Help with Mastic/white dust on concrete

[jstucky]

Have a pain in the butt customer. They had VCT ripped out that had asbestos in it. Concrete now has white dust. He said it was from glue/mastic.

He would like the dust off the floor.

I have a hunch this might not be as easy as vacuuming it off as he wants me to do??


What to do oh what to do???

 

[juniorc82]

Refer it to another firm or decline the job. Because the word asbestos is now associated with this job you are opening yourself up for a liability blow. We have stripped and waxed asbestos tile many times but once you break it and it turns to dust and is airbourne that's where the problem lies. If the customer can prove that it was professionaly cleaned up before you got there I would do it but if they did it themselves I would pass. If for some crazy reason something where to happen the customer will certainly pass the blame to you as the professional who was hired to clean up and if you aint trained for that sort of thing it could cause problems.

 

[Desk Jockey]

Jon is correct. Once friable you'll need an abatement company. They will contain and use HEPA vaccums to capture the dust.

You will open yourself up for severe fines messing with asbestos. I'd run!

 

[jstucky]

He had a special mold/asbestos company take it all out. $1300 to take out about 500 sq ft of VCT. He said they had tubes/hoses running outside and took and hauled it off to special landfill.


So would vacuuming it with HEPA vac even take it all up or would it need to be sanded or somehow cleaned off???

 

[Desk Jockey]

Those tubes were ducting the exhaust air out after it passes through a neg air machine that traps the asbestos particles in its HEPA filter. That way the exhaust air is safe and on just contaminated air.

If it's the dust (non asbestos) is stuck to the glue I would think you could remove it with an adhesive remover and keep from sanding.

If it can be removed by vacuuming I'd still use a HEPA. The HEPA traps dust particles down to .3 microns so it's as efficient as you're capable of, 99.97%. Even drywall dust can be spread through the motor exhaust of a wet/dry vac because the particles are so small.

We often clean up after homeowners that vacuumed out their fireplace only to find out the wet/dry vac just redeposited the soot throughout their home through the vac motor exhaust.