Is this asbestos?

[vampyr]

Untitled

• vampyr
• 24 Oct 2014
• 1

Hello,

I was hoping someone could give me some advice on sonething that I discovered in my house. I have recently had some asbestos insulation board professionally removed inside an old structure in my living room that was a gas cupboard. This has now been removed but above the area there was an old heat flue which had some cement in between the beams to hold it in place.

I removed this cement but noticed that there was a strange flaky substance contained within. The substance is brittle and when I push my fingernail into it, breaks off into little flakes as it is soft. The top layers are shiny gold like and underneath it isa creamy white colour. Please see the link at the top of the page.

I've ready that it could be vermiculite or mica and I understand that vermiculite may contain asbestos. I didn't realise the cement had this in until I tidied it up and took it outside. I used a disc cutter to remove it but was wearing an FP3F rated mask at the time.

Any help wouldbevery much appreciated.

Thanks,

V

 

[ree]

I dont know what it is. Why are you disturbing the old flue?

 

[vampyr]

I recently purchased a house with an old gas cupboard which is now obsolete due to a newer central heating system being installed. The gas has been completely disconnected and the structure in the living room was removed to create more space.

The old flue (which is now unused) was lying below the ceiling level and so in order for me to have new ceiling board put in place, the flue had to be cut shorter in order to do this. There was no other way.

The picture in my original post shows a small sample of the cement that was in effect, holding the flue in place and as this was quite loose I decided to remove it all as I didn't want to risk a big lump of concrete falling through the ceiling potentially.

 

[ree]

Fair enough. Perhaps, if you now have a boarded ceiling then leave well alone?