I have a customer that has a moisture problem with a 3/4 in oak fllor put down on 3/4 inch plywood that is glued and nailed onto the concrete floor in the basement. He wants it pulled up and tiled. How can I get this ready for tile? Better said.... how do I plan on getting up this plywood that has beed glued??

Well, your gonna need to put a few grunts on the job for this one, I think.
Remove the the hardwood conventiaonally, assuming it was nailed down. Pull it from from the end poiint of the installation, in reverse to the way it was laid. Crowbars, claw hammers, etc. You can cut across the floor about every 3 feet with a skil saw set to 3/4 inch cutting depth to make it more managable.

Same with the plywood. Using your skil saw, cut the plywood into small squares, (say 2 ft. by 2 ft.) and use a long pry bar with grunt labour attached to the end.

Do you know what kind of glue you are dealing with? It may be possible to slurry an appropriate solvent down between the squares you have formed to loosen off the glue. I have heard of this being done but never attempted it myself.

Yep, circular saw,some prybars, and an angle grinder with a metal cut off disk, for those stubborn anchors.

I have another idea on this... This guy wants me to install tile after i remove the hardwood. He wants the hardwood and the glued down plywood gone. I was thinking that I could just remove the hardwood and then put hardibacker over the glued down plywood and then just tile it. He is afraid that because of the cupping of the hardwood, his moisture level is just too high to leave the plywood and it will effect the tile. I think it would be fine with the cement underlayment first....any feedback on that idea? It would save alot of money, as he would not have to pay me for the task of taking up 1500 square feet of glued down plywood. BUT,,, we do want to do it 100% the right way..

If he has a moisture problem you will just be trapping it under the backer board. This could result in mold, and or rot in the future.

Plywood is made of wood. If you lock it from being able to breathe with your cement and tile, and it picks up moisture from the concrete under, man are you gonna be facing disaster.

Well,, it looks like we better just take the whole thing right down to the concrete and then tile it. No wood in the mix! WOW.... that is gonna be a job taking that glued down plywood up!

Ya, you don't want to make a plywood sandwich, with concrete bread.

That is a sure case of rot waiting to happen.

Thats funny!