Installing vinyl floor: patch & skim coat

I had an old vinyl floor in my kitchen that I've now ripped out. What's left is a particle-board type subfloor over the actual wood beams beneath.

The bottom of the old floor has stuck to the subfloor in most places, so there's a thin layer of black stuff across the entire floor, most of which is pretty sticky (I guess it's the old glue).

I'm planning to put vinyl squares down, but I went to Home Depot to figure out what to do about this sticky gunk that's left on the subfloor. The guy there recommended putting down a patch & skim coat over the entire floor, then tiling over that.

So my questions are:

1) Does this sound like the best solution? He said using a chemical to remove this junk would probably be a lot messier in the long run.

2) Any advice about how to apply the patch & skim coat? Is it pretty easy? He said just to mix it with water, apply with a trowel and then level out any high spots. How thick should I aim to make it? And, what do I do about cabinets and walls? Should I do anything to protect these edges from the patch & skim, or should I just go right up to the edges?

thanks for any feedback, Matt

Reply to
mjsiemer
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I've installed a few vinyl tile floors. If your'e saying that some of the particle board was stuck to the old floor, I would vote in favor of putting down a 1/4" plywood (or Hardibacker) layer on top of the whole thing. That way you'll have a nice clean and smooth surface for your new tiles. Dealing with the old glue and voids in the floor is a real pain (not to mention you probably won't get very good adhesion to your tiles). Putting down a new surface is pretty inexpensive and won't take very long to do. Just make sure your plywood seams are even (level) with each other and don't lay a tile seam directly over your subfloor seam.

Good Luck,

Dean

Reply to
Dean

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