The first case involves a church which has level loop commercial carpet in the sanctuary and all the open traffic areas. Under the pews there is vinyl asbestos tiles. The pews are being removed and they want to carpet the entire space. The installer they are working with has told them the tiles would have to be removed because the new glued down carpet would pull them up if they installed over the top of them. If the tiles are removed, because they may contain asbestos, they were told this process would be very costly, they were also told that all the adhesive holding the tiles in place would have to be removed because new adhesive would not adhere to it. It is apparent the installer doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
There is no reason you can’t install carpet over the top of existing vinyl or vinyl asbestos tiles if they are firmly affixed to the substrate, not broken or friable. As long as there is no chance or indication that the tile will come off the floor there is no reason to remove them. Even if some of the tile come loose, and there is no indication any of the tiles are loose, they can be removed, the space filled in and leveled. If the tile material is not friable, that is powdery or able to become airborne particulate, there is no risk of asbestos contamination. If the tiles are down tight they need only be cleaned of any surface contaminants such as wax, sealers, floor finishes or other adhesion compromising substance before carpet can be installed over them. There are also sealers which can be applied once the tiles are cleaned so that adhesive will stick to them, as well as premium adhesives that will work with this installation. If the carpet manufacturer says you can’t go over tiles like this then you have to heed that directive and prep accordingly but I don’t know of any that would make you take up existing, firmly affixed tiles if they did not pose any threat of causing an installation or material failure.
If the tiles are removed and there is cut back adhesive underneath them it would be necessary to remove as much of the cut back as possible and abate it if necessary. If there is some of the adhesive remaining there are sealers and treatments that would encase it and not allow a reaction with the adhesive used to install carpet – bead blasting could be avoided. If there are no other negative influences to cause the installation to fail or that would negatively affect the carpet, then it can be installed. A knowledgeable installer and flooring contractor would know these things.
The other question posed in this case is the difference in elevation when the carpet is placed over the existing tile. Certainly there will have to be a feathered transition from the substrate to the edge of the tile so the carpet will not meet at a sharp edge. A cementitious fill and leveler could be used or transition strips, a new invention by an installer, could be installed to allow for a smooth ramped blending of the two surfaces. There is no reason this job won’t work – a problem is being created here that does not exist.
In another case a strip plank wood vinyl floor was installed in a cafeteria and soon after a complaint arose because dark soil was building up in the gaps between the light colored planks.
The end user felt this was an installation problem. The general contractor, end user and flooring installation contractor were all present at the time the material was being inspected. The flooring contractor explained the site conditions, how the floor was prepared exactly how the vinyl flooring material was installed. It was evident everything was done exactly as it should have been and it was determined the installation was not the problem. The end user was cleaning the floor with an agent that was causing plasticizer migration at the edges of the vinyl material causing gapping. This in turn caused the adhesive to emulsify at the edge of the vinyl weakening it. The combination of plasticizer from the vinyl and weakened adhesive, caused a dark build up at the edges of the light colored planks resulting in the complaint condition. The problem was due to the way the vinyl floor was being maintained. Prior to the vinyl being installed the floor was ceramic tile which is cared for in a completely different way than vinyl. The maintenance procedures for the new vinyl floor caused the complaint condition. This was further exacerbated by the fact that the substrate was directly over an open parking garage that was not heated so the concrete expands and contracts with the heat and cold of the outdoors. The movement of the substrate, however slight, would also affect the space between the vinyl planks. The planks were installed tight and flush but they have now opened up slightly in the width and the length. Tests of the vinyl material indicated it was dimensionally stable and research of the cleaning agent and its affect on vinyl proved it would cause plasticizer migration. There was nothing wrong with the material or the installation – the cleaning was the primary culprit. The end user doesn’t want to believe they created the problem. However, when looking in other areas of the facility with vinyl tile, gaps can also be seen in this material. Because it is a different make up, vinyl composition and not a pure vinyl, and a darker color, the same condition will not exist, but soil will also build up in those gaps.
In the next case vinyl composition tile was installed in a government housing project. The main floor was concrete slab the second floor was plywood. The same flooring company installed all the material using two different adhesives from two different adhesive manufacturers. The problem was that all the tile on the second floor plywood was coming loose. The adhesive in every building on the second floor plywood had crystallized. The tile on the concrete was so tight that it couldn’t be lifted off the floor without breaking it into pieces. How is it that, with everything being the same, only the tile on the plywood was coming loose. The first thought has to be looking for the common denominator. The chances of two adhesives failing in exactly the same way is higly unlikely – they both worked on the concrete, they both failed on the plywood. We took adhesive samples, plywood samples cut from the floor with adhesive on it, new plywood and the tiles, for testing. We also used another premium adhesive for a control material. All the adhesive tested on this plywood failed. The plywood was tested and found to contain a component that would cause the adhesive to fail. In fact, in researching all the documents we found one document from the plywood manufacturer that mentioned why the plywood would cause the adhesive to fail. Despite all the proof, documented and from multiple tests, as to the absolute cause of the failure, the plywood, the powers that be wanted to blame the installation contractor. The failure was not his fault. The recommendation to resolve the problem was to pull all the tile up, almost all of which was loose enough to do so, and either replace the plywood or go over the top of the entire job with a thinner material which would mean cutting down doors and pulling moldings off and replacing them and installing new vinyl tile. The plywood manufacturer swore up and down this wasn’t their fault but we could prove it was by indentifying chemical substances in the plywood that destroyed adhesive. The evidence never lies – just like in the CSI crime shows. We can almost always prove what went wrong, why and who is at fault.
Author – Lewis G. Migliore – The Commercial Flooring Report
LGM and Associates – The Floorcovering Experts