On Oct 19, 11:39 am, Joe wrote:
On Oct 19, 12:13 pm, wrote:

My wife and I are considering installing a new floor in our laundry
room. Currently it is a vinyl asbestos tile floor

snip

Why do you think it is asbestos-vinyl? Asbestos has been off the
market for years. In any event, such tile is easily removed and
disposed of using plain common sense. Keep it damp (no dust), wear a
ordinary respirator for your peace of mind, use mild heat to speed
removal, double bag it and put it in the trash legally. This bit of
advice I have from a friend who works for a HazMat removal company, so
that should attest to the facts in the case.
Replace the old tile with new vinyl tile and avoid a lot of the
struggle with old adhesive removal. You'll have a better, cheaper,
flooring than ceramic tile and that should make everyone happy. Good
luck.

Joe

The house was built in 1947- or so. I can't get an absolute year from
the city. Originally we just suspected that it was asbestos-vinyl, but
last week I found a few boxes of the original tile left over from
construction. Right on the box it says asbestos-vinyl, so I'm pretty
confident =) I tried removing some of the tiles using a 9" putty knife
and hammer, which seems to be the norm. Most tiles would come up
halfway, then break in two like glass. The tiles are very brittle
after 60 years - after failing to keep the pieces from breaking, I
decided it would be best to try to cover up the floor. The easier
removal option would probably be to cut up the subfloor around the
perimeter and replace it with plywood and/or hardie backer. The room
is approximately 12'x7'6" - 90 sq ft. Raising the floor by 1/4" isn't
really a concern - we have a bamboo floor installed in the hallway,
and the previous owner (poorly) installed some linoleum tiles in the
adjoining kitchen after adding 1/4" plywood. In fact, raising the
floor would be preferable, as it would bring it up to the same height
as all adjoining rooms.
In pricing the tile, I came out to about $3.50 per square foot for
ceramic tile installed (me doing the work myself - including grout,
thinset, hardiebacker, and allowing up to $1.50/sq ft for tiles). I
haven't priced the materials only for vinyl sheet or vinyl tiles, but
I would REALLY like to avoid vinyl tiles. Every installation I've seen
looks cheap - that may be more of a reflection on the installation or
materials used, but there's no accounting for taste. Vinyl sheets
installed were being priced at around $6 per square foot when paying
somebody to do the work.
Out of curiosity, why do you say a vinyl floor would be better than
ceramic? I haven't been able to find many real comparisons of them.
Would it be better for this application - where muddy feet are a
common reality, or would the dirt get ground into the tiles? As I
mentioned before, my experience with vinyl floors are from
installations done 10-15 years ago, so many things may have changed.
I'm researching now so I'm happy with how things turn out later.