Around here most 1950's houses had plaster on the ceilings. If they had popcorn, it was usually put on later in a remodel.
I hired a Drywall company to remove the popcorn on my 1978 house. They covered the floors, sprayed water on it with a lawn sprayer a couple times, waited a bit, and scraped the ceiling clean with mostly one swipe. No dust. Then they bagged it and took it away to the recycle place. Two or three guys were done in less than a day 2300 sq ft house.
Of course this would not work on popcorn ceilings that have been painted.
Rick Potter
DIY journeyman,
FWW wannabe.
AKA Village Idiot.
If never painted I would cover the floor. Wet the ceiling with a pump sprayer a section at a time and scrape it off. Roll all of it up in black trash bags and dispose of one at a time. I wouldn't test, sometimes the less known the better. As long as it is not friable you are fine. Be honest and check/report you will pay thousands to have a special crew in hazmat suites do the same thing. I swear that they take to the same land fill anyway.
The house next door that was recently demolished had an asbestos coating on the plaster of the "newer" addition. All that plaster had to be removed, double bagged and disposed of in a dedicated dumpster. 4 rooms and that disposal cost nearly $15K...including the PPE.
So I'd personally leave that ceiling in place and cover it with a new ceiling on furring strips to encapsulate it.
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The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...
I didn't use furring strips. I found the ceiling joists on the edge of the room, marked the beaded board plywood before putting it up. Used 2" staples. Put MDF 6" wide boards across joints, caulked it, and spray painted it. No mess from the popcorn. No sheetrock mud to need finishing, and looks much better than any sheetrock anyway.
Even if you get popcorn off, the sheetrock is most likely less than ideally finished, so will need work. Also, if like mine it has ever gotten wet, it's going to be ruined.
I have four bedrooms left to do in that house, but we decided they were good enough to get through this Summer rental season. I hope I can get more than one Summer out of them. At least there was no water damage on any of them.
Any cottage cheese coating applied after 1978 is OK, but prior raises big red flags. That product is ugly but it did serve the purpose of covering up defects like uneven ceilings.
I got the results back from the lab - the sample I sent in is 4% asbestos.
The sample was mostly drywall mud, so the popcorn itself is quite a bit higher than 4%.
Thanks for all the advice.