James Hardie, the fibre cement building materials manufacturer, has launched a new structural flooring system into the UK market, HardieFloor.
The patented fibre cement, tongue and groove boards are perfectly suited to residential building projects, as a substitute for unreliable chipboard.
HardieFloor provides house builders with a durable solution to the issue of having to install a crash deck floor after first lift, prior to installing joists and then having to safeguard it from the weather. It negates the use of chipboard with a plastic, supposedly weather tight, film which can bring about a host of on-site issues, such as swelling and the associated costly and timely remedial works. Instead this new fibre cement floor - which is impervious to all weather types - dries out completely if wet and suffers no long term damage.
Unlike with timber, tiles can be applied directly on to HardieFloor boards eliminating the need for additional membranes and adhesive. This provides home buyers and builders with an alternative to vinyl which is often used in the new build market to prevent issues such as cracked tiles and grout lines from occurring. This is common when chipboard swells as a result of getting wet.
Fibre cement is highly conductive meaning the HardieFloor system works very well with under floor heating systems as it enables much more heat to be transmitted into a room. The robust floor boards do not expand or contract in any way with the heat, ensuring that the tiled floor remains completely intact.
Damon McEwan, Innovation Manager at James Hardie, said: “We are delighted to be introducing this product to the UK market. It has been a great success in the Australian and New Zealand market places for the past eight years and offers builders and owners alike a solution to the ongoing problem of swelling timber floor boards and the issues associated with it.”
HardieFloor fibre cement boards are NHBC accepted BBA certified, LABC registered and is non-combustible and achieves an A2 classification in fire safety tests.
