Yes, you can install any form of carpet tile using Ultrabond ECO 379.
There are a few great reasons why applying a flooring adhesive with a paint roller is a good idea. The first, and probably the most obvious, is that you get to apply the flooring adhesive from a standing position. It's no longer necessary to crawl across the floor on your hands and knees when you can stand up and apply using a roller. Another advantage is that your coverage will increase on a per-gallon basis. Roller-applied adhesives typically are applied rather thinly, which extends the coverage by as much as 50% – a real savings on a per-square-foot basis. Yet another advantage to applying adhesive with a roller is that the drying time is much faster than with traditional trowel applications. Being that it is applied in a thin coat, the adhesive flashes off quickly, allowing for flooring installation much faster than with traditional methods.
Before applying adhesive with a roller, it is crucial to ensure that the substrate is extremely clean. When you are standing to apply the adhesive with a roller, you may not see grains of dirt or other debris that you might otherwise have noticed with a trowel application. It is always a good idea to vacuum the floor with a high-quality vacuum system before application. In addition, make sure that your floor is flat (as opposed to smooth). Roller-applied adhesives go down very thinly, so any substrate defect left on the floor is probably going to show through. We recommend using a MAPEI self-leveling compound before installing Ultrabond ECO 379 to ensure a flat, porous substrate on which to work.
Open time, sometimes called flash time, describes the amount of time that you want the freshly troweled adhesive to remain open to the elements before you start installing floor covering. There is a good reason why open time needs to be followed: Many water-based adhesives need a little time to start evaporating and letting some of the water out before you start installing flooring. Moisture-curing adhesives need to be exposed to atmospheric humidity to get the reaction started. Again, if you start installing before allowing for the recommended open or flash time, you run the risk of a delayed curing time, which can lead to placement problems and long-term performance issues.
Oriented strand board (OSB) is a problem for resilient and wood flooring installations because of the nature of its construction. Traditional OSB is made from large chips of wood that will swell when exposed to humidity and moisture, causing the texture of the chip structure to show through on resilient floors. According to the Engineered Wood Association, OSB is only suitable as a substrate for stretch-in carpet, which isolates the texture of the OSB from the flooring with a layer of carpet pad. The association goes on to recommend applying a 1/4" (6 mm) layer of underlayment over the OSB for installation of resilient and wood flooring. The main thing to remember about traditional OSB is that it is very absorptive and swells when exposed to moisture (such as rain). This swelling is not good for floor installation. Having said that, there are new OSB products out there that are “engineered” materials, making them different from traditional chip/strand OSB. Some of these new engineered OSB boards have much better moisture resistance and can handle water contact without a change in dimensional properties.
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