Home › Floors › Asbestos in vinyl tiles, lino backing and floor adhesives

Asbestos in vinyl tiles, lino backing and floor adhesives

By · Updated

An old floor is three products stacked on each other, and asbestos can sit in any of them independently. The sander finds all three at once.

('

Floors are where asbestos most often survives a renovation unnoticed, because the usual treatment is to cover it rather than remove it. That is not a bad thing — it is frequently the safest option — but it means a great many Australian houses have layers nobody has looked at since the 1970s.

Three layers, three separate questions

  • The tile or sheet itself. Vinyl and vinyl-asbestos floor tiles, commonly in nine-inch squares, and some sheet vinyl.
  • The backing. Sheet vinyl and lino were often bonded to a paper or millboard-like backing, and this is the layer that most often contains asbestos. It matters because the backing is soft and fibrous rather than locked in vinyl — it behaves much closer to friable material than the surface does.
  • The adhesive. Black bituminous cutback adhesives used to stick the flooring down are a separate product with their own history.

You can have a perfectly ordinary modern tile stuck down with an old adhesive, or a harmless surface over a problematic backing. The layers are independent.

Why sanding is the worst option

The most common exposure story in Australian home renovation runs like this: the carpet comes up, there is old vinyl underneath, and out comes a hired floor sander or a scraper to get back to the boards.

Sanding does three bad things at once. It works on all three layers, including the fibrous backing and the adhesive. It does it indoors, in an enclosed room, where fibre settles rather than disperses. And it does it fast, generating an enormous volume of fine dust in a short time. A hired sander in a closed room is the single most efficient way to contaminate a house.

Dry scraping, grinding off residual adhesive and using a heat gun on old flooring belong in the same category.

Covering rather than removing

In many cases an intact old floor can simply be left in place with new flooring laid over it. This is a legitimate approach, widely used, and it is the reason so many houses have three generations of floor stacked up.

Two conditions make it honest rather than a dodge. The new floor must not require grinding or aggressive preparation of the old surface. And what is underneath must be written down — on a survey, in a management record, in the paperwork you hand to the next owner — so that the person who eventually lifts it is not ambushed.

When the floor has to come up

Sometimes covering is not an option: the floor is damaged, the levels do not work, or there is water damage underneath. At that point two factors push the job towards licensed removal. The area of a whole room is usually beyond a homeowner allowance, and the location is indoors, where the consequences of getting it wrong are longest-lived.

If the backing or adhesive is involved — and it usually is, because that is what holds the floor down — the material is no longer simply bonded sheeting, and that should be reflected in how the job is quoted and run.

Carpet underlay

One more layer worth naming: some older carpet underlays were made from materials that can contain asbestos. It is a less common case than vinyl backing, but it is the same principle — the soft, fibrous layer nobody looks at is the one that matters.

', 0)

Frequently asked questions

Which layer of an old floor is the problem?

Often the backing rather than the surface. Sheet vinyl and lino were frequently bonded to a paper or millboard-like backing that is soft and fibrous, so it behaves much closer to friable material than the vinyl does. The adhesive is a third, separate product.

Can I sand back an old vinyl floor?

No. Sanding works on the tile, the fibrous backing and the adhesive at once, indoors, in an enclosed space, and generates a large volume of fine dust quickly. Dry scraping, grinding off adhesive and heat guns are in the same category.

Is laying new flooring over the old one acceptable?

Frequently yes, and it is widely done. The conditions are that the new floor does not require grinding or aggressive preparation of the old surface, and that what is underneath is recorded for the next owner or tradesperson.

What about carpet underlay?

Some older underlays were made from materials that can contain asbestos. It is less common than vinyl backing but follows the same rule: the soft, fibrous layer nobody inspects is the one worth checking.

Sources

What this page explains is based on these official sources. If you check one and it does not match what you read here, send it to us and the article gets corrected.

Keep reading