Removing black tar from floorboards

alexalexalex

We're trying to restore the floorboards in several rooms and they all have this horrible black tar like stuff around the edges of the room. It sticks out about 2 feet or so from the walls in most places so there's a fair amount of it and so far it's proving to be a real pain in the **** to get off :mad:

We've tried using Nitramors on it then scraping and sanding it off and have moved onto using caustic soda and water to try and dissolve it before sanding but neither has really been massively effective and when we try and sand afterwards the sanding discs are just getting clogged up really quickly with the tar stuff

Has anyone got any experience or suggestions on how to get rid of the tar? whenever we start sanding it just seems to melt and get spread around and clog the sanding discs :mad:

any tips would be great :beer:

justjohn

petrol dissolves tar ...other thinners may work. however it may soak into wood

scrape the worst of first

BargainGalore

I wonder if a heat gun would soften it and then scrap surplus with a scraper. Like said petrol, turps would clear some of it but I dont think you might get it all off with that expecially it has soaked in

justjohn

BargainGalore wrote: »

I wonder if a heat gun would soften it and then scrap surplus with a scraper. Like said petrol, turps would clear some of it but I dont think you might get it all off with that expecially it has soaked in

just don't use a heat gun and thinners lol

DVardysShadow

Neither nitromors not caustic soda is likely to touch bitumen.

First go is a good sharp scraper and a heat gun - not a blow torch - to remove the bulk. The use paraffin diesel or white spirit to remove the rest. Obviously keep the room well ventilated.

Petrol is too light and just vapourises back out, leaving fumes going all over the place. White spirit diesel and paraffin don't vapourise out so quickly, so you can work it for longer.

However, it will take quite some time to dry out to the state where you can sand it

BargainGalore

True common sense but worth repeating didnt mean it in that order

justjohn wrote: »

just don't use a heat gun and thinners lol

dodders

I had a restoration job on a parquay floor and and loose blocks had old bitumen on them.
I just used a stanley knife blades in a holder and scraped them off,just took time and elbow grease.

Jaynne

What type of sander are you using? When we hired a giant floor sander it went through our nasty black border with ease. It clogged up a bit faster but was ok however I don't think it was quite as sticky as you're describing.

alexalexalex

Thanks for the suggestions, i had considered a heat gun (I'm assuming the paint removing type?) but was worried about scorching the floor boards

I'll give white spirit or similar a try and see if that helps

Jaynne wrote:

What type of sander are you using? When we hired a giant floor sander it went through our nasty black border with ease. It clogged up a bit faster but was ok however I don't think it was quite as sticky as you're describing

We had a big floor sander and now had an edger. The big one did go through the stuff but took a few goes and the black stuff just melts and sticks to the sheet and starts smearing and staining other tiles. I was just going to get the big sander again and power through it all but wanted to see if there was a better way of going about it that wouldn't involve going through 1,726,874 sander sheets!!

abwsco

The second bedroom in our house had the black tar all over it:eek: Felt like we did use 1,726,874 sander sheets to get it off lol We live in the builders house and have no idea why they chose to do that. Think if that had been the first room we'd done we wouldn't have done anymore as it took so blooming long to get it all off.

fluffpot

I had this in my old flat. Rather than using a zillion sheets and getting my arms wrenched off, I decided to paint the edge black to give the floor a border. It actually looked pretty smart. I did the skirting in a dark red though, not sure if it would work with white....