Anyone found a breathable, thin, floor covering?

[Sue Wilkinson]

Hello!

It's positively ages since I was on here. It's all changed. But I got very excited this morning to see many of the familiar names still here.

I hang my head in shame and admit that I've done nothing to the house for 2 years. I was in dire need of an income and ended up doing lime repairs for people around the village and painting for them, with the wondrous selection of natural and green chemical free paints that abound now where possible. Doing that sort of reduced my energy to zero for my own home. Then, out of the blue a different business opportunity raised it's head and for the last couple of years I've been giving it all my time. It's doing well though, so worth it.

Having worked much too hard recently we took 3 days off last week and went to see the sea in North Norfolk so could have passed Penners! And I came back revitalised! As a result the very damp and uninspiring utility room has been attacked with a moderate vengeance. I still can't give this unlimited time, so I've removed the loose and flaking paint and plaster and taken up the horrible damp lino. Dehumidifier is on it's way to finish off what the window can't manage. A recent washing machine flood didn't do it any good at all. Then it's on to repair the plaster and paint it up. I'm going to use clay paint this time and find I can't wait to start!!!

The downside of this room is that the floor is covered in thick bitumen layer. I have removed this before in other places and revealed lovely old tiles or brick, but I can't do that here. Not now. It will take too long, potentially reveal other problems (such as missing bits) and give me an uneven floor that will play havoc with the washing machine. So I'm going to leave it. It's dark brown and tatty so I'd like to cover it. Has anyone found any sort of cover for this type of floor that won't sweat and yet is thin and heard wearing to allow the washing machine and other items to be moved around to get behind them etc? A breathable carpet tile would be ideal, but I bet that's in my dreams.

Alternatively, what about floor paint? Never used it, would it do the job and is there a more healthy version to the high VOC stuff?

Sue

 

[skier-hughes]

I'm not sure, but thought that the bitumen layer would not be breathable, so if you don't remove this, there is no point in adding a breathable layer on top????

 

[jocelyn plummer]

Hi Sue,

Welcome back!! We've moved from North Norfolk since you and I last communicated--- now nearer to your neck of the woods.But we were up there on Saturday for the weekend.

Penners has moved too!!

Probably best to remove the bitumen if you want to be truly 'breathable' but that of course depends entirely upon what lies beneath! I have always found cushion flooring very good. easy to clean and posssible to shift stuff around it, and I've not noticed any horrid damp bits between the layers. You will have to have it properly laid though so that water does not escape from an appliance to underneath.

 

[Sue Wilkinson]

Thanks Jocelyn, I know removal would be best, but I don't have the time to do it now and as I said, I'm sure I'd end up with a very uneven if lovely, tiled floor which would result in the washing machine dancing around the room. Your experience with cushion floor is good to hear. I know the bitumen isn't going to let damp through, but I was worried about sweating between the layers or about bits of damp getting in from the walls etc and getting trapped. I will give the bitumen surface a scour with a pad and try to scrape the paint splashes off first too, just in case I think I could live with it. If it's in good condition bitumen looks nice, a shiny chocolate brown colour. It's the fact that numerous people seem to have thrown paint and other substances around it.

The dehumidifier is now hard at work. I had no idea how big it would be! Not much more work going to happen in there until it's gone as there is hardly room to swing a cat.

So you have moved? What made you leave Norfolk? We are seriously wondering if we could move to live there. I hate being so far from the sea, and the salt marshes are so wonderful. Are you doing another house now? And Penners, where has he gone and is he doing another one?

Sue

 

[biffvernon]

I suppose that for the first 99+% of human evolution folk have lived on earthen floors, perhaps strewn with a few lavendar sprigs.

 

[Ushy M]

Hello Sue, welcome back - was wondering where a fellow Northants lass had got to! (We've got some lime plastering coming up once our gable end wall, now stripped of cement has had the summer to dry out - not sure if you're still in that line of work?).

Anyway, would cork be considered too hideous for your utility floor? I've found it OK in the past for a utility space - warm underfoot, easy to clean, absorbs a bit of washing machine judder? Plus relatively sustainable, biodegradable I think? (awaiting howl of outcry from Biff on this one though....)

 

[biffvernon]

Relax. Cork is good. Need to keep the economics of the cork forest going. Just don't buy wine with a plastic stopper. The left over bits get used for floor tiles.

 

[robgil]

Just don't buy wine with a plastic stopper.

damn , that rules out just about all of those fine 3 for £10 bottles of plonk in tesco's then.

 

[biffvernon]

I wouldn't buy anything from The Evil Empire of Tescopoly. See, they even put plastic in their wine bottles.

 

[wobs]

Its got to be a proper cork for wine.

Apart from the issue of supporting the cork industry (and the benefits to the environment etc), it means I can use my fancy cork screws, and not have to worry about the disposal of stupid lumps of plastic.

Just got our latest consignment of wine from the wine club. All tastes like wine before you ask.

 

[Penners]

And Penners, where has he gone and is he doing another one?

Hi Sue - nice to see you back. Penners has gone a bit farther north, but still in Suffolk... just. Very close to the border with Norfolk, so a bit worried about parties of raiding, blue-painted tribesmen.

If your floor is bitumen (possibly Synthaprufe) over the top of concrete, then it's got as much chance of breathing as a man with plastic bag on his head underwater. If you're not in position to do anything about its structure, then you can put anything you like on top.

I like Ushy's idea of cork, although I'm not sure whether it would be sufficiently durable for your utility room. Or what about a quarry tile floor? It would be practical for washing machine spills, and so on.

Before you consider that, however, I would check a few things. I suspect that your brownish-black gunk is probably Synthaprufe - this was (and probably still is) widely used to provide a damp-proof membrane over the top of concrete, plus it has adhesive qualities for sticking down things like wood block floors, lino and so on.

One of the characteristics of a Synthaprufe floor can be a slight softness (ie: very slight springiness), although this depends on how many coats were used. The more coats, the springier. If yours is quite noticeably squidgy, then you might have trouble keeping the grout between tiles, due to their movement.

However, if it feels pretty hard, then I reckon you'd be OK. But you might want to try a test patch of floor tile adhesive to make sure it would "take" on Synthaprufe. If it won't, then you could perhaps consider sticking the tiles down with more Synthaprufe. However, before doing that I should enquire of the manufacturer whether they regard this as an effective use of the product.

 

[Flyfisher]

Its got to be a proper cork for wine.

This is another thing that's always seemed a bit odd to me. I've read that 'corked' wine ruins up to 10% of bottled wine, which is a staggering percentage really and seems a very high price to pay for keeping the cork industry alive. Seems a bit like saying we should use iron-ringed wagon wheels on our vehicles to keep wheelwrights and blacksmiths in business.

 

[Sue Wilkinson]

If your floor is bitumen (possibly Synthaprufe) over the top of concrete, then it's got as much chance of breathing as a man with plastic bag on his head underwater. If you're not in position to do anything about its structure, then you can put anything you like on top.

Hello Penners!

Watch out for the raiding parties then. Better build a tower to look out from.

I never knew this stuff might have a name, but I've looked up Synthaprufe and it's quite different I think. For a start the information about the current product says you apply with a brush and gives a maximum thickness of coats which is tiny. I think I've seen it used in a cottage opposite me when a builder was trying to make a profit out of it. It was black and painted up the wall and across the floor.

My stuff is chocolate brown and thick. I mean 1" to 1.5" deep. It is perfectly smooth, polished almost, and where it meets the walls you can find small air bubble marks and a wave lap. It looks poured to me. I have taken this material up from an internal hall about 2 years ago. If you use a chisel and lump hammer it will crack up and let you lift it cleanly with sharp edges enough to cut you. But leave it unsupported somewhere and it droops and moulds itself to whatever it rests on. The good thing is that whoever put it down laid sheets of tar paper down on top of the old terracotta tiles (unglazed) and then poured the stuff over the paper. So it's not stuck to the tiles in many places. It came up quite easily, although it makes a mess. You do have to put some elbow grease in to remove the black from the tar paper and any salts that have come up through the tiles, but then you get the tiles back. I just can't spare the time to remove it at the moment and I daren't risk the uneven floor that is bound to be under it because I need to have the washing machine stay where I leave it! I like the idea of cork. I shall look into that. Warm and soft underfoot when ironing but not too impractical.

I think the only thing really wrong with it is that it touches the walls and forces any damp under it up the wall. I intend to cut a small channel along the edge of all the walls when I'm ready to lay something else on to it. I just didn't want to lay anything that would sweat like more lino or plastic floor covering.

It's great to be back. I'm busy scouring the above mentioned old tiles in the passage this afternoon. (Just having a cup of tea and piece of ginger cake because it's hot as hades in there with the dehumidifier working in the attached space). They got a bit salt marked from the recent washing machine leak. Did I see somewhere that once clean you can just apply linseed oil? I don't want to make them shine or anything, but I'd like them to look less dusty. How do you apply it? brush or cloth? and how much to apply?

See, back 1 day and now have two projects on the go already!

 

[Sue Wilkinson]

(We've got some lime plastering coming up once our gable end wall, now stripped of cement has had the summer to dry out - not sure if you're still in that line of work?)..)

Hello Ushy M, yes still here in Northants. Not currently available for plastering I'm afraid. I did a fair bit though, and I was really pleased with it. Some people I worked for then had someone else do another room after I was no longer available and the difference is very noticeable and I came off well.

I still have plenty to do here, just no time to do it!

My new business is www.fancy-tapes.co.uk. It won't be of the slightest interest to period property enthusiasts, but it's a great little niche market that is going well and allows me to work at home (albeit bits of the home are now warehouse!). Perfect for me. But I'd got a bit blinkered into working 24/7 on it. I'm currently very excited as the paint colour chart for clay paint arrived this morning. It doesn't take much.

 

[Penners]

Good grief! From your description it sounds more like pitch (except, perhaps, for the colour). Maybe some pitch-based product.

If it was laid on tar-paper over terracotta tiles, and comes up quite cleanly, how practical would it be to lift it and enjoy having the tiles?