface” is to move and remove the obstacle.
  2. Unplanned extrusion of material can prevent it from fitting into the space allotted for it. Because of this, swelling may occur. In this case, in order to clearly imagine how you can get rid of the bubble on linoleum, you must first find out the reason, as a result of which it was formed.
  3. Rearrangement of furniture. If the bubble formed immediately after rearranging the furniture, then it is worth lifting individual sections and trying to smooth the bubble on the linoleum.
  4. Wrongly selected size of the material in the room. To remove the resulting swelling, it is necessary to dismantle the nearest plinth and cut the part of the flooring adjacent to the wall. In this case, it is necessary to leave a gap of 5-10 millimeters between the wall and the material itself. After that, you can safely remove the bubble from the linoleum.
  5. The material did not age after purchase. As already mentioned in the article "", before laying such a floor covering, it must be allowed to mature for a certain time, and only after that can its flooring be started. To get rid of the bubble formed on the linoleum in this case, you will have to perform actions similar to those indicated in the previous paragraph.
  6. Another reason why bubbles appear on the linoleum along the edges of the room is excessively dense. It is this circumstance that causes the material to swell. The solution to how to remove the swelling of linoleum is quite simple - fix the baseboard a little higher (1-2 mm) from the original position.
  7. The appearance of bubbles on linoleum can be caused by defects in the material itself. In this case, squeezing the swelling to the edge is not always effective. It is necessary to act as if the linoleum was planted on glue (this option will be discussed later).

Swollen linoleum On an incorrectly laid linoleum with its saturated use, after a certain period, appear air bubbles which increase in size over time.

At the same time, the floor covering acquires an ugly, flabby appearance and loses a large number of own past advantages. Also, bubbles on linoleum are also dangerous because the material in these places wears out much faster than in other areas.

Before removing bubbles on linoleum, it is necessary to establish exactly whether it was glued to the floor surface during installation or simply laid on it. This circumstance will determine the selection possible way bubble escape.

Free laid linoleum option

For linoleum not planted on the adhesive mixture, the following alignment variations are possible:

  • removing bubbles by squeezing them out;
  • heating of the places where bubbles appear;
  • trimming (fitting) linoleum sheets.

Let's consider any of these options in more detail.

It is well known that every PVC material (and linoleum in particular) shrinks with intense heat. With this in mind, some experts advise using a grandmother's remedy called a "water bath" and consisting in applying a rag bag of salt and sand directly to the bladder. This method can "work" in soft (domestic) linoleum leveling options and is not always effective. Actually, therefore, in everyday life, attempts are very often made to displace the bubbles that have arisen on the sides. To materialize this technique, it is recommended to do the following:

  • loosen the fasteners of the skirting boards (or remove them altogether);
  • with a board with perfect edges or a rule, try to "drive" the bubbles to the surface of the wall;
  • carry out this operation a couple of times, since in one pass it is usually not possible to fully remove the bubbles.

Often bubbles appear due to the fact that the linoleum has not served its own period required for alignment. In this option, you just need to cut one edge of the linoleum panel, so that the distance between its edge and the wall is about 0.5-1 cm.

In the case when bubbles appear at the baseboards, the following variations are possible:

  • With a very strong pressing of the skirting board to the floor surface, dents appear on the linoleum, and even under the skirting board. To eliminate them, you need to make the plinth fastening weaker to the minimum expected.
  • There are irregularities on the floor as a ledge or indentation. To eliminate them, you need to remove the plinth, and then bend linoleum and close the recess with mortar (the protrusion can be knocked down with a chisel).

Irregularities can appear due to the reason for the constant movement of furniture, which leads to stretching of the material and the appearance of bulges. Under these circumstances, the damaged area of ​​​​the coating can be fixed with a special glue.

Glued linoleum option

Linoleum planted on adhesive mixture

As put away bubbles on linoleum in this embodiment can only be achieved by changing areas with irregularities - a similar repair must be approached with the following material and tools in service.