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Powder room floor: Marmoleum over asbestos tile?

leavemeout
9 years ago

I'm hoping someone can help me figure out what to do with my tiny powder room floor.

The room is 4' x 4'. It has hideous brown stick-on tiles on top of some white vinyl tile on top of 6"x6" black and white tiles, which probably contain asbestos and likely original to the 1952 house. These 6x6 tiles are stuck with black mastic (likely containing asbestos) to plywood, which is nailed to a wood subfloor. You can see all the layers in the photo below, where I've pulled back the top layer of brown tile:


This powder room adjoins my kitchen, which has a wood floor. I was thinking of pulling up the brown tiles, which I know don't have asbestos (had them tested before we pulled up the kitchen floor), and putting down a floating Marmoleum Click floor over the other two layers of vinyl tile (white stone-look 12" tile, and 6" black and white squares).

But, as you can see, the thin white tile (which might contain asbestos) is breaking up -- a piece of it is stuck to the back of the brown tile in the photo -- so when I pull up the brown tile, the floor won't be flat or smooth. How do I smooth out the floor so I can put the Marmoleum Click over it? Can I use a patching product like Ardex feather finish?

Plus, there's this big gap in the floor where a transition piece is supposed to go, but I'm not sure what to put in that space -- wood? marble? something else? I really don't want a metal transition piece in between my wood floor and the Marmoleum.

Also, is Marmoleum Click the right product for a powder room in constant use? DH and my kids are in and out all day, and they drip water on the floor when they wash their hands.

I've scoured the Marmoleum website, and it looks like the sheet product would be the best for this application, but I would have to remove the floor tiles, which I don't want to do because I suspect they contain asbestos. My carpenter said he'd cut out the floor, but that worries me because you are not supposed to saw through asbestos.

Sorry for the long post! I'm hoping some Marmoleum owners can weigh in here.

One last issue: If I use the Marmoleum Click, the powder room floor will be 1/8"-1/4" higher than the wood kitchen floor, so what kind of transition strip could I use? And how will I fill in that gap between the wood floor and the powder room floor? My carpenter left it empty when he installed the wood floor in the kitchen because he thought I was going to use ceramic tile in the powder room. I changed my mind when I realized the cost (another factor) and that I'd have to remove the suspected asbestos-containing tile or the entire floor, rebuild it, then install tile, which I'm not equipped to do. I think I can install the Click by myself, as it doesn't look that difficult, except for cutting the hole for the toilet!

Sigh.

I've expended hours, days, weeks agonizing over this tiny floor!

Any and all advice most appreciated!

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