Have them try to nail it first. Rare is the occasion you cant nail concrete strip through two layers of tile. Dont glue the tackless. It will be a futile effort because the pressure of the stretch will most likely pull up the tile the tack strips are glued to. Pre-padded carpet is certainly an alternative like Alice suggests. Other options are shooting in a layer of plywood over the tile that you can nail tackless to and install carpet on if nothing else works. We have successfully drilled through asbestos tile with slow rotary masonry drills/bits. This did not create dust from the tile because of its resiliency. It just flaked off chips that were easily shop vacced up. I do not recommend a high speed drill though. If the tile has resiliency then it may work for you, but if brittle, then may cause dust because of its hardness and is not recommended.

My parents were redoing their bathroom floor and found asbestos tile on the bottom layer, above the subfloor. They had a private inspector to come out and confirm it and then tried to get estimates to remove it, but was told it would be too expensive for such a small space and to DIY themselves. My husband and Father researched the proper removal and did it them selves. They wore suits and masks N95, and plastic and duct taped off the area. Sprayed the tiles and glue down well with water during removal and tried to get the tiles up in whole pieces. It's not only the tile that can contain the asbestos but the glue- as well so you have to be careful.

Go to John Bridge's forum. You'll hear plenty. This is copied and pasted from my website: This is a subject that's very hotly debated within the industry. It seems every manufacturer has a thinset that they say can be used over resilient flooring (sheet vinyl) or vinyl tile. The problem with that is twofold. With all the different types of vinyl flooring out now, it's tough to know which ones can, and which ones can't be tiled over. Cushioned vinyl's are out. They can compress, causing voids under the tile, ultimately causing failure. Also, not all sheet vinyl is glued solid to the floor. A lot of times, vinyl installers will only glue the edges and spot glue in the center, and if you thinset the tile to it, it won't stay very long. In my opinion, vinyl tiles are out, as well, due to the fact that the thinset bond is only as good as the bond of the surface under it, and I've seen vinyl tiles ( especially peel and stick) let go way too easily. The same is also true for sheet vinyl. The second problem with tiling over vinyl is the underlayments used for vinyl installation. Normally, in woodframe construction, there are one of several underlayments used-- luan, 1/4" particle board, 1/4" plywood, and sometimes even MDF (medium density fiberboard). ANY of those in a tile subfloor is a guaranteed failure. 1/4" plywood has a nasty habit of delaminating (the layers come apart). Luan has the same problem, plus it can compress to 1/2 its original thickness from normal residential foot traffic (I've seen this happen). Particle board (as well as MDF), just from humidity, can expand enough to pop tile loose. Any of those can cause failure, and unless you pull the vinyl, you don't know for sure whether the vinyl installer just went over the existing subfloor, or added one of the underlayments mentioned. All in all, it's an extremely risky installation, and my question is why, when spending the money it costs for a tile installation, would you want to gamble on it? Here is a link that might be useful: My website's Flooring page

I paid about $2K to have an asbestos removal company take up my kitchen and basement tile floors. They did it correctly, hazmat suits, air blowing outside the house, rooms sealed off, etc. But this powder room was forgotten! Someone shut the door and they didn't see it! So, now I've got 16 square feet of presumed asbestos-containing floor tile (don't know since this particular tile wasn't tested) either to cover up or remove. My carpenter doesn't think it's worth calling in the asbestos removal people, and in my state, a homeowner can remove non-friable suspected asbestos-containing flooring up to 100 square feet. I'd like to cover it up. All the EPA websites say cover up asbestos tile. It's not dangerous if it's not friable (crumbling) and my tile is not. The underlayment for Click will add more height to the powder room floor. There's a silvery foam type sold by Farbo (it's 1/8" at least), and whisper wool underlayment that's 1/8" thick. So my powder room floors would be 3/8" higher than my kitchen floor. Will this look bad? Will the underlayment be enough to "hide" the uneven floor caused by the missing pieces of white tile? Or will I need to fill them in/even out the floor with some leveling or patching product? I looked up t-moldings and reducer moldings -- not the look I was hoping for, but I can live with it if I have to. I understand Farbo no longer sells transition moldings. I was hoping I could get the Marmoleum and the wood floor to abut each other at the same height, but I'm assuming this isn't possible with Click? Does anyone know? Does anyone have Click installed adjacent to a wood floor without an expansion gap?