Breaking out old ceramic tile in a Tacoma kitchen without filling the house with silica dust

Tile, thinset and grout break into sharp pieces and very fine dust. You can sweep up the pieces. The dust floats, works its way through the furnace and settles on everything for weeks if you let it. Whether your Tacoma kitchen has 1990s tile over plywood in a South Tacoma rambler or a much older floor in a North End house, the point of this guide is the same: do the job so that the dust stays in one sealed room and out of your lungs.

Before you touch it

1. See what is under the tile. Look at a floor register, a transition or a loose tile. Grey or white thinset over plywood or cement board is what you hope to find. Old vinyl or black adhesive in a house from before about 1980 means stop, because that material can contain asbestos.
2. Sort out the asbestos question. Pierce County is in the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency's area, and the agency says to survey before renovation. An owner living in a single-family home may do their own survey; almost everyone else needs an AHERA-certified inspector. Landlords, read our guide to removing glued-down plank from a rental first.
3. Think about lead. Some glazes, on older or imported tile especially, can contain lead. If your tile is decades old, have a lab test a chip before you break up the whole floor.
4. Ask whether it has to come out. See the question above about floating over it, and check the height at your doors and appliances.
5. Look for a mortar bed. In some older houses, tile sits on an inch or more of mortar over wire lath. That is heavy, slow demolition, so it goes on the call list below.
6. Clear the house. Keep children, anyone pregnant, anyone with asthma and pets away until cleanup is done.
7. Plan for the weight. A 150-square-foot floor with thinset can easily come to several hundred pounds. Check what your truck can carry.

The dust plan

This is the part people skip, and it is most of the job.

• Seal the room. Tape 6-mil plastic over doorways and open shelving, with a zipper door where you need to walk through. Cover the cabinets.
• Turn off the furnace, and tape over every register and return in the room. A running blower spreads the dust through the whole house.
• Pull air out, not in. Set a box fan in a window blowing outward, seal around it, and keep the other windows in the room closed. Make sure it is not blowing at a neighbor's open window.
• Keep it damp. Mist the tile and the chisel point with a pump sprayer as you go. Washington L&I's silica rule for workplaces is a useful benchmark: handheld chipping tools indoors call for a continuous water spray or a shroud with dust collection, plus a respirator. It does not bind a homeowner, but the dust is the same. Over plywood or OSB, mist rather than flood, because wood swells.
• Vacuum only with a HEPA filter. A regular shop vacuum blows the finest dust straight out of the exhaust. Never dry-sweep.
• Wear the gear: respirator, sealed goggles, ear protection, knee pads, heavy gloves, long sleeves and boots. Tile shards are sharp and fly hard.
• Leave the dust behind. Change clothes at the door and wash them separately.

Step by step

1. Shut off and pull out what is in the way: the dishwasher, the refrigerator and its water line, and the shoe molding or baseboard.
2. Find a starting point. Begin at a loose tile or a doorway. If there is none, mist a grout line and break one tile with a hammer and cold chisel.
3. Work at a low angle. Drive a wide floor chisel almost flat under the next tile, so it lifts rather than shatters. Mist as you go and work in rows.
4. Bring in power only if you have to. A rotary hammer with a chisel bit on its lowest setting is faster, but also dustier. Use one with a shroud and HEPA vacuum, or keep a helper spraying the point.
5. Bucket as you go. Fill 5-gallon buckets about half full so you can lift them. Thin bags tear on the first sharp edge.
6. Deal with the backer. Cement board comes up easier after you back out or cut its screws. Lift it with a pry bar and score it rather than sawing it. Plywood that peels or tears with the thinset will probably need replacing.
7. Scrape the thinset while it is damp with a long-handled floor scraper. Leave the grinder for last, and only with a shroud and HEPA vacuum.
8. Clean top down. Let the dust settle for an hour, HEPA-vacuum the walls and counters, then mop the floor twice with clean water. Fold the plastic inward and bag it. Keep the furnace off until the room is clean, and then put in a new filter.
9. Check what you have. Use a straightedge for flatness and look for soft spots and old leaks. Then read moisture testing before flooring.

Disposal in Pierce County

Tile is heavy, and disposal is often priced by weight, so get the rules and rate before you load.

• Tacoma. The city's Recovery and Transfer Center is at 3510 S. Mullen St., with self-haul listed daily from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.; call (253) 502-2100 to confirm hours, fees and whether your load is accepted. The city's construction waste page says the transfer station cannot recycle this material and points builders to salvage and recycling companies, which require it to be separated. Clean tile and concrete may cost less there.
• Elsewhere in Pierce County. The county's transfer station page lists locations and what each one takes.
• Asbestos. Suspect material does not go in with the rest. Follow the agency's disposal rules or have an abatement contractor handle it.

Tie down and cover the load before you get on I-5 or Highway 16.

What it costs

These are typical Tacoma and Pierce County ranges for planning. They vary with the room, what is under the tile and current disposal fees, and the written quote after a measure is the real number.

The flooring installation cost guide for Tacoma puts these next to product and prep costs.

When to call a professional

Hand it over when:

• Old vinyl or black mastic turns up under the tile, and no survey has cleared it.
• The tile sits on a thick mortar bed with wire lath.
• The thinset is bonded to a slab and needs grinding indoors.
• You cannot seal the room, as in an open-plan main floor, or someone in the house has asthma or a heart or lung condition.
• The subfloor is soft, wet or stained under the tile. That is a repair, and the cause gets fixed first.

Floor removal and haul-away covers what an installer does: tile broken out with dust control, thinset ground off, disposal and a moisture check. Vinyl plank in Tacoma covers what goes down next. Installers work across Tacoma and Pierce County; call (425) 842-3483, or text (844) 543-5757, to book a measure.