Is your garage floor made out of concrete? Does it have accumulated stains and chips in the surface? If your answer is yes to both of these questions, keep on reading this article. You will soon learn about the latest strategy to protect your floor and you can be assured of its effectiveness. It is also easy to apply and lasts a very long time. I am talking about applying an epoxy based garage floor coating. In fact, this is considered today to be the best choice for a floor treatment.
Epoxy is a very tough material that is the result of the combination of a resin and a hardener. If you know what fiberglass is, you are familiar with this sort of composition only fiberglass is made from a resin and a hardener plus cloth. Once cured, it so tough that such things as boats, race car bodies and construction machine parts are produced out of it. The very same idea is applied with an epoxy floor coating minus the cloth since the concrete floor serves as the supporting agent.
The procedure is really easy to understand and follow. First of all, you remove all the items on the floor and thoroughly clean the surface with a high quality degreaser. Then, clean the floor with a solution of soap and water and make sure that all remnants of degreaser are washed off. Next, you perform a beading test. If the floor is properly cleaned, when you spray a light coating of water on the floor surface, beads are formed since the water will just set on top of the concrete. If beads are still present, you have to repeat the application of the degreaser. Once the water spray does not bead any more, you know the floor is clean. Lastly, you should wash the floor with a weak muriatic acid solution (around a 10% concentration) for de-acidifying of the surface.
The two liquid chemicals - the resin and hardener are then mixed together to form the coating and this is applied on the floor using a nap roller. If the current temperature is only 6o degrees Fahrenheit or lower, you should use a space heater so that the temperature increases and the curing speeds up. After 24 hours, the garage floor surface can be walked on again and, after three days, it is cured enough to have the hardness that can stand a normal traffic.
