Ceramic and quarry tile, vinyl and sheet goods, carpet, timber, screed and the adhesive beneath. Lifted back to a substrate the next floor can actually be laid on, not just swept and handed over.
Anyone can lift tile. What decides whether the next floor lasts is what is left stuck to the slab underneath, and that is where cheap quotes quietly stop. Bitumen, old flexible adhesive and screed residue all have to come off mechanically, because a new floor bonded onto old adhesive fails and the failure is blamed on the new floor rather than the preparation.
We grind back to a sound, flat substrate and tell you the tolerance we are leaving, so your flooring contractor knows what they are getting. Where the building predates the mid nineties, both the tile and the black adhesive under it are commonly asbestos-containing and are surveyed under asbestos removal before lifting starts.
Slab that is beyond preparation is handled under slab removal, and the room around it under strip-out.
Recent work
How It Runs
Four stages, priced before stage two
Survey the build-up
Layers identified, adhesive sampled if needed.
Contain and extract
Dust extraction at source, area sealed.
Lift the finish
Tile, sheet or timber taken up in sections.
Grind and check
Adhesive removed, flatness checked and stated.
Silica Dust
Grinding makes silica dust, so extract it
Grinding a concrete slab produces respirable crystalline silica, which is a serious health exposure and one of the most commonly ignored risks on a fit-out site. It is also entirely controllable: extraction at the tool, H-class vacuums, sealed containment and the right masks.
A contractor who turns up to grind a floor with a broom and an open door is telling you what their other controls are like. We extract at source and seal the area, which also happens to keep the rest of your building usable while the work runs.
Yes, and it is the part that matters. A new floor laid over old adhesive fails. We grind back to a sound substrate and tell you the flatness we are leaving.
In buildings from before the mid nineties it often does, and so does the black bitumen adhesive under it. The survey happens before lifting, not after.
Extraction at the tool, H-class vacuums and sealed containment. Grinding concrete releases silica, so this is a health control rather than a housekeeping preference.
Usually yes, because the containment that controls silica also keeps dust out of the rest of the floor. Noise is the limiting factor and we agree hours in advance.
Clean, free of adhesive and flat to a tolerance we state in writing so your flooring contractor can plan their build-up rather than discover it.
Customer reviews
What Hartford owners say about their demolition contractor
