Question - can anyone help?
I am putting down a ceramic tile floor in the basement that has two layers
of glued down vinyl tiles over the concrete. Since they existing flooring
is tightly glued and undamaged, can I put the ceramic tile over them or do I
have to scrape the vinyl and glue off first?
Thanks for any help you can give - Shel
shelperkins (at) cox.net

Doing it the right way does involve removing the layers of vinyl. Stop
trying to be lazy.

Any flex at all will make tile crack. It cannot be laid over vinyl,
unless you were to put some very seriously fastened concrete backer
board or something similar down. Sorry, the vinyl has to come up.

shel wrote:
Question - can anyone help?
I am putting down a ceramic tile floor in the basement that has two layers
of glued down vinyl tiles over the concrete. Since they existing flooring
is tightly glued and undamaged, can I put the ceramic tile over them or do I
have to scrape the vinyl and glue off first?
Thanks for any help you can give - Shel
shelperkins (at) cox.net

shel wrote:
Question - can anyone help?
I am putting down a ceramic tile floor in the basement that has two layers
of glued down vinyl tiles over the concrete. Since they existing flooring
is tightly glued and undamaged, can I put the ceramic tile over them or do I
have to scrape the vinyl and glue off first?
Thanks for any help you can give - Shel
shelperkins (at) cox.net

You might want to consider using one of the elastomeric anti-crack
products like "Flex-Guard"

http://www.crackisolation.com/

as an underlayerment.

Also, with two layers of "vinyl tile" on the floor it's possible that
at least one of them is old enough that it might be *asbestos* tile or
have been installed with an asbestos containing mastic.

One red flag for possible asbestos floor tile is a 9"x9" size, another
is an appearance like one of these:

http://mainegov-images.informe.org/d...estosfloor.jpg
http://www.dolir.mo.gov/ls/nursingho...stos_tiles.jpg
http://www.bainenvironmental.com/images/whitetile.jpg
http://www.isitasbestos.com/images/floortile_sm.jpg

Needless to say, you probably don't want to turn a weekend tile project
into a asbestos abatement program, so before removing tile or adhesive
that might contain asbestos have an industrial hygienist or other
qualified individual sample and identify suspect material, and if it is
asbestos research your options, asbestos contanin material can
sometmes be left in place if in good condition.

Michael Thomas, Paragon Home Inspection, LLC, Chicago IL
mdtATparagoninspectsDOTcom

shel wrote:
Question - can anyone help?
I am putting down a ceramic tile floor in the basement that has two
layers of glued down vinyl tiles over the concrete. Since they
existing flooring is tightly glued and undamaged, can I put the
ceramic tile over them or do I have to scrape the vinyl and glue off
first?

Get a flexible glue that will stick to vinyl tile and you'll be fine.

My professional tile installer sanded the no-wax (shiny) vinyl and installed
the ceramic tile right over it. Been looking good for 12 years. Just make
sure the sub-strata of the vinyl in solid and firm.

--
Walter
www.rationality.net
-
"shel" wrote in message
news:Wyzrg.97377$IZ2.52779@dukeread07...
Question - can anyone help?
I am putting down a ceramic tile floor in the basement that has two layers
of glued down vinyl tiles over the concrete. Since they existing flooring
is tightly glued and undamaged, can I put the ceramic tile over them or do
I have to scrape the vinyl and glue off first?
Thanks for any help you can give - Shel
shelperkins (at) cox.net

As with so many materials, the problem is not sticking the ceramic
to the Vinyl/VCT. The problem is that you will have an expensive
and labor intensive floor that is at the mercy of how well the
other material is stuck to the subfloor and what the subfloor is.

For tile and marble questions I would highly recommend this site:
http://johnbridge.com/
______________________________
Keep the whole world singing . . . .
DanG (remove the sevens)




"shel" wrote in message
news:Wyzrg.97377$IZ2.52779@dukeread07...
Question - can anyone help?
I am putting down a ceramic tile floor in the basement that has
two layers of glued down vinyl tiles over the concrete. Since
they existing flooring is tightly glued and undamaged, can I put
the ceramic tile over them or do I have to scrape the vinyl and
glue off first?
Thanks for any help you can give - Shel
shelperkins (at) cox.net