How to choose the thickness for the skirting boards
There are various thickness in skirting boards. Generally speaking, people go for certain sizes of thickness either to match with what they already have in the house, or for a particular reason. Skirting boards can go as thin as 12mm, however for that thickness, there are only very limited few profiles can be used on 12mm skirting boards, like square edge, pencil round, edge 2 and some other profiles with less pattern or curves. Then the next thickness is 15mm, most of the popular profiles like Ogee, Torus, Lambs Tongue, Chamfered, Ovolo and so on can fit on 15mm skirting boards. The most commonly used thickness for skirting boards is 18mm, majority of the profiles can go on 18mm. Save a few very full profiles like 1914, Worcester, 2305, Highgrove and other profiles that with big proud curves and patterns can only go on 25mm.
If you want more than 25mm thickness skirting boards, you can choose 28mm, 32mm or thicker, however, by this level, your choices are quite limited in terms of material choices. Most MDF products are between 15mm – 25mm, so above 25mm, you have to choose wood, mostly pine skirting boards as they are the cheapest wood skirting boards compare with Oak, walnut, cherry, ash, maple, beech and so on so forth.
Most of the thick skirting boards are used in large country houses, period homes, or other large space with high ceilings etc. Or in some cases, the walls are simply not straight; thick skirting boards are cut and used as a feature to create straighter walls.
Cheapest skirting boards
The cheapest skirting boards one can buy are normally moisture resistant MDF with the simplest design like Torus, Ogee, Chamfered and round, lambs tongue and so on, because those profiles are most commonly used by large building projects, so that those profiles always have been manufactured in a large scale. Their sizes varies between 44mm, 58mm, 68mm, 94mm, 119mm, 144mm, 168mm, 194mm, 219mm, however not all profiles are available for all sizes. There is a reason why those skirting boards are so popular, because 1) they are cost effective; 2) they last longer being moisture resistant; 3) they require less prep time because they come as double primed and sanded, so they only require to be fitted and final coat of paint or gloss; 4) longer lengths, normally 5.4m or 4.4m length so less waste.
Profile sizes
Profiles sizes are the sizes for the actual profile itself, not to be mistaken by the height of the boards. Some of the profiles are very small like edge 2, pencil round, or Torus , so if you put a small profile on a larger board, it will leave a large amount of flat board, although it is nothing wrong with the look of such boards or if they are the look you are going for, it is good to be aware such thing if you don’t want such looks, then you can either choose a smaller overall height or a larger profile to balance out the profile and flat board ratio.