Should laminate flooring in kitchen go under kickboards?

[GingerNinja]

Hey team me again.

We are soon installing laminate throughout our house to replace existing flooring. We've selected the 8mm Floor Select water-resistant laminate and will be using scotia in the living room, hall etc.

My question is.

We have a kaboodle kitchen with the kickboards currently off til the flooring is sorted.

So do I

1. laminate under the kickboards - if so how do you seal out water from going under the kickboards and cabinets as I know the floor needs to float and move?

2. Laminate up to the kickboards and put scotia (ugly and I'd prefer not to) 

Thanks for any assistance. 

Ben

[EricL]

Hi @GingerNinja

The Kaboodle kitchen cabinets have adjustable legs that will allow you to increase the height of the kitchen overall. So if we take the flooring thickness of 8mm plus the underlay, you could increase the height of the cabinet by 10mm so that the kickboard will slide in over the laminate flooring with no issues. 

If you're worried about water getting in between the kickboard and laminate, I suggest putting in a very fine bead of flexible silicone sealant. The sealant will flex with the movement of the laminate flooring. The best practice of course is to wipe off any spills as soon as you can. 

I'm very intrigued by your flooring project at the moment, would it be possible for you to post a picture of the work in progress? I'm sure a lot of our members would be keen to see how it's coming along. 

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric