How To Know If You Have Asbestos Flooring

Before you begin removing floor tiles or sheet flooring that contains asbestos you must isolate the work area to prevent any dust raised during the cleanup from migrating to other parts of the house.

How to know if you have asbestos flooring.

Asbestos flooring only causes potential health problems when it gets disturbed so don t panic if you think your home has asbestos tiles. If you know when the building was built or renovated this might help you estimate when the tiles were installed. Asbestos flooring was made into the 1980s though its heyday was the 1920s through the 1960s. Vinyl or asphalt tiles that have these colors in it have a high likelihood of asbestos fibers.

It s trickier to be certain if your home ever contained asbestos. Most often you won t know unless someone disclosed the information or you ve checked the original building documents. If you re renovating a building or redoing the flooring in a room look for the pattern of older tiles that could indicate that asbestos tiles were present. Many old flooring tiles that contained asbestos were designed and arranged in a 9 in 23 cm by 9 in 23 cm pattern.

Even if the vinyl flooring is pulled up intact the old adhesive underneath may also contain asbestos. Another time period that asbestos floors were popular in was between the years of 1920 and 1960. You should also find a disposal site that accepts asbestos before you start so you know what you re going to do with the hazardous asbestos floor. If you decide to remove nonfriable vinyl asbestos flooring you have to be cautious for two reasons.

How to remove asbestos tiles. One of the main ingredients used in old asbestos tiles was asphalt so they were primarily made in dark colors only. Gather information about the age of the tiles. With that in mind here are the keys to identifying asbestos floor tiles.

Look around the edges of the floor and you ll see what appears to be the same for 12 but it s a creamy white with black. Look for residue of old flooring tiles that may have contained asbestos. Asbestos tiles have traits that make them easier to spot. Identifying building materials containing asbestos helps you plan for removal if you want them gone.

However signs that a home may have contained asbestos include. Step 3 date the tiles. All you need to know about asbestos floor tiles find out if your flooring contains this banned material and if so how to deal whether you aim to remove it cover it up or leave it alone.