Oh no, I think this is asbestos.

[SingingBabooshkaBadly]

Removed ancient built in wardrobes and revealed some lovely floorboards. The rest of the room is carpeted. I just pulled up the edge of the carpet expecting to find hardboard and revealed these strange tiles - which have presumably been stuck down on to the floorboards.

They looked like cork but when I touched them they felt like vinyl. I’ve googled and it seems cork effect asbestos tiles were quite common.

I assume they are safe to leave in place and recover with a new carpet? They don’t appear to be damaged. Will a carpet fitter be ok with this?

Very disappointed as I’d hoped to be able to have the floorboards exposed. I suppose the alternative is to have them professionally removed.

Has anyone done this?

Certainly have - just got the last of my asbestos tiles out.

The advice is if they are not broken, they are not dangerous and can be left in place. Ours had had carpet gripper hammered into them and were broken so came out.

Worth getting them tested so you know:

• Find an asbestos testing company through ARCA, or if no one near you try to find one that doesn’t do removal (less motivation to be cowboys)
• get them out to do a renovation survey. They’ll test the tiles and poke around to see if you’ve got anything else worth looking at
• you’ll get a lab report few days later

If they are asbestos they are likely to be fairly low levels. If you want them removed, you can do this yourself: www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/guidance/a23.pdf
or again find a contractor from ARCA.

There is a lot of crap on the internet about asbestos. The HSE link is a good place to find info.

The only thing I’d say about you wanting to remove them from wooden floor is they may have been stuck down with bitumen that is also asbestos containing, and near impossible to get off, so may not be worth it as you won’t get your wood floor if that’s the case

@TreesRUs - thanks for replying. I suspect they have been stuck down so I think I’ll abandon thoughts of the wooden floor - most of which will be covered by a bed anyway.

Ours also have carpet grippers hammered in but don’t appear to be actually broken. Do you think that just having had tacks hammered in they will need to come out? I’d assumed we could just recover with new carpet.

Thanks for the link - I’ll take a look now.

Can’t help wondering why vinyl tiles in a bedroom? Why? 😩

Oh shit! We just ripped a load of those up in the kitchen, didn't think about them possibly being dangerous.

No probs Singing! Should say I’m by no means an expert, just drawing from my recent experience and extensive research I ended up doing

If you want to know, the best thing to do is get them tested. They may not be asbestos at all and then you can try for the wooden floor! You can just get a bit tested (rather than do the whole survey) which shouldn’t cost much. Although if you’re doing other work and dependent on your house age may well be worth just forking out for the renovation survey.

The advice always is if they aren’t broken then it’s fine to leave them, you might need to reuse the same carpet grippers to avoid disturbing them. Really grippers should be stuck to them rather than nailed for this reason. As they are usually low levels, flooring tradesmen tend to be pretty relaxed about them.

TwatCat they equally as likely may not have been asbestos, trouble is you don’t know without testing. Again, I’m not an expert but these sorts of tiles have fairly low levels if they are, and a one off exposure is far less likely to cause you a problem.

I wouldn’t worry, but if you’re doing work and dependent on the age of your house I’d maybe get an asbestos renovation survey to check if there is anything else.

Oh and about why vinyl tiles in a bedroom... they were across my whooole house. It was the wonder material in the 50s!

Asbestos floor tiles are not a danger. I have them stuck on my concrete floors in bathroom and kitchen. They are half ripped up but we have up and eventually I will cover them (currently a large rug).

I had a builder say they are fine. But more important, I have a friend who is a surveyor and she also said they are completely not a danger and to just leave them.

They will be a nightmare to remove. And expensive because of that. Any floorboards underneath will be wrecked I am sure.

We have just had an asbestos report done on a house we are selling. Apparently in the 1950s and 1960s asbestos was widely used in the construction industry. The floor tiles containing asbestos were deemed to be safe, as were the other things that were tested.

Thanks everyone. user sadly I think you’re right - will be a nightmare to get up and will probably wreck the floor anyway. It’s a spare room and a fairly small double so most will be covered by a bed anyway - not worth the hassle.

Twatcat I wouldn’t have given it a second thought either except when the surveyor mentioned most houses of this age will have asbestos somewhere (1930s) I looked into it and found they put asbestos in pretty much everything.

Apparently all the fake snow in old black and white movies is pure asbestos