Help with epoxy

[nb2841]

I have a new shop that is ready for epoxy, i am having trouble picking out the color and weather or not to do a flake? The epoxy i am looking at is Pratt & Lambert Industrial epoxy(Polyamide cured 2 part epoxy). It is from my local paint stor and i will doing it myself. The area is a 30x30 with a 2 post car lift. The only thing i am certin i want is alot of clear on the floor (shine). My questions are:

what color (what seems to look better longer and ect...)???
should i do a flake? (i will be doing it myself and i dont want it to be splotchy)
how many coats of clear? (2 or 3???)

the celings are a stomp pattern white in color, i am going to be doing my walls white, with one wall the same color as the floor to kinda give it some swagg.....

thanks for the help, i will have a buddy that paints for a living that has done floors to help but any pointers would be great, thanks again.

 

[nb2841]

here are outside and inside picture so yall can pick out a color for my floor. the walls are finished sheetrock, also the shop will be used for hobby stuff. i drag race so my car will be stored inside.

 

[nb2841]

hello?

 

[Bennie]

Hello

It's all personal preferance. I have white walls/ceiling and "dunes tan" floor. I think it looks nice. It seems like you always see grey floors so that's why I went with tan. No flakes or anything. My basement floor is a dark red/maroon color. Looks nice but it shows dirt easy. I'm glad my garage floor isn't that dark.

I wasn't trying to impress anybody with my garage. It's just my "shop" so it's not flashy. Everybody seems to love it though.

 

[bRIZZAd]

Darker epoxy like dark paint on a car (dark blue, black, etc) will show lots of dust if dust is a problem, and I would imagine less light reflectivity, despite your white walls & ceiling. I'd go with a light(er) color like gray personally. Some light tan colors on the board here have looked good as well.

I can't comment on the clear coats since I have no experience there.

Flaking was surprisingly easy, though all it takes is one 'oops' to create an area too dense for your liking (Especially if all you want is a 'light' flaking). The strategy is to grab a 1/4 handful and throw straight up into the air and let it fall down... just that simple. If you grab too much and it falls straight from your hand or the container, you're in trouble.

If you plan to do a 'heavy' coverage (not full) things are a little more forgiving if you make an 'oops' here or there.

 

[nb2841]

i am buying the epoxy and doing my first base coat tonight (still havent decided on a color). i have allready purchased the flakes (black white and gray).

i am on the fence with color, light grey or kaki color khaki/tan. such a hard choice!!!

which color will show less dirt ?

 

[nb2841]

also any advice on applying flakes? what is best method?

 

[bRIZZAd]

What kind of flake coverage do you intend to do?

Doing a FULL coverage I think you can get away with more of a chicken feed style application for the sake of speed like the guys in this video:

However, if you watch them, they do drop big dense clumps each time they begin throwing. Not a good style if you are doing anything less than FULL (or to rejection) coverage.

Throwing small 1/4 size handfuls straight up into the air like the guy in the next video would be best for anything else less than FULL. For Heavy/Medium/Light, throw straight into the air (underhand is good too, despite what the guy in the video does). You can bounce it off the ceiling for even distribution as well:

You can see in the next video from EpoxyMaster that they recommend an underhand throw, but still do suggest you throw up into the air towards the ceiling!

 

[tomd]

have shoes with spikes/screws for walking around to do the flake

 

[Edger]

Did you know that a higher light reflectance value makes it easier to see everything. Light from overheads hit the floor and is reflected back up again.

With black there is no reflectance so all light is coming down and all objects (such as cars) will have a very strong, black shadow underneath causing glare and gloom in the garage.

White has 100% light reflectance so overhead lighting will bounce up from the floor and objects will appear to have only light shadows under them. Medium grey has about 50% light reflectance.

The most practical (and boring) has been light grey because it reflects around 80% of light and it is not a color; black and white are tones so there is no clash with other decorative items.

So basically, the lighter the floor the easier it will be to see around the garage. The more color that is used, the more potential it has to clash with other colored items in the garage.

 

[tncatadjuster]

Did you know that a higher light reflectance value makes it easier to see everything. Light from overheads hit the floor and is reflected back up again.

With black there is no reflectance so all light is coming down and all objects (such as cars) will have a very strong, black shadow underneath causing glare and gloom in the garage.

White has 100% light reflectance so overhead lighting will bounce up from the floor and objects will appear to have only light shadows under them. Medium grey has about 50% light reflectance.

The most practical (and boring) has been light grey because it reflects around 80% of light and it is not a color; black and white are tones so there is no clash with other decorative items.

So basically, the lighter the floor the easier it will be to see around the garage. The more color that is used, the more potential it has to clash with other colored items in the garage.

Great answer, only thing I can add is no flake, I hate them. Can't find a small part if dropped.

The epoxy your talking about is not going to have a tremendous shine like a 100% solids.

 

[AlphaGarage]

Whatever method of broadcasting you decide on - practice!

Remember: although you can always toss out another hand full of flakes, it's impossible to pick any up.

BTW I have light to medium broadcast of flakes on my floor, and I do a bit of wrenching on my old, leaky, British jalopy, but I seldom have any problems finding those many parts that I'm constantly drooping. Fact is most parts are over 1/4 inch in at least one dimension, and even with my old eyes I spot them. Smaller than that? Yes, they can be tougher to see, it's just that most smaller parts are parts of sub assemblies and that work is usually done on the bench.

 

[MoonRise]

i am buying the epoxy and doing my first base coat tonight (still havent decided on a color). i have allready purchased the flakes (black white and gray).

i am on the fence with color, light grey or kaki color khaki/tan. such a hard choice!!!

which color will show less dirt ?

Well, see, there is a UniversalConundrum occuring there.

Not quite as severe as the No-Two-Objects-Can-Occupy-The-Same-Space-At-The-Same-Time Conundrum, but still pretty difficult to avoid.

The UC (can I just call it that, instead of typing out UniversalConundrum every time?) that you are running into here is that dirt come in two different shades: LightDirt and DarkDirt (can I just call them LD and DD to save the electrons and photons and bits and such that would otherwise have to be used to type out LightDirt and DarkDirt?).

OK, you say. What does that have to do with what color you put on your garage floor, you ask?

Well, it is a constant of the Universe that LD is strongly attracted to all dark surfaces and DD is strongly attracted to all light surfaces.

But there is a slight cancelling effect of the UniversalDirtAttractionConstant (UDAC) caused by the addition of the multi-color flakes to the floor, because then the dirt doesn't know whether to have LD or DD show up.

So, the flake addition partially cancels the UDAC and thus upsets the equilibrium of the LD-to-DD ratio.



(pick whatever color or colors that you like and want. It's your floor after all. Me? A neutral grey works with almost any other color or colors that you put into the area. Car, wall, tool chests, wall art, etc, etc)

 

[nb2841]

What kind of flake coverage do you intend to do?

Doing a FULL coverage I think you can get away with more of a chicken feed style application for the sake of speed like the guys in this video:

However, if you watch them, they do drop big dense clumps each time they begin throwing. Not a good style if you are doing anything less than FULL (or to rejection) coverage.

Throwing small 1/4 size handfuls straight up into the air like the guy in the next video would be best for anything else less than FULL. For Heavy/Medium/Light, throw straight into the air (underhand is good too, despite what the guy in the video does). You can bounce it off the ceiling for even distribution as well:

You can see in the next video from EpoxyMaster that they recommend an underhand throw, but still do suggest you throw up into the air towards the ceiling!

i like the medium/heavy. thanks for the videos, i got a better idea now. how long inbetween base coats should i wait?

 

[synik]

Off subject but how big are those garage doors? 8x8? 8x9? Thanks!

Good luck with your question.

 

[nb2841]

Off subject but how big are those garage doors? 8x8? 8x9? Thanks!

Good luck with your question.

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