Concrete floor and salt

[jim]

Do you guys have any tricks for cleaning road salt from concrete garage floors? Here in Wisconsin they use A LOT of salt on the roads. When ever the floor is dry enough it is swept out. Is there any good concrete cleaners that work good on the salt? When I wash the floor and it dries, It gets "fuzzy" with salt residue. Any help would be much appreciated.

 

[MikeF2316]

I put down newspapers (yes, I still subscribe) to soak up all the loose water. When they are saturated, they get replaced with fresh ones. That way 95% of the salt goes out with the papers.

And if there are any large lumps of slush that have fallen off the car, I shovel them out.

 

[flan]

After salt season drag in the garden hose give the area affected a good douching and squeegee the floor nice and dry. During the winter I’ll pull out the car and squeegee the floor once the snows done melting off the car.

 

[wssix99]

When I wash the floor and it dries, It gets "fuzzy" with salt residue. Any help would be much appreciated.

I use ZEP sweeping compound from the hardware store. Put on rubber gloves, grind/rub it in until it grabs up all the residue, and then sweep it all away.

(My floor is coated, so this works quickly for me. I expect it will also do fine for a raw concrete floor.)

 

[shepner]

Same problem here. I found that my ice scraper does a good job of dislodging the salt and grit deposits before I sweep

 

[jim]

Is there anything I can use to put down to "neutralize" the salt when I start spraying the floor out with the garden hose? As stated, when the concrete is washed out and it dries, the concrete gets "fuzzy" with salt residue. I sweep and sweep and sweep the dried salt before I wash the floor out.

 

[manwithtools]

The fuzzy stuff might not be salt residue, it could be effervescence from the concrete itself. How old is the concrete? My concrete is 3 years old and when it get's water on it in certain areas, I get lots of "fuzzy" areas.

 

[jim]

Concrete is 5 years old.

 

[gizardlizard]

I live in Wisconsin too and years ago when I built a killer garage, I put in 18” race deck flooring. I moved and took the floor out 5 years later. The amount of dried salt under those tiles was staggering. Looked like the Bonneville Salt Flats. I swept it out weekly.

 

[jim]

I sweep and sweep and sweep and I still have enough salt in the garage to start my own ocean!!!!!! What will neutralize the salt and not harm the concrete?

 

[Bretny]

If you constantly have a wet salty floor you may be actualy rusting your vehicle worse then just leaving it outside. I have to assume the vehicle also never dries out.

Have you thought about epoxy coating the floor? Then it could dry and the porous concrete wont soak up salt/water.

 

[jim]

We have had some people in the surrounding neighborhoods coat their floors. Some DIY and some professionally done. The pro floors have held up much better and a lot of them have warranties but they still fail where the tires meet the floors. The pro concrete floors were etched before the install. I talked to one of the pro home owners and he said the contractor said he has lost money with all the people with warranties calling him to patch up their floors. He said the salt is relentless and does a number on the floors he has installed.

 

[shaune]

Thompson water seal on the concrete each year. Buy yourself a car sized drip tray, a water proof mat with a bit of a lip around the perimeter to hold the drippings. You slide the mat outside when needed to dump it.