Basement Bike shop-Flooring

[amb77]

Newbie here, I have read a couple hundred posts regarding flooring, but still have questions.

We have a partially finished 900 sq ft section of our basement that is just asking to become my new man cave/bike shop. It even has stairs right up to the garage. It is drywalled, but most of the utilities are exposed.

Half of the floor was covered with carpet, I just finished hand scraping the adhesive from that. Still there is some within the floor eventhough it feels smooth now. They filled one EJ with a filler of some sort. The remaining EJs are not filled. I am negative for moisture.

Also the lolly pole bases need to be levelled out to make it all smooth.

Questions before I epoxy this thing.

1) DO I need to get the remaining adhesive up off the floor(I should say Out of the floor), and if so How do I do it without renting a bead blaster for $500?

2) What do I use to fill the 15 inch wide depressed(1/2 inch) bases where the lolly poles are planted?

3) I will probably get the HD available sikaflex for the remaining EJs. (I am not paying $70 to fill expansion joints in a room that wont have more than foot traffic and bicycle grease on it. )

4) Best way to prep a basement floor? I am little bit nervous about making a mess and ruining drywall down there. Gotta a shop vac though.

5) I am entertaining the more expensive online epoxy kits vs cheaper water based, If I seal a cheaper kit, I doubt I would have trouble if properly prepped. It will be very light duty compared to a garage. Probably not worth the extra expense to make it bombproof. THoughts?
Thanks.

 

[Baada]

I have half completed a basement floor just like yours with great results. I have to move all my stuff to the other side and do the other half still. However, mine didn't have drywall so I had/have a lot of painting to do to make it a good mancave.

1) Floor adhesive - Good news/bad news on this. Bad news is that you will have to completely grind this off if you have any hope of a floor coating sticking. The good news is that whether there was adhesive or not, grinding is the best way to prep the concrete for a new coating.

2) Grinding - I also did 900 sqft indoors, which you can see my link below. You definitely want to rent a concrete vacuum if they have one specifically for the grinding machines. It will overwhelm/destroy your shopvac. There will be a slight dust coating on your walls/utilities but if you get a bristle/broom attachment for your shopvac it will be good as new if you go over it. Please use a respirator and a fan with open windows to keep the air as dust free as possible.

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=131442&highlight=basement+prep

2) Lolly poles - I also had this issue. I used the grinders to level it out the best I could. Then I filled the low spots with Quickrete acrylic concrete crack filler and grinded it again after it cured.

3) Cracks - I also used the Quickrete acrylic filler. It comes in a squirt bottle so I just squeezed some in the crack and used a plastic putty knife to force as much in as I could, let it dry for about 3 minutes and then scrape off the excess. Or, leave the filler proud of the floor surface, let it cure for 15-24 hours and then grind it off. I had good results with both techniques because I found more cracks after I took the grinder back.

4) EJ's - I did not have Ej's on my floor but I know Legacy makes a product specifically for it. From what I recall, Sikaflex is not good for coating over but for filling in EJ's after the coating is done. I also don't think the basement see's the temperature swings the garage does so you may be okay just using a hard filler like I did with my cracks? I'm sure someone else will chime in on this aspect with better advice.

5) Quality Coating - Don't waste your time and energy on a cheap coating. If you are going to do that no matter how well you prep it is going to wear out quickly. I had a cheap coating on my floor before I redid it and it wore out very quickly, even in the basement. Also, depending on the color you are shooting and if you live near a Lowes, Epoxy-Coat can be had for less than $400 for your basement size.

Good luck dude.

 

[amb77]

THanks,

Gonna cost me over 200 to rent the walk behind grinder. I am thinking I might put it off a few months and just rent the bead blaster for $500 and prep the basement and garage at the same time. I also have a 4 car garage that has old peeling crappy coating of some sort from previous owner. I was going to wait another year or two , but for $500 I want to get the most out of it. Will be one hell of a busy Saturday trying to do it all in one day.

How do you get the bead blaster to do the "curb" along the garage walls?

I only see the quikcrete and rustoleum products at my local Lowes?
bummer, other recs for the best bang for your buck true epoxy.