New Floor on a budget

[jbmorrey]

I am looking to repaint the floor in my garage. I am a collector and do some "Tinkering" so I do not need any kind of high traffic professional finish. I would just rather prefer something that is better than the old concrete floor that I have. Obviously I have seen multiple different " Floor Painting" packages at my local Home depot or Lowes, I am just concerned with the floor prep, I have a two car garage and want something that would look "Decent" and on a budget. What is the simplist way to achieve this. My work crew consists of me, myself and I. So the easier the better.

Thanks!

 

[BMWFatherFigure]

A good heavy duty degrease first. If it is 2yrs + old no need for acid, just let it dry. IMO a second colour round the edge or contrast at entrance lift the look and makes it appear more expensive than it truly was.

 

[jbmorrey]

Any recomendations on a Heavy Duty Degrease?

 

[Kevin54]

Any recomendations on a Heavy Duty Degrease?

At the shop we always used Simple Green in the concentrated form. It would eventually strip paint off of the grinders and some of the mills. They quit buying Simple Green just because of that and went with Purple Power. No comparison. Simple Green concentrated will definitely cut grease.

 

[jbmorrey]

What would the best way to apply this? Would it be like mopping it on the floor? Of course after you clean the floor up as much as possible.

 

[Kevin54]

What would the best way to apply this? Would it be like mopping it on the floor? Of course after you clean the floor up as much as possible.

I always mixed it strong i a bucket with hot water, throwed it down across the floor, then scrubbed with a scrub brush on a handle, then rinsed and squeegeed the floor afterwards.

 

[JimVonBaden]

I always mixed it strong i a bucket with hot water, throwed it down across the floor, then scrubbed with a scrub brush on a handle, then rinsed and squeegeed the floor afterwards.

It works great, but make sure you rinse it thoroughly!

Jim

 

[tncatadjuster]

Not quite strong enough. Trust me I like simple green. I buy it in 55 gallon drums.

If you can properly rinse, use a basic cleaner with a ph very low on the scale. Think of it as oven cleaner in liquid form. Spartan Chemical SC200 or equal. It will really clean anything you apply it to. Wear respirator wash off residue all the way down driveway.

Let dry, apply water borne epoxy sold by members here.

Personally, I would grind it.

 

[jbmorrey]

Fortunately I do not have any cracks or damage to my garage floor, I have a standard 2 car garage, any idea as to how much paint would be needed to do this? is there any kind of calculator I could use to figure this out? Thanks for all the tips so far guys!!
James M

 

[houstonfloorcoatings]

One gallon of floor paint should cover about 400 sq ft as floor paint is pretty thin compared to epoxy.

Here is the math on coverage...

One gallon of paint (or any liquid) when spread out over a surface at 1 mil in thickness (one mil is a thousandth of an inch) will cover exactly 1,604 sq ft.

So to get the number of gallons needed to cover a floor at any thickness, you divide 1,604 by the number of mils thick that you want your floor coating.

For example, lets say you want to put down the floor paint at 4 mils thick, you would divide 1,604 by 4 to get 401. This means you would need to spread each gallon out over 401 sq ft to make the floor coating exactly 4 mils thick.

You can find this math formula at HowToEpoxy.org

Hope this helps!
HoustonFloorCoatings.com

 

[antinym]

Random insertion: I put sand in my floor paint for grip.. I hate it. Makes it substantially harder to clean.

 

[houstonfloorcoatings]

I noticed that someone wrote that you do not need to acid wash the floor because of its age. This is incorrect. The age of a floor has no bearing on whether the floor needs to be profiled or not. Epoxy will not stick to a smooth surface, it must have something rough to grip onto. This roughness of a slab is referred to as a Concrete Surface Profile. The thicker your floor coating is going to be, the rougher the floor needs to be, because a substantial amount of the floor coating needs to be embedded into the concrete slab for anchoring or tie-down strength.

Acid washing does not clean your slab, what it does is burn the top layer of concrete so that it becomes brittle. After it is burned with acid, power washing will knock off the top loose layer of burned concrete, this will expose the top layer of rocks or aggregate below the surface of the slab. The result is a Concrete Surface Profile similar to sand paper. This is the objective of acid washing or diamond grinding.

The #1 reason for hot-tire pickup on floor coatings is an insufficient concrete profile. If you do not profile your slab, it will peel.

HoustonFloorCoatings.com

 

[Garage Flooring]

We launched a line of very budget friendly garage floor coatings. They are 100% solids, they will not yellow and we do not charge for shipping.

http://www.garageflooringllc.com/epoxy-coating/