1 post tagged “asbestos”
For a bit of a background for those not on LJ--Saturday we tackled scraping the popcorn ceiling out of our bathroom. Sunday, we found out, quite accidentally, that there was a possibility of asbestos being in the mixture. 1979--they asked most places to quit using asbestos but didn't require lots of materials ALREADY MADE to be destroyed. Our home was built in 1982 (or 1984, we aren't sure which, as we've seen various dates on various things). There's a chance it does have asbestos--a chance it doesn't. I honestly do not know what to do at this point. The bathroom is closed, the hallway has been vacuumed. The guys at work either A. Didn't KNOW the popcorn ceilings *could* contain asbestos or B. Think that since my house was built in 1982-1984 (ish), there isn't much chance that there is asbestos in the stuff. I really just want to clean up my damn bathroom, tape the drywall at the joints, mud the ceiling, and prime and pain the damn thing and then let it be done and over with. I've called THREE different companies in town. All three don't deal with anything other than commercial stuff and none of them think anyone in town does. DHEC told me to call someone (well, someone I know at DHEC sent me to an area of their website which had listings)...that someone at the other company told me to call DHEC. DHEC (phone person, not web) told me to call some random contractors (as they couldn't officially give out a list) and those contractors had no clue. I finally got one guy who said I can call their lab in Charlotte and perhaps send a sample. He also said there's a very low low chance that their is actually asbestos in my house in the popcorn. And, for those of you freaking out about the popcorn ceilings themselves, it's only when it is airborne--like if I scraped the hell out of it without wetting it--IF there were asbestos in there to begin with. What I'm hearing is a lot of "I don't know," "We can't do it," and "Don't worry about it, lady." So. I'm going to go home and fucking clean up the bathroom. I may tape and mud tonight (which means I have to run by Lowe's). I'm going to prime and paint the bastard tomorrow night and then at some point next week, we'll paint the gorram bathroom and have it over with. Will we scrape the rest of the house? Probably. And, we'll wear long sleeves and a mask this time. If it is asbestos, I'm just going to cross my damn fingers and wet it down like mad so that it doesn't go airborne. No one else seems to care or worry about it. And, tomorrow, I may step out in front of a bus. Such is life. If the smoking doesn't kill me later in life (yes, I quit, but I did smoke for years), then I guess the possible, maybe, could be, probably won't be asbestos might. Who knows. I'm not planning on rolling around in the stuff, regardless.
