What steps to make this floor smooth? *large pics*

[6th Gear]

Epoxy was out of budget and Ill end up scratching up the floor anyways. Plus I like the look of the natural concrete, I want this:

My plan is to seal my floor with Quikrete High Gloss sealer.

Now here's what I have right now... pics are large to show the texture, pencil is for scale.

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5601.JPG

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5600.JPG

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5599.JPG
the 3rd pic shows the worst area by far, this is happening around a few of the posts.

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5596.JPG
Most of the floor has this much texture.

I am ready to rent a Diamond Grinder from HD this weekend, but the guy there told me that the floor isn't going to end up being perfectly smooth after because the machine will leave scratches in it.

What do I need to do to make my floor smooth, like a floor at a lowes or HD?
I'm guessing start with diamond grinding and then get finer discs?

I'm starting to consider if it is worth the time/$$. I've got 1200 sq ft to do.

Thanks in advance

 

[wbrian63]

Two questions before I offer my opinion:
1) Did you pour this concrete yourself?
2) Are you sensitive to criticism?

If the answer to 1 & 2 are "Yes" - then stop reading now.

That floor has a really sloppy finish trowel job. The ridges you see are from the float skipping along the surface of the concrete. Maybe the person doing the final float tried to do it too soon, or maybe they were a graduate of the Hellen Keller School of Concrete Finishing - I'm not exactly sure.

Anything you can do with the grinder will be better than what you've got now. I have seen floors that have been diamond ground and they were very smooth. Even a few "scratches" are better than all those ridges.

I would question whether the grinder is properly configured if it's leaving "scratches" behind.

Sealing the surface to prevent staining is probably the most durable solution. You'll get chips in the surface from dropped tools, parts, etc, but those spots are easily touched up with a little more sealer.

One more thing - not positive here - but possibly grinding the surface will remove the layer that the sealer would have penetrated into, making the sealer harder to apply and less durable, but I could be wrong.

 

[6th Gear]

No and No... the building is an amish pole barn. Looks like I got what I paid for

I'll be diamond grinding then!

 

[gmhill33]

Epoxy was out of budget and Ill end up scratching up the floor anyways. Plus I like the look of the natural concrete, I want this:

My plan is to seal my floor with Quikrete High Gloss sealer.

Now here's what I have right now... pics are large to show the texture, pencil is for scale.

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5601.JPG

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5600.JPG

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5599.JPG
the 3rd pic shows the worst area by far, this is happening around a few of the posts.

http://6thgearadvertising.com/pics/garage/DSCN5596.JPG
Most of the floor has this much texture.

I am ready to rent a Diamond Grinder from HD this weekend, but the guy there told me that the floor isn't going to end up being perfectly smooth after because the machine will leave scratches in it.

What do I need to do to make my floor smooth, like a floor at a lowes or HD?
I'm guessing start with diamond grinding and then get finer discs?

I'm starting to consider if it is worth the time/$$. I've got 1200 sq ft to do.

Thanks in advance

A couple of off topic questions.

1. What kind of cabinets do you have? (they really look good)
2. What kind of lights are you using? The 1x4's.
3. How high is your ceiling?

Thanks,
Gary

 

[Ford12508]

Gary, that picture is not of his garage, sorry to disappoint

 

[gmhill33]

Gary, that picture is not of his garage, sorry to disappoint

Oh, okay.

Gary

 

[Greg-nwo]

That is a pic of this garage Garage Condo Project

Thread is a great read and tons of info from the owner/builder in it.

 

[Scramblur]

Gary,
The cabinets are Moduline. I just unpacked mine tonight! If you search for "garage condo", you can see the build that the picture represents.

 

[Dominico]

From my experience I would suggest that you shot blast your floor. I am not an expert by any means on this topic, however I paid to have my floor professionally done and I observed the job. After shot blasting you will be shocked how good the floor looks. Either way these guys on this site have a lot of great suggestions and will steer you right most of the time.

 

[LegacyIndustrial]

Sir, what you see at The Home Depot is many trips over the floor with ascending levels of grit wheels on a very expensive diamond grinding machine. Probably finishing with a 1500 grit wheel.

These floors are also densified in the early stages and burnished in the second to last step.

Not to mention these floors were not in bad condition to start.

Looking at your texture, be prepared for many hours behind the controls of a machine and again switching out the grinding discs many times.
-Scotty

 

[LegacyIndustrial]

I forgot to mention. Contractors charge much more for a diamond grind/polish than they do to coat with Epoxy. If you are on a budget, grind the surface or plane the high spots and then add (2) coats of high-build epoxy, that shoud take care of it.

 

[6th Gear]

I rented the diamond grinder from HD yesterday and the floor is much better! I have a cabinet on wheels and it rolls effortlessly compared to before. I cleaned all the dust out and washed it out, now giving it a while to dry before coating.
Overall the floor is smooth, but the areas that the diamond grinder knocked down have a rougher texture than the previously lower areas of the floor have. So now I'm thinking about abandoning the idea of a high gloss clear and going with an epoxy as LegacyIndustrial mentioned above.

Thanks, you have all been a great help so far!
Lesson learned: it's much easier to do it correctly BEFORE the concrete dries!

 

[HIRISC]

A couple of off topic questions.

1. What kind of cabinets do you have? (they really look good)
2. What kind of lights are you using? The 1x4's.
3. How high is your ceiling?

Thanks,
Gary

Hi Gary..

1- As a couple guys indicated, the cabinets are Moduline. Pricey, but worth every penny IMO.
2 - They are Home Depot troffer T-8's.. 2 bulbs each. Here's the link
3 - Ceiling height where the cabinets are is 101".


Chris

 

[HIRISC]

Epoxy was out of budget and Ill end up scratching up the floor anyways. Plus I like the look of the natural concrete, I want this:

Thanks in advance

FWIW, our floor is MMA (acrylic) coated after a significant amount of diamond grinding to remove the majority of the concrete's 'cream'. We wanted the look of natural concrete/exposed aggregate vs the homogeneous look of epoxy.

Love the look, however the durability of our particular application is TBD. More to follow on the main Garage Condo thread once we hear back from the manufacturer/installer.

 

[LouisM]

Ouch Wbrian!!!

 

[LegacyIndustrial]

Glad it worked out.

 

[thegarageguy]

To smooth out those chatter marks, you need to grind with a 25 or 30 grit, then take it to a 60 or 100 grit to lessen the grind marks, the 200 to get it nice, smooth and even.

Your next steps are optional.....keep polishing your way up or seal w/ acrylic, epoxy/poly, polyaspartic or mma....the 2 latter will need a pro to do as well as the polishing.

Just FYI, concrete polishing is an art and time consuming. You not only need the right equipment and tools but also the right technique.

 

[6th Gear]

After learning what all is involved, I decided to go the Epoxy route. If the surface was better to begin with, a natural glossy concrete finish would have been more realistic. I originally wanted epoxy, but turned toward a natural finish to save some $$$.
But it turns out in my case, a glossy natural finish was more time/work than it was worth. I went with epoxy-coat and the kits should arrive next week.

I picked up some Quikrete patch to fill in some gouges and there were a lot of small pen holes after grinding. I washed the floor after it cured and the Quikrete stayed white while the floor turned dark when it got wet - it looked pretty bad with the white spots every where. So that pretty much pushed me to epoxy rather than clear sealer.
More $$ but I'm happy I had to buy what I really wanted to begin with, it finally made me spend the money!

 

[HIRISC]

Cool, nothing wrong with epoxy at all.

Looking forward to see how it turns out.

 

[haugy]

After learning what all is involved, I decided to go the Epoxy route. If the surface was better to begin with, a natural glossy concrete finish would have been more realistic. I originally wanted epoxy, but turned toward a natural finish to save some $$$.
But it turns out in my case, a glossy natural finish was more time/work than it was worth. I went with epoxy-coat and the kits should arrive next week.

I picked up some Quikrete patch to fill in some gouges and there were a lot of small pen holes after grinding. I washed the floor after it cured and the Quikrete stayed white while the floor turned dark when it got wet - it looked pretty bad with the white spots every where. So that pretty much pushed me to epoxy rather than clear sealer.
More $$ but I'm happy I had to buy what I really wanted to begin with, it finally made me spend the money!

I'm in the same boat man. My concrete installer could have thrown a grenade in and it would have looked better. So now I'm going the epoxy route as well. I've convinced myself the Wolverine floor will look better anyways. Take lots of pics!!!

 

[rbn14]

We let our Universities concrete canoe team build their boat in the basement of our lab. They start with drywall sand paper and sand for weeks. Drywall sandpaper will actually leave a pretty nice finish and sands fast. There is nothing on this concrete but sealer and stain...