Hotel carpet tear-out in Phoenix made me change my blade game

Last month I got a call to rip out a 300-room hotel hall carpet in Phoenix. The stuff was glued straight to concrete with that nasty black adhesive. I was burning through blades like crazy, stopping to swap every 15 minutes. Finally an old guy on the crew handed me a carbide-tipped blade and told me to slow down. That thing lasted 3 times longer and cut cleaner through the backing. Now I carry two knives, one with carbide for glue jobs and one with standard for normal residential. Anyone else use different blades for commercial tear-outs or am I just late to this party?

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christopher_ross2d ago

Learned that same lesson on a school job a few years back. Carbide is the only way to go when that glue has baked into the concrete for years. Now I keep a spare knife loaded just for those nasty black adhesive jobs.