Garage (Building) Almost Complete

[oo7ml]

Hi,

I've been building a 3 car garage for the last 3-4 months.

I've one job left to do, before I take my cars out of storage and bring them home... put some form of finish on the concrete floor.

The floor is currently finished in polished concrete. I can't decide wether to paint it or put some form of transparent laquer on it.

I don't want to leave it as exposed concrete as i'm sure the tires will start to pick up concrete dust, and I plan on driving each of the cars every week.

Has anyone else been down this road before, and if so, what would you recommend?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[Taffy66]

oo7ml said:

Hi,

I've been building a 3 car garage for the last 3-4 months.

I've one job left to do, before I take my cars out of storage and bring them home... put some form of finish on the concrete floor.

The floor is currently finished in polished concrete. I can't decide wether to paint it or put some form of transparent laquer on it.

I don't want to leave it as exposed concrete as i'm sure the tires will start to pick up concrete dust, and I plan on driving each of the cars every week.

Has anyone else been down this road before, and if so, what would you recommend?

Thanks in advance for your help.

I also built a new three car garage a couple of years ago with a slate roof and concrete panel walls but no insulation. This was a mistake and i recently paid a couple of good carpenters to fully insulate and seal the ceiling and walls which has made a huge difference. The floor on mine is 6'' of power floated concrete which is a great finish but still produces dust. This dust settles on a damp car and can cause issues with the paint.
I've got a guy coming soon to paint the floor with a special epoxy paint specific for garage/ factory floors which is brilliant and the most effective and cheaper option.
By polished concrete do you actually mean properly polished which is very expensive or do you mean power floated like mine. If its real polished concrete then you don't need to do anything as dust will be minimal and best left as it is.

[oo7ml]

Thanks Taffy. Yes I put significant insulation in the floor, walls and ceiling.

Sorry, no the floor is not full on polished concrete, it’s just a regular 6” with a very clean finish so it will gather concrete dust.

What options did you come up with when choosing what to do with your floor?

[Chrism355]

Hi I wouldn’t bother painting floated concrete, either lay the interlocking rubber tiles made for garage floors or lay the rubber flooring comes on a roll 1M wide and gets stuck down. Both coverings give a dust free floor and are easily cleaned, fit and forget no maintenance.

[Taffy66]

oo7ml said:

Thanks Taffy. Yes I put significant insulation in the floor, walls and ceiling.

Sorry, no the floor is not full on polished concrete, it’s just a regular 6” with a very clean finish so it will gather concrete dust.

What options did you come up with when choosing what to do with your floor?

It sounds like you did a better job than i did from the outset. My choice on floor finish was either rubber tiles or garage paint. I chose the cheaper paint as my builder had enough left over from a bigger job at my cousin's shed.
The rubber PVC interlocking tiles would be my first choice if my budget permitted however i'm currently watching my pennies to save up for a 812SF later this summer. At the rate i'm saving it'll be 2025 before i can afford one but that's a story for another day.

[oo7ml]

Thanks Chris,

I prefer the concrete look over the rubber floor look.

I guess it’s a case of painting vs a lacquer?

[Taffy66]

oo7ml said:

Thanks Chris,

I prefer the concrete look over the rubber floor look.

I guess it’s a case of painting vs a lacquer?

I need to go and see the cousin's floor before i fully commit. I might go tomorrow as i'm passing his place so i'll let you know what i think. I'm pretty fussy so it'll have to be perfect before i do it. If you prefer the concrete look then you could just apply a clear sealant to stop dust forming.

[Cold]

Pull on your reading/drinking boots and have a read of this thread for ideas and suggestions:
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

[supersport]

I think it needs to extremely durable to not slowly come up, especially with wet or hot tyres.

I used a garage floor paint first time, and it came up very easily, especially with wet tyres.

Second attempt had an epoxy clear coat, almost seems slightly rubberised. My push bike with wet tyres pulled that up.

Maybe I should have left it a week, but even now 20 months later it can be easy to scratch through.

Edited by supersport on Thursday 3rd June 00:34

[Pioneer]

Metallic epoxy is way out there. One of the McLaren owners has just done this to his garage

[oo7ml]

Thanks for all of the suggestions, a lot of reading to do today.

Taffy, let me know how you get on too, and lastly, while a very silly question, what did you use to clean the concrete floor before you put your cars in. There is quite a lot of dust, and I've swept as much as I can away but conscious there is more there. My wife is very close to kicking me out to the new garage permanently, so I don't think she'll be too happy if I tell her I broke our vacuum because I hoovered up concrete dust. Any clever ways to clean as much of this as possible?

[Ferruccio]

I suspect that the only way to get rid of the dust is to coat it.
My concrete floor is very dusty.
But you need to let it dry for > 12 months first.
I need one pair of shoes to go in and I change into another pair to drive off!

[jasonwdh]

I put MMA Resin down on our garage floor, looks great - hard wearing, no dust and water just slips off it. Comes in a range of colours/finishes too.

[xcentric]

Did this a couple of years ago (6 bay garage, long story). Originally concrete floor with smoothish finish, but was very dusty very quickly. After lots of research bought this stuff
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B075FB26TX/ref...
2 Pack Epoxy Garage Floor Paint - 5 litres

Manufacturer is fine, but it's the fact that it's 2 pack epoxy that is crucial - it bonds with the cement, is hardwearing, and not overly expensive.

I put mine down with a wide roller on a pole - you can pour the paint into puddles and then push it vigorously around, and do the edges with more care of even a brush.

Well worth doing.

Note that the floor does have to dry out first, but I think I did mine after about 6 months and it's been fine.

[Taffy66]

Saw my cousin's floor this morning and its a special epoxy resin which you apply with a roller. Looks good and very hard wearing as he's driven back and forth over it with a 7T JCB handler. He put other cheaper stuff on the concrete walls which was also a garage floor sealer but a paint rather than the more expensive and much harder wearing epoxy resin on the floor.
I intend to apply the same epoxy resin to my garage floor when i get the time to clean the garage out.

[oo7ml]

Thanks all.

Taffy, I presume he just put 2 coats on it.

I’ve been reading that you should put the second coat on after 12 hours but no later than 24?

[Taffy66]

oo7ml said:

Thanks all.

Taffy, I presume he just put 2 coats on it.

I’ve been reading that you should put the second coat on after 12 hours but no later than 24?

He mentioned that two coats were put on floor but didn't enquire why. There are two different types of epoxy garage coverings. The epoxy paint is much cheaper but will not be resistant to chemicals and not very hard wearing. The much more expensive epoxy sealant(not paint) is the one to use but will need a pro to apply it.

[jasonwdh]

Taffy66 said:

oo7ml said:

Thanks all.

Taffy, I presume he just put 2 coats on it.

I’ve been reading that you should put the second coat on after 12 hours but no later than 24?

He mentioned that two coats were put on floor but didn't enquire why. There are two different types of epoxy garage coverings. The epoxy paint is much cheaper but will not be resistant to chemicals and not very hard wearing. The much more expensive epoxy sealant(not paint) is the one to use but will need a pro to apply it.

It took 3 days to apply ours, floor gets treated first with something to clean it properly, then a scree is applied that apparently provides the basis of the chemical bond - left that for a night to do it's magic and then applied the top coat over the next day - which takes about 2 hours to dry - once it is dry it is literally hard as nails and beautiful and smooth - it's not cheap but well worth it

[Crazy4557]

Taffy66 said:

He mentioned that two coats were put on floor but didn't enquire why. There are two different types of epoxy garage coverings. The epoxy paint is much cheaper but will not be resistant to chemicals and not very hard wearing. The much more expensive epoxy sealant(not paint) is the one to use but will need a pro to apply it.

Didn't realise the difference, thanks for letting us know as I was thinking of buying epoxy paint but that would probably have failed.

[Chrism355]

If you need to use the garage before you decide on a final product and you want to stop the dust then get some SBR from builders merchant. Unlike PVA SBR does not soften when re wetted but will seal the floor surface to stop dusting and improve bonding.