In article , Mark Modrall
says...

Hi...

I've been ripping out some old 1970's carpet from the basement. I've
found that there's some kind of glue they sprinkled down to hold the
carpet. Is there any good way to get the glue/backing grunge up from
the cement? I used a scraper to get the carpet up. Then I tried a wire
brush to get the leftover. That does a pretty good job, but you can
still see the glue lines so it's not getting it all.

My wife has been after me to ask if there's a better/more complete
solution. At the very least she wants to spray it down with bleach to
kill all the mold that was growing in there.

I had that in my house - I had gotten a new commercial-grade polypro to put in
my basement, and the old carpet (screaming '70s! red orange green pattern) had
been glued down. Poor installers scraped for a day, while I got me and my son,
both with allergies, out of the house. Good thing I had planned to put down
carpet again, over padding. Keeping the basement dry with the B-Dry system I had
just had installed and using a dehumidifier in the summer has kept that carpet
just fine so far, and that was in 1996.

So the question is - what do you plan to put down there? The concrete did not
have to be absolutely clean to replace the carpet, and I think a bleach spray,
then drying, of whatever's left should do.

If you need it really clean for tile or linoleum, then others here are better
sources for info.

Banty


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