From: kent@lightnin.Columbia.NCR.COM (Kent Richardson)
Subject: Re: vinyl floor question
Originator: kent@lightnin
Organization: NCR Corp, E&M-Columbia, Columbia, SC
Distribution: usa
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 92 12:39:00 GMT


>In article <4470@cvbnetPrime.COM> bsweeney@argon.prime.com (Brian Sweeney) writes:
>>Is it possible to put a vinyl floor over an already existing
>>vinyl floor?   In other words, do you have to rip up the old 
>>stuff and put down an underlayment and then the new stuff?

>If the old vinyl is smooth, you can glue the new stuff right on top. You
>should be able to do this with a "pebble grain" surface also. If the old
>stuff is textured with grooves to form patterns, it will have to come up.
>The new flooring will gradually settle into the grooves.

>-----------------------------------------------------------------------
                    >|            - The 90/90 Rule -
>George Patterson -  | The first 90% of the work takes 10% of the time.
>                    | The last 10% of the work takes the remaining 90%
>                    |   of the time.
>-----------------------------------------------------------------------

I have just finished re-doing a kitchen floor with new vinyl. As George
mentions above if there is a pattern in the old vinyl it may show after the
new flooring is put down. I was told by a couple of salespeople that if you
are using the very expensive flooring you can put it right on top of most any
old stuff. It is a very thick product (Mannington Gold, etc.), but I would hate
to put down a very expensive flooring and find out that they were wrong. 
You have a few options you could take.

  1  If your floor is a smooth vinyl I would put the new directly on top of
     the old as George suggests above.

  2  If it has patterns I would suggest putting 1/4" underlayment directly on
     top of the old vinyl. If the old is loose in any places it should be cut
     out. I used a 1/4" board made for underlayment. It was called U-DEK. There
     is another would that is the same called Structure Board. I was informed
     by many people not to use Luan. The other wood was only $2.50 more per 
     sheet than Luan. Put "Liquid Nails" under the underlayment to help bond it
     to the old floor. This probably is not necessary but could not hurt. It is
     very cheap anyway. The wood I used had crosses every 4" to show where to
     nail. I would DEFINITELY rent a nail gun to do this job. I did not and for
     8-9 sheets of would I used about 3000 nails.(OUCH my thumb!!) I used a 5-lb
     box of 4d CC Sinkers (Cement Coated). Some people suggest putting nails 
     every 3-4" around the edge and every 6-8" along the interior of the sheet.
     I put mine every 4" as shown on the wood. You then need to fill in any
     cracks that are greater than 1/32". I used a product called floor leveler.
     It dries like cement and puts out a baby powder dust when sanded. It worked
     O.K. for me. I would have liked to have used something that did not make so
     much dust when sanded. I had someone else lay the vinyl because I did not
     want to be responsible for making a wrong cut and ruining hundreds of $ of
     vinyl. 

  3  I saw a product in Lowes the other day that is apparently made to put on
     top of old vinyl to level it, so that a new vinyl can be put directly on
     top of the old. It was made by Armstrong. I did not see this before I 
     started. I don't think that I would have used it anyway.

  4  Pull the old vinyl up and sand the old underlayment smooth. This would be
     a lot of work and could be dangerous it your old floor is not pretty new.
     I was informed by several people that the vinyl backing and the glues had
     Asbestos in them up to about 4-5 years ago. Our local paper printed an 
     article on this recently that stated that Asbestos was used up to as little
     as 2 years ago. The Asbestos particles are not so dangerous when they are 
     in the glue. It's the loose particles that you could breathe that are the 
     dangerous ones. I figured that the sanding could produce a lot of this if
     I pulled the old floor up and sanded the underlayment. 

  5  Pull the old vinyl up and put down underlayment? The old vinyl is only
     1/16-3/16" thick. Why pull it up?


The person that put my vinyl down was very resonabley priced. He also did an
excellent job. I found that around Columbia, South Carolina the average rate
ranged from $4.50-7.50 /sq. yard to install the vinyl only. The person I used
only charged $3.00/sq. yd. He only charges $10/sheet to put the underlayment
down. I now know how much work that is and would gladly pay that next time. 
If you have any questions please post or email me. Also below is the phone #
for Congoleum's technical service. They should be able to tell you anything 
that you would want to know. Manningtons phone # also.


Congoleum Tech. Service   1-800-SUB-FLOR

Maningtons Customer #     1-800-FLO-ORUS  ? I think

Good luck with the floor!!!!!

_____________________________________________________________________________

	Kent Richardson				In-circuit Test Engineer
	Surface Mount Operations Center
	kent@lightnin.ColumbiaSC.NCR.COM	NCR MCPD Columbia
	Phone (803) 739-6162			3325 Platt Springs Road
						W. Columbia, S.C. 29170

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