shop floors, what's your's like, what works

[threeputt]

Ok, so we're getting tired of painting our floors every year. (in a part of the shop area) And then having it chip, flake etc. and generally look bad after a few vehicles exit and enter over it.

The thing that's come to my attention recently is these "mats" that have either a coin top or diamond plate top look to them.

Drove a hundred miles Saturday to look at one actually installed in a working environment.

What are others doing for a really nice floor in their wrap/vehicle area?

 

[ExposeJustin]

We have grey epoxy paint and it works out nicely; we also have 2 mats that are 36" x 120" that we place on each side of the vehicle when the guys go to work on it so they can crawl/stand/sit comfortably.

 

[the graphics co]

polished concrete, easy to clean, looks nice.

 

[401Graphics]

race deck flooring, or something similar ?

 

[Letterbox Mike]

polished concrete, easy to clean, looks nice.

I would go this route as well. We were going to before our new flatbed arrived but it came faster than we expected so we weren't able to unfortunately, but it seems that just having the concrete ground and polished seems to be the most low-maintenance option. At least that's what our research showed us.

I wouldn't use any of the do-it-yourself floor paint kits, if you're painting it I'd have a professional do it. They'll polish the floor first, acid etch it and use a much more durable pain than what you can get from Home Depot. This was our second choice but we thought just polishing it would be the lowest maintenance, even though it's not a nice and finished looking as a painted floor.

 

[lexsigns]

semi polished concrete- no paint...wanted to but so much vinyl and tape stuck everywhere it would take me a week to scrape off. I dont own the building and dont want to invest much in painting expecially if I had to redo all the time.

What I do have is the puzzle type mats ( grey) I have them in a u shape for around the trucks and along the benches- saves my back and feet from being cold- Only thing that sucks is when a wet or snowy truck comes in I have to take them up or will get way to slippery!!!

Maybe wrapping is the way to go!

 

[HulkSmash]

Ok, so we're getting tired of painting our floors every year. (in a part of the shop area) And then having it chip, flake etc. and generally look bad after a few vehicles exit and enter over it.

The thing that's come to my attention recently is these "mats" that have either a coin top or diamond plate top look to them.

Drove a hundred miles Saturday to look at one actually installed in a working environment.

What are others doing for a really nice floor in their wrap/vehicle area?

Same problem as you. Painting 3 times a year....always coming off. Even the professional garage floor paint. I'm leasing this building so im not putting 10k down to do all our floors professionally. I'd go with polish concrete...

 

[threeputt]

race deck flooring, or something similar ?

Actually RaceDeck and similar products are modular 12"x12" interlocking squares. They average $3.50 to 5.00 per sq. ft.

This stuff is a large rubber mat. Averages around $2.50 per foot.

Not bad if you're only doing 500 feet like we are.

Here's a link: http://americangarage.com/p-159-commercial-coin-garage-flooring.aspx

 

[HulkSmash]

Actually RaceDeck and similar products are modular 12"x12" interlocking squares. They average $3.50 to 5.00 per sq. ft.

This stuff is a large rubber mat. Averages around $2.50 per foot.

Not bad if you're only doing 500 feet like we are.

Here's a link: http://americangarage.com/p-159-commercial-coin-garage-flooring.aspx

we looked at those.. we need to do 4k sqft.. no not economical for us;

 

[CheapVehicleWrap]

we looked at those.. we need to do 4k sqft.. no not economical for us;

But you can take them with you if you move.

The ones at harbor aren't bad when on sale... racedeck is ridiculously priced.

 

[threeputt]

So.....DOES anyone have the coin top mats installed?

Would love to hear before I throw $1200 to $1400 bucks at it.

Priced out the professional grade 3-step epoxy stuff (not the Home Depot stuff) and it comes out at about $2.50 per foot. Requires something like 16 days (to do it properly according to them) for all three steps and a ton of labor and prep.

We can't devote 16 days of unusable shop floor at this time. And it's no savings so we're really looking at the mats.

Anyone have them installed in their shop?

 

[signage]

If you are going to paint your floors you need them cleaned (either ground or shot blasted) for any of the paints to adhear correctly. The profession stuff used by professionals does not take that long to cure! I do graphics for one of them!

 

[Letterbox Mike]

So.....DOES anyone have the coin top mats installed?

Would love to hear before I throw $1200 to $1400 bucks at it.

Priced out the professional grade 3-step epoxy stuff (not the Home Depot stuff) and it comes out at about $2.50 per foot. Requires something like 16 days (to do it properly according to them) for all three steps and a ton of labor and prep.

We can't devote 16 days of unusable shop floor at this time. And it's no savings so we're really looking at the mats.

Anyone have them installed in their shop?

Not sure how much it helps but I have the 5/8" coin-top mats in my home gym and it's holding up very well considering I'm constantly dropping hundreds of pounds of steel weights on them. They're holding up very well to the abuse...

 

[Mosh]

dirt.

 

[SD&F]

Cement....looks great. If polished, looks good and holds up fine.

 

[FireSprint.com]

Sealed concrete. We had our floor cleaner do it for like $.10/sqft. Works nice, cheap to re-seal, very durable & easy to clean. It only took him a few hours too.

 

[Salmoneye]

Just saw a floor yesterday that has been down for 12 years with forklifts and skids on it every day and it still looks good. You are using the wrong paint. I epoxy over wook floors in some of our cheap rentals and it does well too.

 

[SignManiac]

I'll be doing something to the floor of our new building pretty soon. It's about 12'w. x 50'd. I was thinking that a optical illusion painting with the vanishing point far away like the sidewalk chalk artist do would be pretty awesome to look at from the front of the garage door!

Maybe a view of the earth from the space shuttle or looking out the door of a jump plane down at the earth. My suck for people who get vertigo

 

[BIG EASY DOES IT]

Just have them grind the concrete floor down. Then you can get it staind any color you want. For that finished color look. Then polish.

 

[rjssigns]

3" to 4" long pieces of treated 4x4 placed on end and covered with rubberized tar. Zero problems. Laugh all ya want, but it works.
Years ago I was in Ohio on a service trip and that is how they did the floor. Maintenance man said it wears like iron besides being quiet. The only part that wasn't was where the new press line was installed.
When I was there in the late nineties they had over 40 acres under roof. Epoxy coating would have killed their bottom line.

p.s. You wanted ideas. I can think of some. Never said they were any good though.

 

[TyrantDesigner]

I would polish the floor, wouldn't really take much otherwise that rubber flooring is awesome ... in my shop at home I'm going to throw the rubber stuff down ... but I also am not covering about 4k sq feet only like 300.

polishing is actually easy, you can rent a machine down at your home despot for this, take a weekend and get it next to mirror, then every 4-6 months if you really want to you can throw down some concrete sealer. but not needed in a garage.