I've been reading every post I can and looking at everyone's pictures prior to beginning my shop floor epoxy project. It's 30x50 and I've decided to go with products from original color chips. My question is why do some floors with chips lay down so smooth, and others look like a nightmare to roll a floor jack across? I'm going with the 100% solids. Should it be thinned with xylene to help the flakes settle? I'll be top coating with urethane and don't mind some texture, but want creepers, jacks, stools, etc to roll easily. This is my first attempt at epoxy and tend to be a perfectionist when it comes to my shop, so any help is very appreciated.
Norklad 200
- Thread starter Dmac39466
- Start date
LegacyIndustrial
ALLIANCE MEMBER
Dmac: Did you ask the color chips folks?
They should have told you to add an extra clear coat or three to help cover the flakes.
The flakes are like snowshoes on snow, they float on the epoxy.
If you are that much of a perfectionist, have them send you a touch-up kit so you can play with the product before applying, hone your skills before putting to the floor.
They should have told you to add an extra clear coat or three to help cover the flakes.
The flakes are like snowshoes on snow, they float on the epoxy.
If you are that much of a perfectionist, have them send you a touch-up kit so you can play with the product before applying, hone your skills before putting to the floor.
Shea
Well-known member
No worries Dmac, your floor jacks, creepers, and tool boxes will roll over the floor just fine. Some of those floors you may be looking at have color chips added to full refusal. This can give the appearance of a real rough floor, but it's not. If you are going the full color chip route, just be sure to scrape the chips real well and vacuum before you apply the top coat. As Scotty said, at least two coats of urethane and you will have a great floor.
benwah
Well-known member
Also, If you want a smoother floor over the flakes, you can apply a clear epoxy coat on top of them to achieve a textured, orange peel, or smooth finish. Then apply your polyurethane.
LegacyIndustrial
ALLIANCE MEMBER
Frankly, the chips sit nice in 100% solids epoxy. Try placing them directly into a urethane paint and they become obnoxiously tall.
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Garage Flooring
ALLIANCE MEMBER
Question: Are you doing full broadcast or random broadcast?
why do some floors with chips lay down so smooth, and others look like a nightmare to roll a floor jack across? Part of this depends on your answer from above and part of it depends on installation.
If you are doing full broadcast epoxy, I personally would do a base coat, flake, clear UV epoxy top coat followed by aliphatic urethane top coat or at least two coats of the urethane.
In both full and random broadcast, after your base dries with the flakes in it, take a shop vac and rub it hard on the floor to knock down any chips that don't lay flat. You can use a scraper if you angle it correctly, for diy a shop vac works great with a wide attachment at the bottom.
All of this has to be looked at in relation to how thick a paint flake is... About 4-5 Mils (http://www.torginol.com/colorflakes/) Part of that flake is going to sink into your base, so for random broadcast one coat of urethane is more than enough, assuming it is a decent urethane with relatively high solids and DFT.
All of this in prospective. A mil is 1/1000 of an inch. Even at 5/1000 which reduces to 1/200th of an inch its not enough to impact the workability of the floor -- and that is not even a possible outcome. Where the issue comes in is where flakes land on other flakes and vertical and are not knocked down before the top coat goes on.
For illustration purposes these flakes are broadcast into about 6mils of urethane base (of which only three was wet) and 3 mils of urethane topcoat. Testimonial on GJ
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