Any ideas on how I can speed up the process? If you don't have any ideas, do you know any good home improvement message boards? ANY bit of advice you can give me is greatly appreciated and I thank you all in advance.
I might not be able to respond quickly or to everyone because I'll be working on the floor between freeping. Thanks again for any help you can give!
call a contractor, open a beer, and watch him work.
What are you putting down instead?
We just did Pergo in the kitchen. It’s dream flooring and went right over the old stuff.
I spent three days removing the old flooring, it was a pain, then my contractor for ceramic told me, he would just put the new tile over the old floor. I had big scrapers, and roofing tools, the thing that worked the best was the heat gun. Inch by Inch, it took a long time.
Try a little acetone, be careful, vent well, wear a mask and gloves, IF you decide to use it. It will usually loosen most glues, including super glue types.
Getting my previous home ready for sale a couple years ago I needed to replace the wood floors in the entry way, dining room, and hallway. Knowing that the vinyl kitchen floor was a big downside when someone viewed the home, I just ran the new wood floor right over it.
UGH... you just brought back bad memories of remodeling our older home. There was actually about 3 layers of the crap on my floor. Just backbreaking work, is all I can remember...
The heat gun (fumes notwithstanding) - is faster, but messier and gooey.
I did dry ice on standard wood subsurface and heat gun on a metal (US Navy Frigate) floor ("deck")...
Forget all the stuff above. This is what you want:
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=37073
It’s the only thing that will get up impossible tiles or linoleum, I know, I’ve did it about 5 months ago. You’ll need the air scraper, a compressor, and hose. The scraper comes with a 4” blade, it shouldn’t break, but get another just in case. You hook up the scraper, fire up the compressor, and just push it along under the tiles. It should zip them right up.
Some places may rent this, but I had no such luck, I had to buy it. It’s very useful.
if you have, or can obtain, a small plumbers propane torch, you might try heating them a bit by passing the flame over a tile for 10 to 20 seconds before you try to pry it up
it may blaken the old tile a bit but should not set it aflame, while it also lossens the glue that is under the tile
If the builder put down luaun, then get a pro to replace it with Fiberrock underlay. Luaun and moisture don't get along at all.
I ended up replacing my entire subfloor. Not what I wanted, but we won't have any more problems.
If you are using luaun, then skimcoat the entire area before you put anything down. I would pull up the tiles that are easy, then skim over the rest. Works great in rent houses and homes you will sell in a few years.
There are also flexible vinyls that are great over wood floors. Just cut to fit and drop it down with tape or the correct glues. Remember to put quarter round trim around the edges.
Do it correctly, spend a fair amount of money. Do it cheaply, then the new owners can cuss your memory in a few years, as I did to our home's previous owners.
1. Move everything out of the house.
2. Put everything in storage under someone else’s name.
3. Buy a random bunch of furnishings at a garage sale.
4. Go out of town, maybe take the family camping.
5. Have the insurance company fix the house up as needed when it just happens to burn down during the camping trip.
Oh, sorry, just tryin’ to help.
These are very important. If the tiles came loose in front of the refrigerator have you thought about moving it around the room till they all came loose. If this might take too long see if you can get a group of 7-12 year old boys with scrapers. Get your wife to film it and make a memory that will last. I looked at your profile to come up with this plan.