Garage floor stains!

[blackouthx]

Okay so I just recently purchased a home and the prior owners must have had a leaky car. There are oil stains through out the garage and they are an eye sore.

I tried using concrete cleaners I found at stores but nothing seems to work that well.

I guess my question is if anybody recommends any cleaner products? I want to epoxy the floor but not over the current stains? Is there an epoxy that will cover up these stains?

thanks and sorry for the noobish qustions

 

[AlphaGarage]

Nothing noobish about your question! A common misunderstanding is to think that a good high quality high build epoxy coating is like a typical paint, so the surfaces they cover need to be the same in order to get great results - that's not the case at all. Typical paints and some other floor coatings are just 2 - 4 mils thick, and only adhere by mechanically sticking to the substrate, so yeah - the floor needs to be pretty smooth and really clean. But a high build system with quality a primer is more than 20 mils thick and both mechanically and chemically adhere to the concrete, so the system can handle less than ideal surfaces and cover them well.

There are a lot of good reason why epoxy coatings are popular for both industrial and residential floors; they protect the concrete, they're very easy to clean, they're durable and last a loooooong time, and they're a great way to cover stains and other existing problems!

Preparation is important, but since a good epoxy will bond with a less than perfect substrate you don't want to waste time and resources cleaning and perfecting the concrete till it's in new shape. You want to profile and clean up the oil to the point that when you sprinkle water on the floor it's evenly and completely absorbed into the concrete. Stains, discoloration, marks etc aren't really an issue as long as the floor passes the water test and if free from contaminants like silicon.

Here a look at a floor that looks like it's beyond saving, yet with a bit of prep and epoxy (the exact same ones we offer for your DIY projects) it was fixed and used for a TV show... Just click the picture to read all about the process...