How to drain off winter snow melt?

[Chetter]

Just like many of you I to have the issue with snow melt. We did all we could when I built the garage to get the floor to slope towards the door but still had issues with water runoff and it would run under my hot rod and towards the outer wall as well as towards the overhead door. My first solution was to create a small 1"x1" concrete dam around the perimiter where my truck and wifes car are parked to keep the runoff from under my hot rod as well as running over towards any of the walls, this then allows me to vacumm the water up since I don't like pushing it out the door and creating an icey hazard for my wife to get to her car. I have a forced air heater set at 48* and by morning my floor is pretty much dry. I would like to do something to drain the water but not really sure what direction to go since my floor has some small low spots. I would probably need to have the floor truly leveled if that is possible without tearing up the current floor.

 

[jasondavidmann]

Just like many of you I to have the issue with snow melt. We did all we could when I built the garage to get the floor to slope towards the door but still had issues with water runoff and it would run under my hot rod and towards the outer wall as well as towards the overhead door. My first solution was to create a small 1"x1" concrete dam around the perimiter where my truck and wifes car are parked to keep the runoff from under my hot rod as well as running over towards any of the walls, this then allows me to vacumm the water up since I don't like pushing it out the door and creating an icey hazard for my wife to get to her car. I have a forced air heater set at 48* and by morning my floor is pretty much dry. I would like to do something to drain the water but not really sure what direction to go since my floor has some small low spots. I would probably need to have the floor truly leveled if that is possible without tearing up the current floor.

Chetter Do you have any pictures of your 1x1 perimeter? I'm thinking this might work for me.

 

[bczygan]

Build a carport, with clear panels for the roof, in front of the garage.

Park your cars under this and let the sun melt the snow and the wind dry the rain. Then you can pull the vehicles inside.

Meanwhile the garage is available for shop work.

Bill

 

[twangin6]

I ended up insulating the garage several years after buying the house. Snow melt became too much to handle. Many times I would have 20 to 30 gallons on the floor. I borrowed a concrete saw and made two parallel cuts from a central low spot to the outside frost wall, busted out the concrete and laid in some pvc pipe with floor drain fitting . When it gets really cold out (below zero) I keep a garbage bag of straw over the outside drain hole to keep it from freezing. No more vacuuming the water off the floor and spring clean up with a hose and broom is a breeze.

 

[twangin6]

Not much will melt when its 10-20 below, don't need another reason to go out and start a frozen truck.

 

[jomobco]

I did this:
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=308343

 

[Garage Flooring]

There are several ways to deal with an issue like this. One way is use a product Like RaceDeck or TrueLock flow through tiles and elevate your floor above it. It sounds like it may be a little late for that option.

By far our most popular option has been the AutoFloorGuard. We also have a full container of them in stock at Amazon with Prime Shipping available.

Another option is the Park Smart Clean Park. I DO NOT like the 20 mil product at all but really like the 50 Mil product. We definitely have some people that do not like the assembly. Video at bottom of our page. http://www.garageflooringllc.com/clean-park-50-mil-garage-mat/


There are also a ton of floor drain options. This one is a little different and I do not know a whole lot about it yet http://www.u-drain.ca/residential-u-drain.html

Floor drains need to be thoroughly researched, especially when it comes to code compliance.

 

[ontcanuck]

This came from Justin at LLC (50mil) works great, use the shop vac to **** up any water about once a week. First image was taken at the end of the winter last year. The second image taken 2 weeks ago

 

[Gotcha640]

Drive to Texas.

 

[ontcanuck]

You mean this

 

[RaceDeck1]

interesting

 

[Denwood]

My approach to this is detailed in this thread. The pad contains and drains floor melt using a few tweaks. This thread covers it:
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=309814

1. Installed a drain at floor low point. It drains outside into a 5" deep dry well.
2. Installed self regulating heat trace on the drain in case it freezes (shop only heated in use)
3. Laid down an 8' x 18' piece of EPDM roofing.
4. Installed 8'x18' parking pad using FD FreeFlow
4. Used solid vinyl ramp edging sealed to EPDM.

It's dipping down to -30C (-22) outside, and shop temps this morning were -7.5C . The heat trace is turned off, and so far the trap has not frozen. Rather than leaving the heat trace on, I've just been using the clean out to remove all water from the trap with a small wet/dry vac. I have a small Rigid wet/dry vac that only gets used for floor clean up when there's a lot of salt/snow/sand coming in.

 

[Jazz1]

Fellow in the 'hood had to chop out this section of concrete rotted from water melting off car and pooling over a period of 30 winters. Water needs to be drained off. Ugly enough job and it was over his basement so floor had to be shored up to complete the job. There was a floor drain but floor was not sloped quite perfect. I will bring my vehicle indoors only to work on then back outside she goes.

 

[Denwood]

Concrete sealing is a must in our area Letting the shop stay below zero for parking is not a bad idea either as the energy supplied to chemical corrosion is much less. Daily parking in a heated garage where salt is applied to roads can't be a good thing.

In cases where temps were in the -20 to -30C range, we previously never washed cars. Now at least they get a few over the winter with a chance to drain and dry off if I fire up the heat for 30 minutes.