You can go here   epa.gov/lead to know what you need to know.    Other than that homeowners are not required to follow RRP rules.   If you want to be safe anyway just follow the general guidelines here (skip to page 13)  http://epa.gov/lead/pubs/sbcomplianceguide.pdf  

Keep kids and pets out of the area.   If you need more details, then describe your project and I'll do my best to help you with the RRP.   I'm sure there are others here that can help too.


Oh and asbestos is an entirely different animal no to be related or confused with lead paint and RRP work.    Don't fool with asbestos.  Let the pro's do the abatement.     

Thank you for the advice!  I'm not too enthused about dealing with the asbestos, but the lead seems more manageable.  Much appreciated! 

Update:

I found a list that shows Asbestos fibers as being  0.7 - 90 microns, so theoretically a sealed HEPA vac (Which the new CT's evidently are) should work well.

Yet, several websites warn that HEPA vacs are not sufficient. They don't go into details.   Are they just being absurdly over-cautious?

Festool sell a vac that they claim contains asbestos.

Haven't read up on it but remember seeing it when I was buying y CT26.

http://www.festool.co.uk/Products/Pages/Product-Detail.aspx?pid=584139&name=Special-application-mobile-dust-extractor-CLEANTEX-CTH-26-E-a

To be honest, it's a specialist job for a reason!
What price would you put on your health. You're a long time dead!!!

Thanks, I have seen that site, and many others.  The ones that site shows are exactly what I have (they are brown on the inside, and asbestos can be white-ish, brown, or blue.)  Also, a contractor who has had other tiles tested said these look identical to known bad ones.

Regardless, why take a chance. Heck, I don't want to inhale cellulose fibers, either!
-------------------------------------------

Hoping for the official word from Festool.

I'm VERY curious about the Ct 26 E/ a that Umbro linked. 
It says: "Approved for dust category H and asbestos dust." - and: "For wood dust and dust with MAC values < 0.1 mg/m³ "
Plus they sell a special bag for it, # FIS-CTH.

Is this an older model, made redundant by the new filters?

Is it current, but only available in the UK? If so, can my new USA CT36 be modified to become this model?

The USA Federal EPA rules are a minimum. Individual States, Counties and Cities can and often do, make stricter rules.

Therefore, before doing your own lead removal, check with your local building inspectors and public health department.

When the time comes to sell your home, the fact you did your own lead removal could well be something you need to disclose to the buyer. This is a function of the real estate laws of your state.

Please consider the potential future liability before deciding to do your own lead removal.

As Tom Gensmer said, the correct method of remediation includes DEDICATED tools.  The CT's sold in the United States have not been certified for asbestos work.  That does not mean they aren't a good choice, but everything connected to the CT will have asbestos fibers within it.  The potential for a cross contamination or release is there.

As Carroll Adams said, check with your local authorities before shooting yourself in the foot (figuratively, because literally aint good either!).  Proper legal disposal is usually the toughest part for the homeowner.

Each building and safety and/or health department could well have individual rules for lead and asbestos work.

My suggestion is that these are not practical DIY projects, largely because of future liability.

So, if FOG members want to have the lead removal experience, how about making friends with a certified contractor and joining a crew for a few days. Who knows, working with lead might turn out to be your personal bliss. In which case take all the needed classes, obtain the several required licenses and have at it. Same goes for learning to remove asbestos.

It is no secret I consider the money and time I spent participating in the 2011 Festool Solid Surface class instructed by Steve Bace to be an outstanding investment. By the third hour of working with solid surface material I realized doing so was far from my bliss. Knowing this has made my relationships with the many solid surface contractors I meet each year far better.

During my career I managed many projects which started out with asbestos removal. Despite using the best available contractors those jobs always ran longer than planned and cost far above the original budget. Just one case was a multi-story commercial building containing a late 1920s palace-size movie theater. The original budget was for 3 weeks at a cost of about USA$900,000. Before we finished removing the asbestos so we could deal with lead and everything else, we spent USA$18 million over 22 months. I was horrified, but the various inspectors kept telling me we actually lucked out.

At least a few years later, when my former employer sold that building to investors, all the inspection reports were solid gold.

Please don't take this as an official answer from Festool.  Shane's availability to the FOG is very limited this week.  Europe has different models of CT's with different filtering levels.  I have never seen Festool here in NA make claims about the CT's here being acceptable / approved for asbestos work. 

Peter

Asbestos and lead have been blown out of proportion.

Asbestos is pretty harmless as long as you don't turn it into powder and snort it. 

heck, 1/2 the water mains in most towns are lead pipe......

I agree with that first part.  Not quite as much with the second, but also to SOME extent.  That's why I don't feel the need to starve for 2 months in order to pay a pro to clean this up.

Still, it would be foolish not to be as careful as possible.
================================

Alex, thanks for that info.  Very helpful.

If you are a smoker, exposure to asbestos increases the likelihood that you will get lung cancer by 50 times. It's a really bad combination.

http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/asbestos/site-kit/docs/CigarettesAsbestos2.pdf

It's all statistical. You might go swimming in the stuff and have nothing happen. What is known is that thousands of people die from it every year. As such the precautions are justified.

Lead pipes is NOT THE SAME as lead paint. The Lead paint itself is relatively harmless, it's the DUST that it produces that can be harmful.

Also, we need to separate the difference between ACTUAL risk levels versus PERCEIVED risk. I agree that most of us grew up in houses that contained some amount of lead based paint. Did it affect us? Well, not as far as we know.

The issue for contractors is, the EPA DOES think it's a significant issue, and will fine you over $32,000 PER DAY if they find that you are not in compliance with the regs. It doesn't matter if you disagree with them, or think it's a non-issue. The EPA has already started to fine contractors, starting back in early 2011.

As for homeowners performing the work, I suppose it depends on how long you plan to live in the house. Something to consider is resale. As mentioned above, when you go to sell the place and the potential buyers look at your place and say "Hmm, 100 years old, looks like you've remodeled recently, who did your RRP work?". Again, it's all about perceived risk. Some people may be like-minded, shrug their shoulders and say "oh well, no big deal".

Then there is the crowd like a customer I worked for last summer. My helper accidentally broke two CFL bulbs in an unfinished attic. I drove to the home center to buy two new CFL's to match the ones my helper broke. The customer met me at the front door and just about lost her mind. She was just barely able to restrain herself from screaming at me, going on about all the mercury that was released into her house, and how would we clean up the "toxic waste" in her attic?

Granted, the EPA is not going after homeowners. But what about the people you sell the house to? When their baby grows up and develops a learning disability and haul you in front of a jury, which side do you think will win? The disabled kid will win 100 times out of 100.

Anyways, I'm not trying to dissuade anybody from working on their homes. Just practice safety. Follow the EPA guidelines. Cover your butt. Wear the Tyvek suit, wrap everything in 6 mil plastic, and document EVERYTHING. Whenever I start a Lead job one of the first things that I do is document that there is already Lead in the soil, because if you live in a metropolitan area there WILL be Lead in the soil, and you need to document that it was there prior to your involvement.

The negative pressure idea is a no-no, unless you are filtering the outgoing air with a certified HEPA filtration unit. The list goes on and on....

As for the Asbestos thing, hire it out, hire it out, hire it out. If you do try to tackle it yourself, buy a vac designed specifically for asbestos, and either sell it or dispose of it when you're done. My guess is that Festool is going to tell you that, in the North American market, they do not recommend the use of any of their dust extractors for Asbestos work.

I'm not trying to be a party pooper here, but there are potentially HUGE criminal and civil liabilities here, and any project involving Lead or Asbestos should be undertaken with a high degree of caution.
Thanks!
Best,
Tom

(stumbles off of soapbox)

You might want to send an email.  Lots of people are out of town and playing catch up on threads will be tough next week.  Your post has a good chance of being overlooked.

Peter