Why does nobody talk about the carpet glue disaster at the old theater in Tacoma?

I was working a job at this old movie house in Tacoma last fall, pulling up the original carpet in the lobby. The spec sheet said to use a standard adhesive, but the subfloor was this weird, oily concrete that had been sealed like 50 years ago. We went ahead and glued down the new pad anyway. Came back the next day and the whole thing had just... slid. Like a two-inch shift across a 400 square foot area. The project manager said we lost a full day and about $800 in materials. Now I always do a moisture and adhesion test on old commercial concrete, no matter what the paperwork says. Anyone else run into a subfloor that just straight up rejected glue?

3 comments

3 Comments

paige_wells442mo ago

My uncle's kitchen tile did that on a slab from the 60s... just a slow creep over a year until the grout lines didn't match up. It feels like a lot of old building materials just have a life of their own and modern stuff doesn't always stick, literally. You see it with paint peeling off old plaster too.

brian_murray2mo ago

Old houses really do have their own stubborn personalities, don't they?

jason_fisher49d ago

My 1870s place has a pantry floor that dips like 2 inches in the middle, and I keep thinking it's finally gonna give out, but it's been like that for 10 years now. I mean, is it really that serious or is it just old wood doing old wood things? Maybe your uncle's tile just settled a bit, not like the house is actively fighting him or anything.