# Have you used stick on tile over old flooring?



## kdabbler (Feb 19, 2006)

Our vinyl kitchen flooring is really sad. I've got little area rugs hiding the bare patches. We can't afford to do a proper tear out with new subflooring right now but are wondering if anyone has had experience with self stick tile? Dh thinks we can just lay it on our old vinyl floor. I think it wouldn't last very long if we did it that way. I fear peeling tiles in less than 12 mos, you know?

Any thoughts?


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## candynut (Jun 18, 2005)

We did this a few months ago in my in-laws house. No peeling floors yet, although they had a kitchen sink leak and I think it made the floor swell up underneath, so the squares don't match up as well.

But, if your floor desperately needs something and that's all you can afford, I would probably go for it.

Oh, just make sure the floor underneath is very very spotless when you stick it on. A crumb will make a lump in your floor that will never go away!


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## MissMommyNiceNice (May 1, 2007)

Is your vinyl floor all one piece? If so, you should be fine if you clean it very well. If it is already stick on tile, you should take it up and put it on whatever is underneath (hopefully a solid piece of vinyl or sub-floor). You may need to use a torch & scraper, but it would be the difference between a floor that will last one or two years and a floor that will last 5 or 6. Make sure you ventilate well if you use the torch, it can be stinky!

We did this in our bathroom, and it looks great. We got two boxes for about $45, it looks like stone, and there was enough left over to do our foyer downstairs. YOu can get cheaper kinds though, depending on what you're looking for. And a tip from my friends, we learned why some of that tile is at Ollie's! It's not square - the whole floor was crooked!


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## sunanthem (Jan 29, 2004)

I helped a friend do theirs over old vinyl; they didnt pull up anything, and her hubby was a handyman/jack of all trades, so thats what he suggested. This was about 2 years ago; I dont know what the floor looks like now, cause they have sinced moved.


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## mightymoo (Dec 6, 2003)

I did it, worked great, we moved out after 18 months after doing it and it still looked great. If you buy a few extra tiles you can replace any that come loose later.


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## kdabbler (Feb 19, 2006)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *hklinefelter22* 
Is your vinyl floor all one piece? If so, you should be fine if you clean it very well. If it is already stick on tile, you should take it up and put it on whatever is underneath (hopefully a solid piece of vinyl or sub-floor). You may need to use a torch & scraper, but it would be the difference between a floor that will last one or two years and a floor that will last 5 or 6.

It's two sheets of vinyl adhered to a sub floor. I really don't know if we can peel and scrape it off. I'm going to say no only because knowing the history of our house, the floor was probably put in by the previous owner's father pre-1975. At that age, I wouldn't be surprised if there are rotten areas of subfloor that would peel off with the vinyl.

Also, we really want to avoid pulling up the current subfloor because below it is yet another floor with what we believe to be asbestos tile. That would be a major expense.


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## MissMommyNiceNice (May 1, 2007)

In my bathroom, it was only peel & stick over the subfloor, so we took it up and put our tiles right to the subfloor. You should be okay if it is a solid peice of vinyl. Our's looks great, and i'm sure you can find just what you want! We used Armstrong ones from home depot.


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## Laurie73 (Feb 23, 2006)

I am dealing with the asbestos floor thing now. We just bought a home that was built in the 50's. My SO is working on it before we move in and one of his projects is updating the sad kitchen. Instad of putting tile over the existing floor, he decided to tear that up. We had read about the asbestos link, so he had the first layer sent to a lab and that came back negative. Problem is that there is another older floor underneath that and that sample came back positive. Now we are freaking out and don't know what to do. He's done a lot of reading and is worried it's even in the sheet rock and what would we do then? My concern is that I don't want to bring my kids (inc. a newbie) into the house and expose them to that. Only positive is that the kind they found does not stay in the body...I'm scared and looking for a light at the end of the tunnel...

I just want our home to be safe.


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## MissMommyNiceNice (May 1, 2007)

If you do asbestos abatement, it can be terribly expensive. My suggestion, don't disturb it! It's only really dangerous if you breath in the dust where it clings to the lung tisse. A lot of houses have it, and I'm sure it's in our tile somewhere (whole house is tiled







) but I'm just going to cover on over it with snap down wood floors.

don't sweat it too much, you should be okay, Laurie! Old houses come with bagage. Nothing we can do about that!


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## Laurie73 (Feb 23, 2006)

We're going with abatement because it is only costing about $1500. It's worth the expense for us. We decided that we'd rather rid the house of it and know it's gone for good. We'll be getting it done about a month prior to move in so I am feeling good about that.
I think we would have just let the floor be if he hadn't disturbed some tiles already...now that he did, we just want it out of there.


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## Penelope (Jul 22, 2003)

We didn't have our (old) floor tiles tested, but our contractor (who is very experienced and a really good guy, and who didn't actually do the floors for us, so had no incentive to lie) told us that you'd basically have to grind it up into a powder and snort it for it to be a health issue.


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## moonchiald (Jun 21, 2007)

We put Traffic Master stick on tiles straight onto our old linoleum. The old floor was still in good condition, though. I wouldn't recommend it, if the old floor was coming up.

The new tile has been down over 3 years and it still looks great. We were/are very pleased with it.


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## Yo Becca (Apr 17, 2005)

we put stick-on tiles over floor that was actually painted. (what idiot paints a floor white? White housepaint does NOT make for a good kitchen floor). We figured anything was better than what we had. Our "handyman" contractor did it and he insisted on applying glue in addition to the adhesive on the tiles. it worked great and stuck well, other than the little peices he had to cut to fit around the toilet (we did our kitchen, hall and bathroom) We used the cheapest ones at Home Depot, and he used (i think) the glue that is used to put down roll-out flooring. We bought several extras as well so that we could replace any that had problems, but never used them. We probably did this about 18 months-2 years before we sold the house.


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## Rebecca (Dec 4, 2002)

I just put them in my kitchen over old 1950s linoleum at the suggestion of my realtor. It looks fantastic! And only cost me $37 for 3 boxes (30 tiles per box) and the primer that I didn't bother to use. Our home depot is moving so they were clearancing everything. I have no idea how long it'll last but since I'm moving and the next owners will likely rip out the entire kitchen anyway, I don't really care.

Buy thick tiles. They'll stay flat and adhere better than the thinner, vinyl-y ones. The ones I chose are almost like industrial tile and were still easy to score with a box cutter.

Be sure to follow their suggestions for cutting the tiles. I sacrificed one tile that had a weird splotch on it so it wouldn't have been used on the floor and peeled the backing off of it. When you place the tile to be cut against the trim (or whatever you're cutting around) place the sticky tile on top of the tile to be cut and line it up with the bottom-most whole tile. That will give you your cutting line and the sticky tile will hold it's place nicely without wiggling from the pressure of the cutter. Does that make sense?

If you have some high spots that don't stick, set a brick (or other heavy thing you happen to have) on top for a while.


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## boingo82 (Feb 19, 2004)

I haven't done it, but I've lived with the results of others doing it, and I wouldn't ever put it in myself.

The adhesive ALWAYS begins to ooze up through the cracks, and crud sticks to it. Not attractive. Not at all. Then the tiles start to come up, leaving adhesive that won't come off, but your socks stick to it. So does dirt. It's disgusting.


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## moonchiald (Jun 21, 2007)

The new tile (including the Traffic Master, that we used) doesn't have a separate adhesive that will ooze. DH and MIL just washed the old floor with towels to make sure it was throughly cleaned and then just peeled the backing off the tiles and placed it. It is thick tile and has held up wonderfully to the fridge being moved, animals, etc.


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## MiaPia (Aug 28, 2003)

DH put down stick-on tile in out kitchen/entryway/dining area last year and it was one of the smartest things we've ever done! It was inexpensive and the results were GREAT. In the kitchen and entryway we had ugly old peeling 1970s linoleum, and in the dining room we had nasty carpeting. We laid it directly over the old linoleum, and laid it over the sub-floor after pulling up the carpeting.

We used these from Lowes bought on sale.

It didn't take DH very long at all to install, and it looks fantastic. We actaully get compliments all the time (granted they're from people who knew just how AWFUL it looked before!







).

This is a VERY VERY high-traffic area (including 2 very large dogs) and they still look practically new. We haven't had ANY problem with peeling/buckling/discoloration. I would recommend it for anyone.


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## boingo82 (Feb 19, 2004)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *moonchiald* 
The new tile (including the Traffic Master, that we used) doesn't have a separate adhesive that will ooze. DH and MIL just washed the old floor with towels to make sure it was throughly cleaned and then just peeled the backing off the tiles and placed it. It is thick tile and has held up wonderfully to the fridge being moved, animals, etc.

The one I had experience with did NOT have a separate adhesive, and is still on sale at Home Depot. I don't know when the previous owners put it in, but you can still buy it. It can't be *that* old.
Granted, it was at the bottom of the peel-n-stick price range, but it was awful to live with and even worse to take up.


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