Mechanically embossed resilient laminar floor material

Claim 1

A process for mechanically embossing a floor covering material consisting of the steps of: a. passing a flexible sheet material having a printed pattern thereon by a heater structure which applies heat to only the upper side of the flexible sheet material, said sheet material being formed of a backing layer, an intermediate layer of a flexible foamed material and an upper thinner embossable layer of a wear resistant material, b. heating the sheet material for a short time to a very high temperature on its upper layer, while maintaining approximately a 100*-200* F temperature differential at the point of embossing between the upper layer heated side of the sheet material which faces the heater structure and the flexible foamed side of the sheet material facing away from the heaters, c. immediately feeding the heated sheet material into an embossing structure having a back-up roll and an embossing roll in engagement with the upper layer surface of the sheet material which had faced the heater, and completely bottoming out the embossing roll against the sheet material without the collapse of all or part of the foam structure intermediate layer underlying the embossed heated upper layer, and d. providing the embossing roll with cooling means and wrapping the sheet material around approximately one-half of the circumference of the embossing roll to cool the sheet material after the embossed pattern has been placed thereon to provide a product having a substantially undamaged foam cell structure in the intermediate layer under the embossed areas which is capable, upon reheating of the sheet material, of exerting sufficient stress upon the upper layer to restore the upper layer to its unembossed state, the sheet material being guided in a direction transverse of its direction of movement and the peripheral speed of the embossing roll being controLled so that the embossed pattern is placed on the sheet material in registry with the printed pattern thereon.