gap around skirting for laminate flooring

I am laying 6mm laminate flooring in a small room 2.4 x 2 metres.

I am keeping the existing skirting boards. The instructions say that I should allow a gap of 10 mm for the laminate around the edge of the room.

However this seems to me to be too much considering that the beading is barely 10 mm wide and it is likely to fall into the gap when I fix it.

Is 10mm actually necessary or is this more appropriate for when the skirting has been removed as the skirting would sit on top of the gap.

So what is the smallest gap I could get away with?

heeelllooo ben67

you should go by manufacturers recomendations buuuttt
i always recon minimum off 6mm each side for small rooms

the rate i use 4mm per meter so by the time youve got to 3m or 10ft youve got to increase your "gaps" above the 6mm so if your room is between 3m and 5m you can reduce the gap slightly [under the 10mm each side]

if you where to remove or undercut the skirting you would solve your problem[expansion under skirting]

Hi Ben,

If your beading is from the same manufacturer then I would expect at least 2mm of overlap, i.e. the beading would be 12mm wide (or more).

The floor really isn't going to move around very much so a couple of mm should be fine in this case.

I would recommend (when cutting the boards) to mark them for a 10mm gap, but make sure you cut along the outside of the line with the jigsaw so that you don't lose another mm to the width of the blade.

If you find that you are more comfortable with an 8 or 9mm gap, then again it *should* be ok, but any less and you could get into trouble later down the line.

Good luck!

PS - another tip is to get blades that cut downwards rather than upwards so that you can mark your boards on the top and not have to reverse the pattern and mark them on the bottom!

Thanks.

Very useful