OMG I did not know this!!!! Did you?

[Treegle]

I've just discovered that it's possible for artex to contain asbestos!! I never knew this! And my dad worked as a painter and decorator for many years!! Is this common knowledge?!!!

Yes, I knew. Only because a ceiling caved in at work, and they needed to check there was no asbestos in the artex before doing the work to repair it.

I think it used to, but anything artexed in the last few decades surely wouldn't have it in?

Yeah it's older stuff - but that's still there and getting scraped off by people who may not know isn't it

Sorry I should have been clearer. I realise it's no longer made with it but the stuff is still on people's ceilings and not in fashion any more so people scrape it off!!!

Yes I knew this because it was flagged on the survey when we bought our house. House was 1900s but I think artex was a 60s or 70s ‘improvement’. I don’t think I’d know otherwise though!

I found this out recently. I wish I hadn't attempted to scrape the bloody stuff off many moons ago. I guess I'll find out in another 10 - 15 years if its done any harm.

Yes but I come from a shipbuilding town. Anything built before late 80’s I reckon would have asbestos in it, from housing to council buildings.

I had artex walls in my last house. Easiest thing to do was have it plastered over instead of removing it

And we had a specialist company test it and ours didn’t contain asbestos so we had the decorater skim straight over it.

Do you reckon there is decorators all over the country scraping it off?

Why would anyone bother to scrape off artex? Surely you’d just plaster over it?

I'm in the US and we have similar situations with what we call 'popcorn' ceilings. They're all fine 'in situ', only dangerous if they start crumbling or you want the texture/popcorn removed.

My cousin had to pay a FORTUNE when she wanted to get her ceilings scraped and redone. It was a massive undertaking with plastic coverings, hazmat suits, vacuum hoses. Looked like that scene in ET!

Yes I knew but only because it’s been mentioned on Homes Under the Hammer

I'd like to think anyone in the decorating trade would know this. I thought it was pretty common knowledge!

I tried to scrape it once. Guess I thought it would come off like woodchip or something. Shit

I'm not in the decorating trade tho and didnt know. Hopefully my dad did and wasn't scraping it off and bringing it home

We plastered over ours.

I didn’t realise until a few years back and I’ve been worrying about it!

We had a hole in the ceiling due to a leak. My husband prodded it and made it bigger and it was left for ages until we had the entire ceiling pulled down and redone when we needed new pipes put in. There was dust everywhere. We have a late 1987 house with artex and the company didn’t test for it - we had no idea about it at that point or I’d have asked them to!

I’ve considered getting the other rooms tested but if they find it does contain artex then I’ll just be worrying even more.

My sisters house in the late 80s had the stuff swirled on the living room and hallway. Imagine how bad that was.

I have artex ceilings in my council house that i made the council send a specialist to test for asbestos. The test cane back positive but the council insist as long as the ceilings are in good health, as in no cracks and so on, its not a risk. Still had to insist on it being checked though!

It was on the walls!

oh fucking hell! My parents house is covered in the stuff. Every single room has it on the ceiling in weird n wonderful patterns! It was the 'in' decorating thing.

Meh! It’s safe if is not disturbed.

I knew this - we are leaving are horrible ceilings in place as a result . It’s only a problem if it’s damaged . Same applies to old fashioned fascia board