I have a realy small bath that has ceramic tile on the floor and I want to put linoleum over it. It is only temp. (a year or so). To make a long story short out side the bath is linoleum (that I will be matching). Eventually I will be tiling the hole kitchen pantry and hallway which leads into bath. But for now I just want to do the linoleum thing. Can I skim out some leveling compound or something and then lay the linoleum? Or do I have to put 1/4″ sub down? Would rather not ahve to put sub floor down as it would be to high for what I have now. So basically what should i do over the ceramic to make it acceptable for the linoleum?
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Rip it out
I'm with CAG.
Linoleum telegraphs any imperfections in the substructure like soft plastic. Adding an underlayment is out, because nailing it down through tile is not recommended for several very good reasons, such as destroying the tile, which creates instability in the subfloor, which means squeaks, linoleum cracking, etc. etc., (and underlayment needs to be nailed down.) And putting the underlayment down with just adhesive won't work well because of the tile issue as well; the chances for a good bond are slim.
You could go to all the trouble of placing a leveler on the tile, but by the time you level the floor, you could have ripped out the tile.
Or, you can wait for a year and do the whole project at the same time and get a seamless transition from one room to the next. Or do a section at a time, but do it right the first time. If you try to place the linoleum over the tile, you will eventually have to redo it. So why do a job more than once?
If you feel like you honestly can't live with it the way it is and don't want to rip out the tile, try Henry 547 universal underlayment. They advertise as bonding to ceramic.
But it's not what I would recommend.