Epoxy Flooring and welding?

[MrBeast]

I am working on building a new shop, I am seriously thinking about going with an Epoxy floor coating, however I do a lot of MIG and SMAW welding, and I am worried about what hot slag and BB's will do the the finish on my floor.

Anyone have any input they can offer on a floor coating I can use that will stand up in that enviroment?

 

[rickairmedic]

I have also considered epoxy but from what I have read if you do alot of welding and fab best bet with epoxy is to lay welding blankets on the floor when welding .I dont know that I would remeber or want to deal with putting down blankets everytime I wanted to weld so for now my floor is bare concrete.

Rick

 

[5wndwcpe]

I have also considered epoxy but from what I have read if you do alot of welding and fab best bet with epoxy is to lay welding blankets on the floor when welding .I dont know that I would remeber or want to deal with putting down blankets everytime I wanted to weld so for now my floor is bare concrete.

Rick

Rick,
Do you have any kind of coating or sealer on your floor currently ?

 

[rickairmedic]

5 window only thing on my floor is whatever is left of what they put on it in 65 when the house was built . I wont say its pretty but its functional.

Rick

 

[PAToyota]

If you search, you will find several discussions about how poorly epoxy stands up to such shop use.

 

[mike944]

I have to agree. I can't imagine any floor covering holding up to drops of molten metal at what? 1600 degrees? Other than some type of ceramic, what is posibbly going to hold up to that?

Plain old sealer is probably best

 

[akdiesel]

My shop floor was done by profesionaly by the previous owner. I am not sure what brand they used. It is an epoxy type of paint that has a black coating below the gray top coat.
I have mig welded over it with no issues. The previous owner also had a tractor that had chains and the most it has done to the floor is small scratches. The floor coating has been in place for 6 years now.
I have to say that this is the toughest coating I have seen. No peeling, no burning, and no chipping.

 

[Vicegrip]

An unintended side effect of the thin water based cheap rustolium floor coatings is that, in my experience, they seem to resist slag and plasma spray better than the thicker build pro type coatings. I think the heat soaks through the coating and into the concrete rather than making a charred crater in the coating. I MIG, TIG and plasma cut over the unprotected floor all the time and there is little in the way of burning. I do not use SMAW (stick) at all in the home shop. Stick makes many and larger slag blobs than MIG and I suspect there is little besides a cement or ceramic floor that can resist stick or gas cutting slag.

 

[vc-onthepc]

I work for Insane Racing Fabrications and the floor there is coated with U-coat It product and we use mig and tig welders all the time . Also use plasma cutter and oxy acetiline with very little burn marks left unless like other descibe you get a large blob of metal and it sits on the floor while it will discolor it .

Hope this helps ...Vince