pigiron3733
Member
- Joined
- Jan 31, 2017
- Messages
- 5
As many others before me i would like to share my legacy industrial epoxy flooring kit journey, in hopes to provide tips to those who are making the decision and/or doing it themselves.
My garage floor is 25 years old, has had 2 prior coats of paint applied (which looked like poo) and was beat up. I don't do heavy car work or machine work, more home projects, hobbies etc. My mission was not perfection, but rather to coat it with something that would LAST.....In the end I am very happy.
My kit was the Legacy HD Kit, Fazor Tan, system 3 chips (4lbs), primer, top coat. It is the 600 sq foot version and my garage is about 540 sq ft.
I did a mechanical grind with an EDCO TL9 machine with diamond tooling on the bottom. I am not positive, but I believe the tooling was more aggressive than i wanted as there are occasional swirl marks you can see in the coat, but only if in the right light, at the right angle, certain time of day etc.
Lesson learned - communicate with Scotty about diamabrush machines, I am curious if it would have been a bit better and faster.
The EDCO 9" grinder was small and overall took about 5 hours to grind my floor. My ADVICE is to rent a big dustless shop vac as my little shop vac was quickly overwhelmed and essentially useless.....and maaaaan does it make some dust. (Oh yeah, get a 3M respirator for this project). I chose to skip patching the floor as there weren't many cracks or gouges.
Overall grinding is the way to go over acid etching, although the dust is a mess, use a shop vac and leaf blower when youre done.
My biggest issue came with the next step...I water tested areas of my floor and to my surprise the areas under the tires were still readily repelling water. I hosed the entire garage down and still couldn't get absorption (which also meant i needed to wait 3-4 days before applying primer....oops).
After a chat with Scotty (again) I picked up an oil stop primer from legacy and got to work.
Day 1 - oil stop primer 130pm, standard (tinted) primer at 930pm.
Day 2 - Epoxy main coat and chips 10am
Day 3 - Top coat 8 am
I'll post another pic after I get cabinets and the tool wall installed.
Lessons learned:
-The primer was plenty for me
-I primed on a cool february night where the humidity went from 70% to 90% between the time i started and about 5am. This had me concerned but it seems the cooler temps (50s-60s) worked out and i do not have fish eyes or any apparent defects.
- The epoxy was fun and timing wasn't an issue but HAVE A PLAN
- use quality rollers
- Spikes are a must
- If using a 4.5" hand grinder on stubborn areas, be careful to keep it level as dips will show through (again only in certain lighting, time of day etc.)
- Epoxy stinks, dont do it at night if you have kiddos sleeping at home as it will take a few hours for the smell to go away.
-HD Kit was a great value, if you want that glass top perfect finish I'd recommend an SD kit (its thicker) or hire someone, grinding to perfection is an art.
- Good luck applying the top coat and not missing a spot, I have a couple areas where the roller was a bit dry or just plain missed. Small but noticeable if you really look.
Overall I cannot say enough good things about legacy and Scotty, they were awesome. If you're going back and forth between a box store kit and spending the extra money on a legacy kit..........SPEND. This is a project you do not want to repeat in 2 years!!
My garage floor is 25 years old, has had 2 prior coats of paint applied (which looked like poo) and was beat up. I don't do heavy car work or machine work, more home projects, hobbies etc. My mission was not perfection, but rather to coat it with something that would LAST.....In the end I am very happy.
My kit was the Legacy HD Kit, Fazor Tan, system 3 chips (4lbs), primer, top coat. It is the 600 sq foot version and my garage is about 540 sq ft.
I did a mechanical grind with an EDCO TL9 machine with diamond tooling on the bottom. I am not positive, but I believe the tooling was more aggressive than i wanted as there are occasional swirl marks you can see in the coat, but only if in the right light, at the right angle, certain time of day etc.
Lesson learned - communicate with Scotty about diamabrush machines, I am curious if it would have been a bit better and faster.
The EDCO 9" grinder was small and overall took about 5 hours to grind my floor. My ADVICE is to rent a big dustless shop vac as my little shop vac was quickly overwhelmed and essentially useless.....and maaaaan does it make some dust. (Oh yeah, get a 3M respirator for this project). I chose to skip patching the floor as there weren't many cracks or gouges.
Overall grinding is the way to go over acid etching, although the dust is a mess, use a shop vac and leaf blower when youre done.
My biggest issue came with the next step...I water tested areas of my floor and to my surprise the areas under the tires were still readily repelling water. I hosed the entire garage down and still couldn't get absorption (which also meant i needed to wait 3-4 days before applying primer....oops).
After a chat with Scotty (again) I picked up an oil stop primer from legacy and got to work.
Day 1 - oil stop primer 130pm, standard (tinted) primer at 930pm.
Day 2 - Epoxy main coat and chips 10am
Day 3 - Top coat 8 am
I'll post another pic after I get cabinets and the tool wall installed.
Lessons learned:
-The primer was plenty for me
-I primed on a cool february night where the humidity went from 70% to 90% between the time i started and about 5am. This had me concerned but it seems the cooler temps (50s-60s) worked out and i do not have fish eyes or any apparent defects.
- The epoxy was fun and timing wasn't an issue but HAVE A PLAN
- use quality rollers
- Spikes are a must
- If using a 4.5" hand grinder on stubborn areas, be careful to keep it level as dips will show through (again only in certain lighting, time of day etc.)
- Epoxy stinks, dont do it at night if you have kiddos sleeping at home as it will take a few hours for the smell to go away.
-HD Kit was a great value, if you want that glass top perfect finish I'd recommend an SD kit (its thicker) or hire someone, grinding to perfection is an art.
- Good luck applying the top coat and not missing a spot, I have a couple areas where the roller was a bit dry or just plain missed. Small but noticeable if you really look.
Overall I cannot say enough good things about legacy and Scotty, they were awesome. If you're going back and forth between a box store kit and spending the extra money on a legacy kit..........SPEND. This is a project you do not want to repeat in 2 years!!
No seriously, it looks good!
