A Floor Too Far...

Well folks, I knew I was getting off easy by uncovering those beautiful floors under my horrible avocado green shag... apparently I shouldn't have pushed my luck.

I decided that I really needed to pull the horrible carpet in the bathroom. Partly because it was just horrible - really, who puts carpet in a bathroom? - and partly because one of the nests of carpet beetle larvae that I discovered was right at the bathroom doorway - and why would they stop at the doorway?

I didn't really feel up for a whole bathroom remodel. I didn't want to pull the toilet, or do major demolition... just wanted to get the carpet out of there. So I crafted a plan. I figured I'd just pull up the carpet to expose the ugly linoleum underneath, and then I'd cover that with a layer of cheap peel and stick vinyl flooring. Not a long term solution - but enough to give the room a small facelift and deal with the current problem.

And so I waded in. It only took an hour or two to get the carpet out, and here's what I found:

Alas, it was not just ugly, but also damaged beyond the point where my peel and stick solution was gonna work. But more seriously, I discovered that the toilet had been leaking for God knows how long. Soo.... out the window flew my "easy makeover" plans.

But I watched a few videos on pulling up linoleum and it didn't look too difficult...

And so, once again, I waded in. And... hmm...

None of the YouTube videos mentioned anything about tar paper! And the heat gun/iron/steamer removal method that looked so easy in the videos, only turned this flooring into a melted mess - which made removal much more difficult.

Turns out this floor was vinyl, not linoleum - which, I guess requires a different removal method. And the tar paper was used for waterproofing in older bathrooms. So after a few days of chiseling, scraping, grunting and cursing, I was left with this:

Gotta say, I was feeling pretty darned hopeless at this point. I scoured the interwebs with a new set of search terms, but everything I found showed people using steam or heat to remove this stuff. I don't know if I was dealing with a qualitatively different sort of tar paper or what, but heat just turned this stuff into... well, into tar - like roofing tar. I was lucky if I could get off one square inch at a time.

But then... then... I stumbled upon an unlikely savior! Late one night in a Googling frenzy I happened upon a video of a young woman in a similar situation, with a rather unorthodox solution. She took old towels laid them out on the floor, then saturated them with diet Coke and let it sit overnight. Then the tar paper just scraped off like butter!

It sounded sorta crazy, but it did trigger a memory from long ago. When I was in college I was on a work study program, and I spent my freshman year working in the cafeteria kitchen. One day while working on the cleanup crew, the fry cook handed me an empty pitcher and asked me to fill it with carbonated water from the soda machine. I couldn't quite figure out what she was gonna do with the stuff, and I was totally shocked when she dumped in on the griddle and the thick layer of grease just slid off! Turns out the carbonic acid in the carbonated water eats through grease.

Soo... perhaps the diet Coke woman wasn't crazy after all. And at this point, I really didn't have much to lose. I decided to use plain carbonated water instead of Coke, so I laid out my old towels, saturated them and let it sit... and sit... and sit...

It took 24 hours of soaking, and a razor blade floor scraper, but.... finally... success!

Whew!

But now what? Well, it turns out that vinyl peel and stick flooring isn't recommended for bathrooms unless you have an impervious layer like old vinyl or linoleum underneath it. So I've spent the last week or so doing extensive research on every flooring system on the market.

I seriously considered a next generation vinyl floating floor system - no glue, really easy to install, and waterproof, but there were just too many issues for me to want to go that way. First of all, it's vinyl... which means plastic. And while people are singing the praises of these systems, there are a few caveats to their use. You're not supposed to put them in rooms with a lot of direct sunlight - and this bathroom has a west facing window which bathes the room in sun all afternoon. The sunlight is problematic both because it heats the floor and causes expansion, and because it can cause discoloration. I have a friend who put white vinyl in her kitchen, and 2 years later she has a horrible yellow swath across the room from where the sunlight from the west facing window falls.

But more seriously, it really limits what you can do with the room going forward. Apparently you're not supposed to put permanent fixtures (like a vanity or pedestal sink) on top of this sort of flooring system, because the floor needs to be able to expand and contract with changes in heat and humidity. And since there's a real likelihood that the sink will need to be replaced sooner rather than later... well, I just didn't want to limit myself in that way.

So... ceramic tile it is! You know what they say... in for a penny, in for a pound!

And that's meant that I've had to immerse myself in researching underlayments, and tile, and mortar, and grout. Holy Moly! Who knew there were so many variables?

But after looking at quite literally thousands of different options, I've finally decided on a charcoal colored porcelain tile that gets rave reviews, should look great, and will leave many different doors open for whatever direction I decide to go with the rest of the room down the line.

And... the nice fellows at Lowes will cut the stuff for me as long as I can provide measurements!

So now I just have to work the puzzle and do a lot of math - oh... and pull the toilet... and then actually lay the tile... Oy! Wish me luck!

So tell me, have you ever gotten yourself in slightly over your head with a DIY home improvement project? I'd love to think I'm not the only one....