I am considering replacing my old beat up, poorly patched parquet floor with either 3/4" hardwood strips or engineered flooring. The parquet is an odd size that I can't match with anything currently available. It is fastened with a black mastic. The floor is on the upper level of a traditional ugly raised ranch style house. My question is this. If I rip up the old parquet, do I have to remove the remaining mastic to get a good surface to put down the new floor? If so, am I asking for the second biggest headache of my life. (The biggest was a natural stone retaining wall that I just finished).

I am wondering the same thing...I got most of the Tar like black stuff up but there is still some very tenacious stuff sticking to the concrete. I am planning on replacing the Parquet with Bamboo. It will be glued down. Appreciate in advance any help on this one. Thanks, Dan

Hold on ... How long has the stuff been down? There could be asbestos in that adhesive.

regardless of the asbestos concern. There is a product manufactured by Sentinel 747 that will take up old cutback adhesive. With no problem about creating an airborne asbestos problem.

www.senpro.com/retail/adhesive

spray it on with a spray it on and dampen the entire surface but do not saturate. This will soften the adhesive and will be able to scrape up the deeper portions into balls of cutback adhesive. Then saturate the floor with the adhesive remover and the remaining adhesive will completely dissolve. This can be absorbed by using either a bale of shavings obtains from your local co-op or any wood stove pellet fuel. Pre moisten to break the pellets up. This can be used to absorb the adhesive remover and clean the floor of all adhesive residue.

Thank you I will find some and try it... I take it that I should start with bare concrete to install the new flooring. Will the adhesive not adhere to the old remaining stuff? Thanks

These maybe two different scenarios. The first guy, Dave, sounds as if his floor is a raised wood subfloor. So, IMO, I'd remove the parquet if it can be removed and install 3/8" minimum plywood over the mastic to smooth out the substrate to allow for gluing or nailing a floor down. If the parquet cannot be successfully removed, then go over it with more plywood or if it is well adhered, you can nail into it and through it. The second guy, Dan, is over concrete and that is a separate matter. If he is intending to glue bamboo directly to the slab, he will need to get that slab very clean. OR, float a new subfloor over the slab.

Thanks Gary for pointing out the differences between these two projects.

I missed that. I have never used the sentinel product over wood and don't think it would work well there. I agree with Gary's assesment of the wood application.

The process I described should get your concrete floor very clean. Also using a razor scrapper for the initial softening and scrapping into adhesive balls will really get a lot up.

After using the sentiel product. I have used a professional floor cleaner/stripper solution to scrub the floor clean and then mopped to completely remove all residues. Some cases I have used a floor leveling compound like ardex feather finish to skim coat the floor.