Poop and Basements

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

I have the unfortunate task of turning a basement dogs were holed up in into a bedroom. These dogs happened to pee and poop everywhere.

Luckily, the floor is linoleum, so mopping should go a long way but I'm understandably worried it won't be near enough, especially for a room I'll be sleeping in. No, there really isn't another room in the house that is available. Google is turning up a lot of rather different advice and obscure product recommendations on deodorizing, especially when poop is involved.

Please, dear god, help me figure this out.

Noizlanif · July 2011

Is pulling the floor up an option? Chances are, if the animals were down there long enough without it being actually cleaned / picked up. That stuff will seep into the flooring. Otherwise, bleach bleach bleach. Bleached it once? Bleach it again!

tardcore · July 2011

I agree with this smart person ^^^

That kind of stuff will usually seep through and the scent will linger because it's underneath the flooring. If you can't pull it up, be ready to bleach and soak the crap out of it.

Skoal Cat · July 2011

Even if its concrete below the linoleum, concrete floor can be neat and new linoleum is cheap.

Caswynben · July 2011

Also, tiling on concrete is really easy

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

What's below doesn't look like concrete - whatever it is, it's kinda neat. Very dark and has some lighter smoky coloration. The tiling itself is no longer particularly sturdy. It's more likely to break off in shards than in square pieces.

Pulling the flooring pretty much has no downsides, as far as I can tell. Thanks.

Creidhes · July 2011

Frosty the Snow Plow wrote:

What's below doesn't look like concrete - whatever it is, it's kinda neat. Very dark and has some lighter smoky coloration. The tiling itself is no longer particularly sturdy. It's more likely to break off in shards than in square pieces.

Pulling the flooring pretty much has no downsides, as far as I can tell. Thanks.

How old is your house? Lots of older linoleum has asbestos backing. It would be worth getting that checked before you start pulling it up.

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

Oh. Wow.

That is... asbestos backing. It looks exactly like the stuff GIS brought up.

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

Yeah, it looks like this:

The filename of that picture being asbestos4.jpg.

The adhesive is pretty faded and sticks to the tiles more than the floor, but, well, yeah.

Phoenix-D · July 2011

And the tiles are flaking?

I think you're in the realm of either don't live down there or get professional cleanup, unfortunately.

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

Jesus Christ, I spent most of my teenage life in that room before moving out (and now moving back in). The flooring near the laundry area of the basement has been up for as long as I can remember.

Yeah, the tiles have been flaking for forever, the house was made in the... 60s? I think. The basement flooded pretty regularly, multiple times a year.

Midshipman · July 2011

Asbestos is pretty harmless as long as it isn't in the air. You shouldn't have been in any danger living there as long as you weren't ripping up tiles and throwing them around on a daily basis.

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

Thanks. I was having a bit of a panic attack. The exposed flooring in there has always been rather well-worn and polished, probably thanks in part to the constant flooding. We did rip up tiles, but I can count the occasions on one hand, and it was never more than one or two, usually when they were loose.

Midshipman · July 2011

Yeah, you want to treat it with respect, but it isn't death incarnate or anything. The real danger was back in the day when nobody had any idea of the dangers it presented and people worked with the stuff constantly without even any breathing filters. I had an engineering professor who used to have snowball fights with asbestos insulation when he worked onboard merchant ships

Frosty the Snow Plow · July 2011

The flooring that is exposed is at the foot of the stairs, most of the laundry room, and creeps into the room I'm trying to clean. Besides not ripping up the existing tile, is there anything I should know?

Kakodaimonos · July 2011

Frosty the Snow Plow wrote:

The flooring that is exposed is at the foot of the stairs, most of the laundry room, and creeps into the room I'm trying to clean. Besides not ripping up the existing tile, is there anything I should know?

Don't worry about the tiles. Those are non-friable and won't put asbestos fibers into the air. You are either going to have to remove them or look at doing some sort of floating floor over them. Do not sand, grid or do anything else to rough up the surface of the tiles.

And if you want to remove them, you can. Here's the non-friable tile removal guidelines from Oregon. Most states are going to be similar.

DEQ wrote:

The safest way to handle vinyl asbestos floor tiles (VAT) is to make sure the material stays in a nonfriable
condition. Friable asbestos materials can easily release fibers when crushed. Nonfriable asbestos
materials have a binder that holds the asbestos fibers within a solid matrix and will not allow asbestos
fibers to release easily, unless mishandled, damaged, or in badly worn condition. In most cases, VAT is
considered nonfriable.
Nonfriable asbestos materials in good condition are exempt from some DEQ rules. You do not need to be
a DEQ licensed asbestos contractor or DEQ certified asbestos worker to do nonfriable asbestos removal.
If you remove VAT using this guide, the VAT should remain in nonfriable condition.

http://www.deq.state.or.us/aq/asbestos/docs/Asbflr.pdf

Fuzzy Cumulonimbus Cloud · July 2011

Are you sure you have VATs and not just ceramic tiles bound to normal grout?

Penny Arcade

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