‘‘Raking light isn’t actually light, but incident light,’ says technical sales advisor Wim de Pee. ‘It’s light that falls directly on the floor and is not broken by sun blinds. This phenomenon can’t be prevented completely, but as a contractor you can contribute to counteracting its effect.
How do you prevent the effect of rakking light on your floor?
Putty layers
Certainly at this time of the year, when the sun is lower, the light enters more obliquely and raking light can cause nasty effects on hard floor coverings. When you stand with your back to the window, you can see possible putty layers through the PVC or Marmoleum floor. As a contractor, you can prevent this.
Increasingly larger windows
Of course, this starts with recognising a space in which raking light has free rein. In current housing construction, but also in offices, more and larger windows can be seen – for example, conservatories and atriums. Assess rooms of this type and pay attention to the incidence of raking light. If you get the impression that raking light is easily visible there, I have a good tip for you.
Roll the adhesive bed with a fur roller
When you’ve applied the adhesive bed (with 540 or 640 for PVC and 514 or 614 for Marmoleum), roll it immediately afterwards with an adhesive-saturated fur roller. This creates an even adhesive bed while sufficient adhesive remains on the floor. In this way, you roll the ridges out of the adhesive bed. Note: do it immediately, otherwise your adhesive will become too dry.
It always works
This is an extra step to perform, but it always works. When raking light falls on the floor covering, you’ll now no longer see the putty layers, not even if you watch the light. And there’s another practical advantage: with PVC, the processing time is shorter, despite this extra step. On the rolled adhesive bed, you need to lay the floor covering earlier and start gluing it.’