Rubber Bounces Back

Variety, they say, is the spice of life, and all types of flooring have their own place in the market, whether your preference is for PVC, carpet, linoleum, timber, stone or the many other variations and materials we see on offer. Generally commercial flooring falls into three main categories – high performance safety flooring; smooth but relatively plain sheet or tile flooring; and decorative flooring, which is often in tile or plank format.

With advances from manufacturers in technology and improved design capabilities, the traditional boundaries between these different materials have started to blur, with increasing cross over of form and function. Safety flooring, which dates back over 50 years and was once only seen in back of house environments, is increasingly being installed in front of house areas as more design-led products have come into the marketplace. Decorative safety flooring was once a contradiction in terms, but several companies such as Altro now have an increasingly expansive range of products designed for safety primarily but with a leaning towards high design.

Pre-dating even the advent of plasticized PVC as a flooring medium is rubber, often viewed as one of the original decorative floor coverings, alongside linoleum. Like PVC, rubber flooring is also enjoying a renaissance, perhaps due to its long associations with design and practicality. And, when you look at its performance, it’s easy to see why rubber flooring is once again growing in popularity. Rubber is recognised as one of the most durable flooring finishes available, with modern versions containing plasticizers and fillers to make it harder wearing and more stable. It is more resistant to cigarette burns than PVC and is also deemed to be softer and quieter to walk on, thus cutting down impact noise (footfall) and airborne noise (echo) considerably.

These practical qualities make rubber flooring ideal for use in gyms and other areas of high activity. You’ll find such specialist floor coverings in the Altro portfolio, as well as a couple of decorative rubber floorings, which include both smooth and studded - or “penny round” as it is sometimes referred to. In studded format, rubber is often seen in airport concourses, chosen for its hard wearing characteristics and for ease of maintenance - which brings me nicely to another one of my unofficial guides to the cleaning of rubber flooring.

1.  New Altro rubber flooring (not sports) should be cleaned with an alkaline detergent. Existing rubber floors should first be stripped of degraded polish using a floor stripping solution, then thoroughly rinsed with clean cold water.
2.  Neutralise with either a bespoke neutralising agent or a couple of tablespoons of vinegar in a bucket full of water by mopping over the floor.
3.  Allow to dry then apply two coats of a high solids metallised emulsion polish.
4.  Maintain by dry sweeping and spray buffing with a floor maintaining solution and a high speed rotary buffing machine fitted with a soft brush or pad.

This article first appeared in the December 2009 edition of the CFJ.