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Epoxy Floor Paint Recommendations?

dalmatiangirl61

Diamond
Joined
Jan 31, 2011
Location
BFE Nevada/San Marcos Tx
I need some recommendations for epoxy floor paint that I can order and get shipped to me, there is nothing local. Rustoleum has a 2 part epoxy I can order from Amazon
Amazon.com: Rust-Oleum 304851 EpoxyShield Professional Floor Coating Kit, Dunes Tan : Everything Else

It looks like I can order Sherwin Williams Shield Crete, its a water-based epoxy
H & C&(R) Shield-Crete(R) Water-Based Epoxy Garage Floor Coating - Homeowners - Sherwin-Williams

At last shop I used Sherwin Williams Tile Clad, does not look like I can order this one online, and iirc it requires a fair amount of ventilation because it off gasses cyanide something or other, which might not be a good choice for this application.

Any experiences with water based epoxies? What flavor of epoxy paint do you prefer? Just to be clear, no paint is not a viable option.
 
I can't give you any recommendations for brand but I do have a tip for you. We had a paint crew where I worked and they did thousands of square feet of epoxy floors and they always wore old golf shoes when they were putting the epoxy down. You can walk across wet epoxy and it fills back in where the cleats were.

It's been a while but as I recall they mixed the hardener in the 5 gallon buckets that the epoxy base came in and dumped it on the floor and squeegeed it around. They could cover a lot of area fast and it was always so nice to go from a crappy old concrete floor to a new epoxy one.

They also had a machine that shot steel balls at the concrete and caught them to rough up the surface so the epoxy would stick better.

I'm looking forward to seeing before and after pics.
 
I could hire a couple guys to do the job, but it would be on me to make sure they understood how to apply it. No concrete grinding machines or shot blasters, the section I have almost ready to go was painted at some point in time, maybe oil based paint, idk, I scraped what came off easily with a razor blade, not all came off. Before painting I will mop with a strong tsp solution and call it good.
 
WEll, the difference between cleaning and etching, the etching converts the stray alkali on the surface to water and salt, and you scrub the salt off with the broom and rinse.

Cleaning is cleaning but not etching. I think etching will not harm most anything due to short time period of exposure.

I would be wary of all the new single part 'epoxy' paints, they are water based and not as tough. Just did my garage last year. Tires lift it up pretty easily.
Now I did get tire lift on real 2 part epoxy in the past, so maybe that is a tough test for a machine shop.

I used ben moore single part epoxy and two part epoxy in my shop and they both held up well. Unfortunately the don't make that product anymore.
 
In my case, 18 metre x 9 metre shop notionally divided into three 6 x 9 'bays' by expansion/contraction joints in the fibre-steel concrete floor, centre bay had been occupied by my British tractor .. several oily patches. Local bloke consented to do the job, one bay a time at one week intervals. Centre bay least occupied, did that first after I'd done two degreasings with Shell water-rinse petroleum based degreaser, followed by 'poulticing' the oily patches with builder's lime after wash/soak with mineral turpentine .. did that process three times over a week. The epoxy guy then diamond-ground the bay to skim off the weaker slurry top that finish working the concrete produces. His grinder utilised a serious industrial vacuum cleaner coupled to it .. no dust. He applied the epoxy as described by BigB.
In the intervening weeks I moved all the machines etc into the two available bays & repeat. Job has held up for 15 years so far, no evidence of where the oily patches were. Should mention, epoxy was applied a few years (2) after the concrete had been laid. Epoxy is Shell Epirez Supatuff FC.
 
I need some recommendations for epoxy floor paint that I can order and get shipped to me

Any experiences with water based epoxies? What flavor of epoxy paint do you prefer? Just to be clear, no paint is not a viable option.

The stuff I would recommend takes a week to fully cure. Are you ready for it?
 
My main garage floor is concrete. I thought I was being smart by having the floor "sealed" with a sodium silicate containing liquid - to prevent oil drips from the automobiles from soaking into the concrete.

Sealed it did. Oil drips wipe right up even a day later.

But so does condensation (h20) - continuously during the humid periods in the summer. The floor sweats when the slab is colder than the air dew-point. Makes for serious consideration of "slips & falls" not to mention the damage to machinery. Sweat/condensation usually happens about four or five times during the summer when the dew point goes above 65F.

Keeping the barn doors open from about July 1st onwards helps to warm the slab and minimize the sweating. But the cooling effect of even night or "captured ground effect" when the doors are shut tend to reverse the warming. And barn doors closed don't help as they can't seal out the outside air well.

So you may want to anticipate the possibility? If your space is somehow dehumidified or even air conditioned then perhaps its a non-issue?

Joe in NH
 
My main garage floor is concrete. I thought I was being smart by having the floor "sealed" with a sodium silicate containing liquid - to prevent oil drips from the automobiles from soaking into the concrete.

Sealed it did. Oil drips wipe right up even a day later.

But so does condensation (h20) - continuously during the humid periods in the summer. The floor sweats when the slab is colder than the air dew-point. Makes for serious consideration of "slips & falls" not to mention the damage to machinery. Sweat/condensation usually happens about four or five times during the summer when the dew point goes above 65F.

Keeping the barn doors open from about July 1st onwards helps to warm the slab and minimize the sweating. But the cooling effect of even night or "captured ground effect" when the doors are shut tend to reverse the warming. And barn doors closed don't help as they can't seal out the outside air well.

So you may want to anticipate the possibility? If your space is somehow dehumidified or even air conditioned then perhaps its a non-issue?

Joe in NH

It is going to take a whole lot of climate change before I have to worry about condensation. I have some sodium silicate and was planning on applying it first as a sealer/densifier, maybe a radon blocker. This first area is the test bed for what I do with the rest of the areas.
 
WEll, the difference between cleaning and etching, the etching converts the stray alkali on the surface to water and salt, and you scrub the salt off with the broom and rinse.

Cleaning is cleaning but not etching. I think etching will not harm most anything due to short time period of exposure.

I would be wary of all the new single part 'epoxy' paints, they are water based and not as tough. Just did my garage last year. Tires lift it up pretty easily.
Now I did get tire lift on real 2 part epoxy in the past, so maybe that is a tough test for a machine shop.

I used ben moore single part epoxy and two part epoxy in my shop and they both held up well. Unfortunately the don't make that product anymore.

The SW water based epoxy is a 2 part system, maybe part 2 is just distilled water, idk. Door is too small to get a car or forklift thru, so it will see dolly, bicycle and motorcycle tires only.
 
Do not use Rust Oleum or other one-part or water-based epoxies. I read reviews where it would peel up.

I used a local supplier back in 2007 to do my garage floor. It was a two-part product.

Make sure you apply the glitter; it disguises the smeary effect of plain epoxy and it provides traction. When distributing the glitter, throw pinches of it up toward the ceiling and let it sprinkle down. This provides a better effect when it contacts the floor.

Wear the golf spikes when you do it. I kept my paint-splattered golf shoes so I will be ready to do my next shop. You could probably get cheap golf shoes at used sports equipment stores or on Craigslist.
 
Do not use Rust Oleum or other one-part or water-based epoxies. I read reviews where it would peel up.

I used a local supplier back in 2007 to do my garage floor. It was a two-part product.

Make sure you apply the glitter; it disguises the smeary effect of plain epoxy and it provides traction. When distributing the glitter, throw pinches of it up toward the ceiling and let it sprinkle down. This provides a better effect when it contacts the floor.

Wear the golf spikes when you do it. I kept my paint-splattered golf shoes so I will be ready to do my next shop. You could probably get cheap golf shoes at used sports equipment stores or on Craigslist.

The Rustoleum is a 2 part epoxy, ad says it is solvent based. Initial area is approx 10 x 20, I know how not to paint myself into a corner. I want a solid color so have no intention of using the flakes.
 
Agree on the peel-up with the single part paint. I'm finding it patchy, though the concrete in my shop floor is very old and sandy. Mostly the peeling seems associated with traffic vs oil splashes. Cure was fast which was nice- overall it worked OK. If I had an empty shop and nothing outside getting rained on I would certainly prep more thoroughly and use a fancier product.

But still better than the previous raw concrete floor.
 








 
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