Removing tiles from wooden floorboards

[Allgood]

Hi guys and gals,

Our ppor is an old farmhouse, probably around 1940s. It's been added onto over the years, probably using less than perfect materials but is a pretty solid old place. The original floorboards are not of a quality to be polished and have some humps and hollows between rooms. The past owner, aka my mother (!!) had all the carpet ripped up a few years ago and had most of the floor tiled over the floorboard. This was done by using a cement levelling compound throughout the house to fill the hollows, and looking at it you wouldn't pick there was ever a problem, except that at the front of the house you can see about 4 inches of the skirting boards, and at the front only about 2 inches because the rest is below the level. You can't generally notice this because the difference within any particular room is so slight. Does that make sense??

Anyhoo, we've considered ripping up the tiles and working with the original floorboards, but after looking underneath the house, I don't think they'd come up too well because like I said, they're going all different directions (but generally look in pretty good nick). So now we're considering the floating flooring route, and within this we really have 2 options: going over the tiles, or ripping them up, relevelling and then laying floaters.

Has anyone removed tiles from floorboards before? I so what did you use? I'm worried that a kanga or jackhammer might go through the floorboards if I'm not careful. The Main reason that I want to get rid of the tiles is at we want to gyprock some of the walls that are currently Masonite, and add some nice, big skirting boards and architraves to match the lovely high ceilings, but some of the architraves are half berried in the levelling compound and tiles, so I thought I should go back to square 1 and do it properly.

Any advise would be greatly appreciated.

 

[wylie]

Just going by what you've written, if the floor is now level and solid enough to take a floating floor, why not cut through the skirts at the level they are, install the floating floor and then add new skirts that are level with the floor?

Trying to get the tiles and the levelling compound up sounds like a nightmare and then you have to start all over.

 

[Scott No Mates]

Use a wide flat blade instead of a point or chisel bit on the kango. As Wylie said why dig up the floor if it's level?

 

[knightm]

Just going by what you've written, if the floor is now level and solid enough to take a floating floor, why not cut through the skirts at the level they are, install the floating floor and then add new skirts that are level with the floor?

Trying to get the tiles and the levelling compound up sounds like a nightmare and then you have to start all over.

+1 unless its bouncy or structurally compromised, if so go down and start again. If its solid why wreck the level base.

 

[DaveM]

Agree, go over the top

 

[Allgood]

Thanks for the replies.

Okay. So over the top clearly has it. I'm just not sure why I'm considering starting again. I guess it's that if you go over the top of tiles, then your floor would be, say, an inch higher. Is it weird having to step down an inch to go into the wet areas or am I being picky? Also what about doors that open inwards from the outside, do you put a strip to hide the edge of the floaters so they're not exposed? And cut the bottom off all doors. And the dishwasher would then be an inch higher, would that fit under the bench? And what would I use to cut the architraves horizontally at floor level?

Sorry, genuine questions, just can't get my head around why it doesn't seem right to me Hmmm, maybe I should just do a knock down rebuild

 

[AlmostBob]

tool

one of these type of things,

you can sit it right on the tiles and cut the architrave, our fibreglass fixer uses them when installing or repairing showers and they work ok, not necessarily this blade

 

[willair]

Thanks for the replies.

Okay. So over the top clearly has it. I'm just not sure why I'm considering starting again. I guess it's that if you go over the top of tiles, then your floor would be, say, an inch higher. Is it weird having to step down an inch to go into the wet areas or am I being picky? Also what about doors that open inwards from the outside, do you put a strip to hide the edge of the floaters so they're not exposed? And cut the bottom off all doors. And the dishwasher would then be an inch higher, would that fit under the bench? And what would I use to cut the architraves horizontally at floor level?

Sorry, genuine questions, just can't get my head around why it doesn't seem right to me Hmmm, maybe I should just do a knock down rebuild

Maybe just start again you can buy a 100mm scraper,and once you get one tile up it's not that hard of a job and when I have done this before ,, if you use a home brand disinfectant just spray it under the first tile leave for about ten minutes then use the scraper,the disinfectant will bleach the floor-boards but if it's going to be resanded then that does not matter..imho..

http://www.tradetiler.com/gundlach-100mm-scraper.html

 

[MRCCON]

tool

one of these type of things,

you can sit it right on the tiles and cut the architrave, our fibreglass fixer uses them when installing or repairing showers and they work ok, not necessarily this blade

Rofl, not for a whole house I would of thought.........


Basically these are your answers;

If you want a floating floor, go over the existing tiles.

If you want a solid timber, polished floor, rip the tiles up.

To rip tiles up on a full house, you usually use a Jack Hammer with a tile blade, which kind of looks like a big blade spatula, it's quite thin and will get under the full tile instead of just chipping at them like a shovel bit.