Epoxy flooring

I did it...wouldn't do it again. Looks like crap.

I started with a pristine garage floor (new house). Cement had dried for over 1 month.

Applied the Home Depot stuff, looked good for 1 year. Now, its all peeling off.

I suspect there was still some moisture in the cement, though I followed all of the rules, and the cement was clean/virgin.

If I had to do it all over, I would use the floor decking. Sams Club has the plastic kind for 99 cents/foot. The nice stuff is 4$/ft.

Good luck.

 

Gotta be aggravating to have that kind of experience!
Just a coupla thoughts...
'...over a month...' may not have been long enough for the concrete to have lost the bulk of its moisture. Did the Home Depot product specify how long to wait before application?
Also, is there a vapor barrier under the slab (6 mil visqueen, etc.)?
And, were any additives/agents (calcium, etc.) or glass fibers (strength enhancers), or after-placement curing agents (spray-on sealer used to slow evaporation) applied?

 

the do-it-yourself stuff isn't good enough or worth the money. you need the industrial stuff, however it's expensive for home use and requires professional installation, here's some to look into.
http://www.dur-a-flex.com/
http://www.superiorepoxies.com/

 

Oh and there is a cure rate for concrete, to soon and the moisture will lift the finish. it needs to be checked prior to installation, in most cases it can be few months before the epoxy can be applied if the concrete is new. here's a good read.
http://www.dur-a-flex.com/ProductLine/INFOsheets_LINKS/FlooringGuidelinesPDFs/compositemasters.pdf

 

I originally did the do-it yourself (Behr) stuff from Home Depot, applied by the guy that painted the interioir of our house, but that started looking crappy after a year or so.

I decided to eventually get a pro to do it. Had them come to my garage, strip off the old stuff, prep and apply the new stuff. Looks great. Wasn't cheap (~$1700 for a smallish 2 car garage, works out to about $3.95/sqr foot), but it did come with a 7 year warranty.

I did get a chance to test out the warranty, when my jack slipped and made a nice little hole in the epoxy. They came over, and patched it up no problems.

Now that I've seen how they did it, I think I would consider trying it again, if I didn't have a previously coated floor.

Like they said above, use a professional coating not the cheap home depot stuff. I've heard that there is considerable difference in the quality. There is a product out there, U-coat-it that seems to get lots of mention on the various car boards, but since I haven't tried it, can't really comment.

And prep is extremely, extremely important. The guys who did my floor used big-ass sanders to sand off the old coating, then they poured down acid and sanded again. Let dry, and then began the painting process. It's quite labor intensive.

Hope this helps.

Dom

 

Try floorjunkies.com They have tiles for the floor and they hold up real well no glue just snap together pretty resistant to oil many colors t choose from.
DM

 

For about $5 a square foot you can get someone to do grade 5 porcelain tile. Very durable, looks really classy.

 

I was a painter many yrs ago, but have been a chemist for past 25 yrs (yes, Im old), although, not in the coatings field, and much of above info is wise.

But I can add this: I coated our own floors with Fasco epoxy (305/821-9441 in Miami area, ), and this "steelflex" material is tops. more costly, but not to be compared with the readily available stuff. New Concrete must be checked not just for moisture, but for curing as far as chemical conversion to a pH closer to 7. If you spray some phenolphthalein on it, you should NOT get a pink color. If you like, I can send you some from my lab. If pink, it is NOT cured enough. and you should NOT coat it with ANYTHING.

Good luck,
Joe

 

UCoatit

 

Colby,

You're welcome...Maybe another time.....

Do it the easiest way/best way you can.good luck.

 

we did acid-wash/stain on ours and get tons of compliments. don't think you can do it yourself, though...

 

I have done this twice and not had any issues and I am about to do again. The key to epoxy on concrete is etching the floor prior to applying the epoxy. Use muratic acid, not the heavy detergent stuff they also sell at Home Depot, it does not work well for this application. Also the other key is to stay off for at least a week. This will guarantee the epoxy completely cures to the concrete. If you put anything heavy on it prior it will come up. I am not a fan of the flakes you can put in, so I left out.

 

I used the Behr product from Home depot, and would not do it again. The product looked great and stayed down flawlessly, but it took nearly a week to prep the floor and to get it all done- LOTS OF WORK. Once done, it was very tough. After about 3 years, it just looked a little dirty. THEN, it only took about 1 hour to recoat, and looked better than ever; never had any pealing problems, but it is extremely labor intensive to prep the floor correctly- seems to be the key. In my new house, I'm going to have the garage floor scored, and acid stained, then clear coated.

 

I had my floor done 7 years ago and it still looks like new . And that is through the typical Michigan winters . The company that did the work was called FloorPro .

 

WE have one of those coat yourself jobs done and our floor is starting to really look dingy. Cracking, peeling going on all over. I do not want to use it again. Would love to go with some nice porcelein tiles or maybe racedek type.

 

I have done a CADD layout using the Floorjunkies stuff and it will cost around $2800 for 1600 s.f. Going to try it out on the new garage before commiting to the other car storage spaces.
BT

 

How many contractors are doing epoxy floor coatings on a residential level? Do you sub out the concrete prep (shot blasting or grinding) or do that yourselves?

 

i diamond grinded my entire floor myself. was a long, pain in the butt process but i took my time (patience is NOT something i am known for). I used a commercial dual head grinder with a vacuum attachment that captured maybe 80% of the dust. WIped any areas that looks sketchy with denatured alcohol. Vacuumed the floor many times before doing. It's a large garage, so i had to do it in stages as the epoxy would harden before i could finish the whole project. Preparation is the key. I used some aggregate for high traffic areas so my kids won't slip and fall. It sounds stupid, but you just have to follow the directions. I spoke with a rep from the company no less than 15 times before starting the project. From a pride standpoint i wanted to be able to say i did everything to the garage myself. Sheetrock, paint, electric, etc. Came out fantastic. I even had the company mix me up a custom blend flake to use (white, red and rosso red). You;ll need some consecutive days off from work to do as the clear needs to be applied within 24 hours of the top coat. Very gratifying when i see people's reaction when they walk in.

 

Expiry floors are about my least favorite project. Prep is everything. I used a water based product the first time that didn’t hold up at all.

For my second rodeo I went with a solvent based floor which held up pretty well, it was down for about 15 years when I sold the home. The failure points of the solvent hard floor were expansion joints began to crack a bit and sporadic blemishes from using an oxy torch. Next go around I’ll hire a pro.

 

I too bought the industrial stuff - was about $1,500 for 400 square feet, but you can bounce a sledgehammer off this stuff with no problem.

Had to apply another coat every 4 hours and did six total coats - and it REEKED - not sure if I was bleary eyed from the lack of sleep or the fumes by the end?

Kevin

 

oh no, mine reeeeeeked too. For a day or so. Then all good. Am really happy with the results, and the fact that i did it myself....
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