Garage floor top layer failure

[tlorek]

I have a problem with a professionally installed garage floor and am looking for suggestions on remediation.

Background:
Bought a 5’ish year house in late 2021 and before we moved in I wanted to have the 3 car garage floor coated. Talked with several local vendors and went with a seemingly reliable vendor. Note that I would’ve done it myself but I just didn’t have the free time at that time.

Vendor ground the floor, and filled cracks with Rustoleum concrete patch and repair...


They then used a base coat from Concrete Floor Supply...


Flakes were applies, and then apparently due to supply issues, they used a Rustoleum top coat instead of a pro product...


When completed, the final product looked very nice...


Less than a year later, we started getting discoloration from hot tires (SWFL is a tad warm), and somehow had an incident where all layers were lost, and bare concrete is exposed...



Relatively current state:
Started discussions with vendor about coming out to fix. He mentioned that there was an issue with Rustoleum top coat and that the top would need to be ground down to primer, flakes re-added, and then recoated. All sounded good and then Hurricane Ian came through. Vendor subsequently disappeared and here we are.

Needless to say I’ve been pretty pissed about this. Thoughts on what I can do to correct? I’m fine with working on this myself, I’d just hate to have to grind and re-do the entire garage.

Thanks much!

Tom

 

[Walkers]

He used consumer grade products, you got consumer grade results. Only real cure is to remove it and hire someone that uses professional grade products.

 

[Garage Flooring]

Looking at the pictures, it appears maybe it is down to the concrete in areas. If so I would agree either put tiles over tile or grind it down and start fresh. If however you just have stains in the top coat I would start by sanding the top coat (in a small space) and see if you can get through the stain.

If that works, rent a sander, sand the clear off, and go back over the floor with two coats of Polyurea. If you have pieces chunking off the floor, don't throw good money after bad.

 

[FJ4FUN]

You're down to concrete or, at "best", down to primer. Patching it would be a complete waste of time and money. As Justin pointed out, go with tiles or grind it down and start fresh. Even if you were able to patch it, you will always see the patches, they cannot be blended/feathered in and given the materials originally used you'll likely be playing wack-o-mole forever.

Put a diamond grinder to that and get up as much as you can. Anything that survives the grinder can be recoated with a quality primer-body coat-flake-topcoat system. You may not have to grind 100% off but I suspect it will be close.... This really isn't anymore complicated than if you were to do it yourself on a fresh slab. The grinding will take a bit more time but it's not rocket science.

 

[benwah]

Here is a job i did years ago for a customer in a similar situation. They had some guy come in and put down a floor in every wrong way possible. The solution is to grind it up and do it right.

 

[Armorpoxy]

You need to recoat this. Also some tires have additives that can stain even pro grade urethanes and polyaspartic topcoats. Only a ceramic topcoat like Ballistix or Coval which we carry solves that potential problem.

 

[tlorek]

Thanks for the suggestions all. Consensus is what I was afraid of. I'll be planning on tackling this early next year when m temps are cooler.

 

[P0234]

Hot tire marks are a thing across even the pro products, I had some on my Epoxycoat floor. Unless your garage is perfect, I'd just find the matching flake and patch the areas. No one except you will see the fixed areas unless you tell them to look for them.

 

[Armorpoxy]

A great solution for hot tire marking is Ballistix or Coval Silicone-Ceramic topcoat. This topcoat just sprays on with a garden sprayer over the current topcoat, it's not in lieu of regular topcoat on fleck jobs, but can be used alone on metallic floors.