Quick Epoxy-Coat review

[P0234]

Quick intro and review of epoxy coat.

With a new house and an old house sale, move and new baby, I figured things weren't hectic enough, so I thought I'd coat my floor in the new house before moving in. Bonus points for packing away most of my tools/gear before attempting to do this.

After lots of reading here I was on the fence about Rustoleum Pro and E-C. I chose Epoxy Coat because the advertised dry time was much shorter than Rustoleum. I went with the beige kit with the clear, enough to do my smallish 2-car garage.

Steps:

1. Scrub floor with wire brushes to remove paint left from contractors
2. Power Wash with Zep Concrete Cleaner
3. Acid etch with included acid
4. Acid Etch with Muratic Acid
5. Neutralize with generous amount of TSP, and broom scrub
6. Let dry 24 hours, when done concrete humidity reading was 51%
7. Apply base coat late in evening as temps were dropping
8. Apply Clear approx 15 hours later

The good

• Looks great
• Application procedure works fast and well
• Generous amount of chips

The not so good

• The mixing sticks ****, #1 problem with this kit
• Advertised dry time isn't accurate, working time is longer than indicated as well.
• My concrete laughed at the included acid etch, had to resort to Muratic to get any sort of profile
• Did I mention the measuring sticks ****!?!?

As great as it looks, its 4 days and I can still dent it with my fingernail, though it heals really fast. I finally had to bring stuff in and park a car on it. Weather has been ideal, about 50% humidity, lows in the high 60's, highs in the mid 80's.

The measuring stick stuff is terrible. It's such an inaccurate way to measure. It is very hard to see the lines well in such a deep bucket and even if you are off by a tad, you significantly affect the levels. If there is a next time, I'm buying small buckets and measuring, but there is no reason EC could not include marked small buckets. Wishful thinking would be graduated cylinders. So I ended up with about 1/4 gallon of the clear epoxy leftover. I know I used plenty of hardener as my rollers were SMOKING after application! And I went by the stick on a flat surface every time.

I also would like to see some graphs or formulas for working times. I know this isn't for everyone, but some of us would like to know. I felt the 15 minute window in the instructions was a scare tactic, it seemed like I had much longer than that. For the next one, there is no reason I couldn't do a whole two car garage in one mixing.

Overall, I'm happy with the product so far, I don't want to say it is a bad product, but I feel lucky in certain respects and I am glad I did several hours of reading here. If I had followed the directions at face value, things could have gone very wrong. The fact this kit is sold at Lowe's is amazing as now I realize what can go wrong.

Anyway, that's my story. Thanks for reading it and a big thanks to all those that have posted their experiences with the E-C system.

 

[rugerlady]

If the instructions are read correctly, your have 15 minutes to get your cutting in done and get the product spread out. From there you should have another 30 minutes to roll it then back roll it. All told you should have about 45 minutes totsl to work each section.

 

[P0234]

Hmmm, I guess I must have read it incorrectly:

"Immediately pour ALL mixed contents in a line on the floor. After mixing, you have up to 15 minutes working time at 70° degrees F (lower at higher temps)"

 

[Familyof8kids]

Ya a successful install!!!!! All I have been reading lately is failures and I almost want to send back my UPS delivery arriving today and take the restock hit but NO WAY we want the first JOHN DEERE floor posted on Garage Journal. Even my local JD shop is wanting to see it badly.

Thanks for the info on the sticks. Another person somewhere said that was an issue with almost all mixing buckets and he used a banging bunch of buckets with marks he made on them so mixing was no question.

Good job! Any pictures??

 

[P0234]

Yeah, I am happy it went down well and I don't want to say its a bad product at all. There is just a lot left to luck with the current instructions. Here is a quick pic. I had to move stuff in after a day.

 

[csp]

"Immediately pour ALL mixed contents in a line on the floor. After mixing, you have up to 15 minutes working time at 70° degrees F (lower at higher temps)"

Would you rather have the instructions say you have 45min when in actuality you only have 15? Personally, I'll take the conservative instructions.

 

[P0234]

I don't think it would take much to come up with a graph for working time based on temp. I am ok with a conservative one but we are talking a 3x difference here.

 

[P0234]

Just as a follow up, it took about two months for me to finally not be able to put a finger nail mark in it. Finally rock hard.

 

[pauloman]

your muratic acid use caught my eye. Floors are acid etched with about 10-11% conc of acid. Muratic acid is generally sold in about 33% conc.

Note that muratic acid fumes (HCl) will attack any metal objects in the area. You also need to flush the acid away (which could kill your lawn in nearby). I imagine that flushing 30% acid is much more difficult than flushing 10%.

I see you did neutralize the surface (which is great and als necessary). I don't know but may be it takes more/stronger stuff to neutralize the stronger acid. That might explain the slow cure.

paul oman - progressive epoxy polymers - member SSPC (professional coating society)

 

[AlphaGarage]

The cure time should not be dependent on whether or not the acid was properly neutralized or not (at least that's the case with our coatings - as always confirm with the supplier of your products).

What might be affected by non-neutralized acid is the durability of the coating. If there's residual acid in the concrete there's the possibility of it becoming "hot" when exposed to moisture that wicked up through the concrete. As it rises it could "hit" the ceiling of the coating, and with no where left to go it can pool there and slowly start to work again on the calcium in the concrete just below the coating. If there's too much of this interaction the coating might end up with nothing but loose calcium and concrete dust to hang on to, if it's bad enough the coating could delaminate from the floor.

That's why it's critically important the you thoroughly neutralize the muriatic acid before applying any coatings.

After you acid wash the floor, do not allow the acid wash solution to dry on the floor! Unlike in the movies the muriatic acid doesn't vaporize everything it comes in contact with, in the case of concrete it leaches out calcium. However the calcium is still there, it's held in suspension in the acid solution. If that's allowed to dry the loose calcium is redeposited on the concrete, it looks like fine dust, and it will need to be removed. Probably the easiest way to do that is to re-acid etch the floor, again.

Once the floor is rinsed neutralize any residual acid. Use 3 to 4 cups of baking soda (or bicarbonate of soda, lime, or soda ash), mixed with 1 gallon of water. Apply it to the floor and agitate it with a stiff bristle broom, rinse with clean water, rinse again.

I'd avoid using a pressure washer to rinse off the acid solution, you don't want to drive any hot acid down into the concrete. Once it's been thoroughly neutralized you can use a pressure washer.

Also - an acid solution is not intended to clean the concrete, do that beforehand, then acid etch.

Keep in mind that muriatic acid is one of the most toxic and hazardous items sold in the hardware store - read all directions and take them seriously. It's not only dangerous in its liquid state, its fumes are also hazardous, both to your health and to any many metal objects in the vicinity. Make sure the environment is well ventilated, wear the appropriate protective gear, know what to do in case of spill or contact with skin, eyes etc.

There are alternative chemicals which are far more "user and environmentally friendly", but they generally have a higher price tag. We offer "OrganiPrep 921," very low odor, contains no toxic or hazardous air pollutants, no mixed required, rinses off with just water, same results. More info.

 

[P0234]

Thanks for the input guys. I don't think my experience is out of the norm. It was ready to park on after a few days but it didn't get rock hard for quite a while. I'm very confident in my rinsing and neutralizing as I am in my use of hardener. Anyway I am thrilled with the final results. The floor looks and works great.

I just wanted to share my story in case someone else was worrying about being able to leave (temporary) marks.

 

[rmmiller]

Being new to this forum I am very impressed with the number of vendors that are actively involved and the helpful knowledge they share. I plan on doing my floors in the future and this thread will be helpful in the near future.

 

[P0234]

Well despite the comments above about my questionable use of muratic acid, the floor did great. Made it almost ten years before I moved out. I expect it to go at least ten more.



Needs a good bath but otherwise looks great.

Only had a few spots that had trouble. One quarter sized dot came up under a tire.



A jack stand dug in here I think…



And a couple of hot tire marks from when it was still new. None since.




Overall it was a great floor. I kept three to four cars maintained in that garage, plenty of things dropped and spilled. Was super easy to clean and really kept the dust down.