HImage - Attic linoleum flooring

[Mike Lamb]

I wish I started an album of all the cool and bizarre flooring that I see in old attics. This was good one.

[Bill Kibbel]

I've seen a fair amount of linoleum, but never anything like this. 

[Chad Fabry]

That's really cool. I would have loved that floor as a kid. It's game-ready.

 

[hausdok]

Judging by the uniforms worn by the football players, that's a really old piece of linoleum. If I were the owner, I'd take it up and see how many complete pattern pieces I could get from it and then I'd cut those out, frame them, sell them at an antique auction and keep one or two in good condition until I reached a ripe old age and then I'd sell those at an antique auction. What that could go for in some circles might amaze them.

[John Kogel]

Good luck finding a buyer that isn't freaked out by asbestos. 😟

[Jim Katen]

I had something similar in my room when I was very small. It was from a later period - the '50s, with a cowboys & indians motif. Haven't thought about it in decades. 

[hausdok]

On 5/27/2024 at 10:20 AM, John Kogel said:

Good luck finding a buyer that isn't freaked out by asbestos. 😟

Once it's encapsulated in a coat of clear lacquer or epoxy, asbestos can't harm one. I think the fears of a lot of stuff are overblown. Some people are affected, and others are not. I'm a non-smoker, but I've seen some heavy smokers outlive many non-smokers. It's the same with asbestos. There used to be about 3000 building products that contained asbestos. My dad started me working for him when I was maybe 7 or 8. My mom took a job at the post office, and somebody had to watch me when I wasn't at school and on the weekends. They couldn't afford a babysitter, so my father would take me to the construction site. He was a builder. He'd put me to work with a broom sweeping up while he worked. There was always a lot of dust from stuff that is no longer made, or made with different stuff now, that contained asbestos. I'd get home and my mother would toss me into the tub because I'd be coated with it. It would be crusted in my nose snot even. You'd think that with all of the asbestos he and I were exposed to, he or I, or one of the men who'd worked for him, would have had mesothelioma but never did. I once asked him about that when he was in his seventies. He just shrugged and said, "I guess it affects some and others tolerate it." So, that's why I think the fears are justified but way overblown.

[Mike Lamb]

Are there any credible cases of asbestosis other that those who worked around the stuff?

[Bill Kibbel]

I've been tryin to post a reply for 3 days. Thought I was blocked.

I don't know about asbestosis, but with mesothelioma, a vast majority of cases are from workplace exposure. There are statistics however, of cases from non-occupational exposures and there have been many studies from those stats.  I think the problem is there is no way to accurately separate causes between in-home exposure to ACMs and outdoor environmental exposure.  I'm sure there's plenty of airborne asbestos still being released everywhere from the friction wear of vehicle brakes and clutches.

According to answers given by medical folks, It doesn't require a large amount of asbestos fibers to start the chain reaction that can lead to lung cancer, particularly for people that are genetically vulnerable.

[hausdok]

Same here, Bill. I wanted to respond days ago but couldn't.

I don't know much about any studies - mostly because I've never bothered to read any. The stuff is in our environment and there's little we can do about that. Like Bill said, it was used in brakes for more than a hundred years I believe. The dust is along every highway and street in the world. Here in Washington State, there is naturally weather-exposed asbestos north of Everett around Arlington or Mt. Vernon, I think. Every couple of years there is something in the news about the fears that residents of that area have. During the time I was inspecting, I'd frequently, when I inspected older homes with forced warm air heat, I'd discover old frayed asbestos tape sealing the inside of ducts. People had lived in those homes for decades and who knows how long that tape had been frayed exposing them to microscopic particles as those pieces of tape would flop around in the airstream. If numerous persons that had lived in those old homes had come down sick from exposure to that kind of frayed tape, or the vermiculite that filled their ceiling joist bays in the attic, one would think the cause had been traced and everyone would be outraged. There were news stories back when the old Seattle Post Intelligencer did a series of "expose's" on how there were so many homes around here with vermiculite in the walls and ceilings, but no big revelation of thousands, or hundreds, or even dozens of deaths. I've come to believe that I've more chance of dying from a snakebite than I do from something asbestos related.

But my point is simple. No matter what it is, different people have different reactions to the same thing. I was a professional mechanic for 7 years before I was in the service before I became a home inspector and I couldn't tell you how many brake jobs I did, or co-workers did, where we'd blow out the backing plates of a wheel and the air in the shop would for a few minutes thickly cloud up with the asbestos dust and everyone breathed it - we didn't wear masks in those days because asbestos back then wasn't an issue. We'd even done that at the trade school where I trained to be a mechanic. Nobody even gave it a second thought. Hell, I don't know, maybe if I were to reach out to mechanics I'd worked with in various shops I might find that some of them came down with mesothelioma, but I think there is a strong chance that, if they haven't died of old age, that most of them are fine.

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

[John Kogel]

Right, Our house had old scuffed lino on the floor and loose vermicky in the attic. My Dad died from smoking, but my sis still lives there, having renovated in about 1984.

Like you, Mike, I hung out in a gas station and would drop brake drums on the floor to knocj the black dust off them.

But that changes nothing for the home owners of today. They simply don't want it in their homes, and I agree, why expose your grandkids to asbestos needles in the air if you can avoid it?

Still you could easily recreate those wonderful flooring pictures and sell posters. Mike Lamb would be happy to accept royalties for the use of his any of his pics I'm sure.😁.