Thermoplastic tiles and wood

I am going to glue down some solid wood strip flooring using Rewmar MS adhesive.

My floor is concrete most of which is covered with 1970s black thermoplastic tiles. These are surprisingly level and well stuck down on top of a bituminous adhesive.

I e-mailed Rewmar and they say that their adhesive can be used directly on top of these tiles.

That's all very well but can anyone tell me if it's true in the real world?

(It will be a big job to lift all of the tiles and possibly mean re-screeding the ground floor- can I avoid it?)

There is no way they have told you that you can lay on top of these! If they have said this, then you have spoken to someone who is not on the tech side of there company!
they have to be taken up and then a water based or acrylic compound needs to be layed. In fact ring them back up and ask them the same question again and if they answer the same again, then tell them that you have spoken to Matt Bourne and he asked if they would like to go on a trainning course! I just re read your post and have seen they emailed you? Can you foward the email to me?

Honestly they did. I haven't kept the mail- I got it a few weeks ago- but I only asked them the one specific question and got just the one answer.

I don't know who it was that answered tho'.

If I remove them am I going to rip up the concrete with it?

If they are on a black glue (bitumin) they will come up really easy. You need a VERY sharp heavy scrapper. A blunt one will be hard work! I uplift these all day long and a room 3x3 meters will take me 15 mins with a sharp scrapper. Next you need to lay smoothing compound. Has to be water based or acrylic if you are glueing to it! You should remove all glue by shot blasting etc. ( just remove any lose or thick adhsive, and i didn't say that ) Next prime with the correct primer ( 131 if balls product, pe360 if uzin etc etc) Read the sticky topics at the top for more info.

Alternative, only if your strip flooring boards are wider than 100mm and there are many longer lengths (from 1.2 meter on) install the floor floating, glueing all the T&G's properly.

You have to install a combi-underlayment first over the tiles to prevent sweating of the tiles effecting the wood.