Rocksolid floor install

[Mike_C]

Finally decided to coat my floor after 3 years of being here. Of course that means I had 3 years to fill the garage with **** as well... So I will have to do the floor in 2 sections so that I can move stuff around.

Here are the items that I I have to keep in the garage.
44" HF Tool chest with top
5 drawer HF tool cart
Homark tool cart
CNC mill, I can lower it onto its casters.
Welding table, on wheels.
Welder, on mobile cart
7x11" horizontal bandsaw, soon to be on wheels.
20 ton shop press, might add wheels
20 gallon parts washer
11' workbench, I have some appliance dollys that I can use to move it around.
Hydraulic tubing bender, on wheels.
60 gallon air compressor

Here is my dilemma, I have one control joint towards the back of my garage where I wall used to be. The back section is 11x28', 308 square feet in total. The front section is 22x28', 611 square feet. And each rocksolid kit is good for 250.

So whats one to do? Do I buy another kit for a measly 60 sqaure feet of space? Or do I put down a seam line? This is how they tell you to apply a seam if you have to. (If coating in sections is required use duct tape as a stopping point. Remove tape before coating cures. Do not coat over the section that is cured. Place tape on top of the coated section duct tape as your stopping point. Once the next section is coated, remove tape. Do not allow coating to cure over the tape.) Do they want me to apply duct tape over the cured coating, and **** the two coating applications up perfectly?

Here are some pictures of my garage, still working on cleaning and moving **** around.

I've patched most of the floor, missed a few spots.

And here is the back section.

You can also see where my stairs are on the left of the last photo. If I were to put a seam line from the stairs to the back wall, that would leave me with a 247 square foot section to coat, which is pushing it on a single kit. But if I do end up with a seam line, I am leaning towards putting it there.

 

[benwah]

Couple questions, what are you using to patch your floor?

Which kit are you using, Polycuramine?

 

[Mike_C]

I used a kit from legacy industrial for the book of the patch work. Of course I missed a few small spots. I am going to try rock solids 2 part patch kit for the remaining spoots. The legacy kit worked great, and I would order it again for larger repairs.

I will be using rock solids garage for kit, and I believe all of their for coatings are polycuramine based.

 

[Shea]

Mike, just make sure to double check that it's the new Polycuramine kits you are using. Retail outlets are still selling the remaining polyurea kits that they have on the shelf. RockSolid has had problems with the polyurea kits that are more than a year old. They don't want to cure properly.

Also, if you are buying them from Menards (they aren't selling the older polyurea kits) and plan on doing a top coat of clear, do not buy the garage coat clear. It's $50 a box more expensive than the Diamond Coat clear which is the same product.

We talk more about RockSolid's new Polycuramine kits here.

 

[benwah]

So it looks like you're patching concrete before prepping, is this correct? What method of surface preparation are you going to use?

So I spoke with a gentleman over at Rustoleum, which manufactures "RockSolid Floors" and he stated there are no Technical Data Sheets Available, and he wouldn't email me the info he had, which is a Red Flag to me - but whatever. This is a hybrid "Amine based Polyurea" according to them and has a pot life of "1 hour" at 70 degrees (I'd be cautious of this). He could not recommend a standard Dry Film Thickness and only stated, "Each kit is good for 250 sq. ft." Which, if you do the math, you will see it's less than 6 mils.

I admit, the marketing is well done, but I am unsure of the product itself.

From my experience, polyurea's main downfall is adhesion issues and pot life. It usually fails when surface prep is not adequate, just a heads up. The pot life is really short and it's a PITA to work with. I personally don't even use it, it has more cons than pro's for me - once again, my opinion. Others on here use polyurea's regularly so maybe they can chime in some advice for you.


Just some observations... You are dividing your shop into 2 sections, 1 is roughly 300 sq. ft. and the other is roughly 600 sq. ft. right? Legacy Industrial, who is very popular around here, kit's of epoxy primer and urethane's kits are good ~300 sq. ft. Have you thought about going the epoxy/polyurethane route?

 

[LegacyIndustrial]

Benwah, is this really a urethane system being promoted as polyurea?

The long pot life points that way.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Mike_C]

Menards has the technical data sheet

http://www.menards.com/main/store/2...olid_wall/Prod_Tech_Spec/PolycuramineMSDS.PDF

 

[benwah]

Legacy, After looking through their MSDS http://www.rocksolidfloorsinteriorfloorcoatings.com/downloads-interior-coatings/msds-sheets this coating is definitely more epoxy than anything.

I compared MSDS to some pretty standard high solid/100% epoxies and that is what this looks like, with a few "Trade Secret" products in there. I see absolutely no Isocyanate in their part A or B, so that makes me think this has neither polyurethane or polyurea components in it. This has no aliphatic or cyclo-aliphatic properties in it, so this seems to be not very chemical resistant. It may, **I am no chemist**, but something isn't matching up. Unless these components are their "Trade Secrets" this product is less than 10% urea(thane).

Here are my thoughts...

When referring to polyurethane or polyurea, POLY pertains to "polymer"

AMINE pertains to epoxy. Polyamine means two or more amino groups. In this case POLY means: multiple; more than one

This product looks like a fast-cure Polyamine, Polyamide or Polyamidoamine Epoxy, hence the name, with some "Trade Secrets" in there. Since they do not want to give away their secrets we have no way of really knowing.

I could be totally wrong, which is fine. But until they come out with something showing what this is, I will remain skeptical.

Even when I asked the guy on the phone, "What exactly is this coating?" He replied, "Polycuramine.'.........

Oh, and it's not UV resistant or stable. So how can it be polyurethane AND polyurea along with epoxy?

Menards has the technical data sheet

http://www.menards.com/main/store/2...olid_wall/Prod_Tech_Spec/PolycuramineMSDS.PDF

That is the MSDS, same as the link I've posted above.

 

[Shea]

Oh, and it's not UV resistant or stable. So how can it be polyurethane AND polyurea along with epoxy?

Hey Behwah, you've come to the same conclusion as us on many of the same things that we mentioned in our article. Our calls to Rust-Oleum were less than informative as well. Abrasion resistance is on par to a quality 100% epoxy also.

 

[benwah]

Hey Shea, great write-up! Not sure how I missed that before, a lot of good info.

Well after a week of waiting and over 5 phone calls to their "support line", I have not received 1 piece of information about this product. These guys are a bunch of flakes and I would not spend $1 on their mysterious product. The way I look at it, if you cannot or will-not give your customers the proper data sheets or chemical breakdowns of what your product is, you're most likely LYING about it and don't want to be caught.

Selling this is big box stores is just the perfect way to get away with it too. Shame on you Rustoleum, but in all reality, we should have expected it from this company.

 

[hrockwell]

Some additional information from my personal experience. I installed the original Rocksolid product on my garage floor about 2-1/2 years ago. I have a two car garage but I have two HD garage mats. I didn't apply the coating under the mats so the 250 SF kit was enough to do the exposed area. It has held up well, the only problem being noticiable yellowing of the clear coat where it is exposed to sunlight. I decided to 60 grit sand the floor and do another application.

I contacted their product support and asked if the new Polycuramine would behave any better to UV exposure. I didn't get a straight answer but they said that my inquiry was a warranty claim and they would send me replacements. I told them that I was going to use full broadcast microchips this time in a color that would hopefully make the yellowing less obvious and they said they would also send an additional clear kit. Overall I'm very satisfied because I wasn't really expecting the free replacement plus the additional clear kit.

As far as the complaints about limited work time, I had no problems with the color coat on the previous install, plenty of time to apply both coating and chips. The surprise was the clear coat which started to thicken much quicker and I just about ran out of time before finishing. As far as coverage, I have about 240 measured SF and I had leftovers of both products so their stated coverage was pretty accurate for me.

 

[Disranger]

I will be installing a Rock Solid floor this weekend in my garage. We did my dads over the winter(mi) on his brand new floor. His being brand new it went pretty well. My one complaint was that it was hard to see where I was applying the clear with the rollers. The floor was so shiny and he has really good lighting so it reflected. We just about ran out too. The floor in one area looks marbly under the clear coat. And the color from the two kits doesn't match perfect either. Even though I mixed the two kits together. It still had a slight but noticeable color difference. All in all still looks great. We did this around the end of December and his has held up perfect. He has a 4 post hoist on wheels and parks a bike and car in there. No lifting has occured.

My floor is 10 years old and has some oil stains. I just hope I can prep it well enough with the degreasers and etc. I had planned on grinding the whole floor to be safe, but balked at the almost $300 rental charge per day. Maybe I will regret that maybe I won't. Most of my floor is in great shape, just had some oil "mishaps". I too will be doing a seam. I need to shuffle stuff around for the small room that is built into the garage. I will coat that at a later date. I will update how it turned out

 

[benwah]

I would definitely recommend renting the floor grinder. You should only need it for 1 day. Yes it may be expensive at first, but in comparison to your coating cost and time and effort to prep the floor properly - it's worth it to me.

 

[Shea]

Disranger, $300 a day is fairly expensive. You can cut those costs by at least 30% or more if you grind with a Diamabrush. You can read about it here.

 

[Disranger]

Disranger, $300 a day is fairly expensive. You can cut those costs by at least 30% or more if you grind with a Diamabrush. You can read about it here.

Very interesting. I may look into this.

The rental company said they would rent me a handheld diamon grinder for $25. I had considered it. We both wondered if it could make the floor un even. I have to do about 650sq ft I think.

 

[Shea]

Hand held diamond grinders work very well but they do require a learning curve. The edge of the diamond cups can easily gouge out half moon marks (kiss marks) if you don't hold them flat. These can telegraph through a coating. If you practice in an area you won't see much first, you can figure it out.

The Diamabrush grinders are much more forgiving of this and is why they work so well for the DIY crowd.

 

[Disranger]

Think I am going to rent the diamabrush. Checked it out yesterday. Seems like a good idea.

 

[slush]

Also, if you are buying them from Menards (they aren't selling the older polyurea kits) and plan on doing a top coat of clear, do not buy the garage coat clear. It's $50 a box more expensive than the Diamond Coat clear which is the same product.

We talk more about RockSolid's new Polycuramine kits here.

Is this still accurate? The MSDS sheets on mendards show "Trade name: Polycuramine PC 96 Part A" for both kits, but when I looked over at rocksolid it showed PC 96 Part B for the garage specific kit.

The problem I'm having is mendards will not ship the garage top coat kit, but will ship the diamond top coat kit.