- This topic has 11 replies, 2 voices, and was last updated 5 years, 1 month ago by
.
-
Posts
-
Hey all – my primary fermentation area is in my cellar. There is a floor drain and I have cylindro Conicals, so as you might guess it gets real wet down there. The standard grey garage floor paint was a BAD idea and I want to refinish the floor with a good quality two part epoxy coating. Does anyone know where I can find this in the Denver area?
I am getting ready to Epoxy this week. This will be the second coat for most of my brewery because the footprint of the room changed. I purchased mine from Original Color Chips. There are 2 schools of thought on Epoxy as I see it. If you want a solid product that will last you should go with a solvent based product but you have a vapor that is really nasty and the pot life of the product when mixed is not long; the water based stuff is getting better but wont give you the durability especially if you are constantly moving things around on it. The solvent is also a bitch to clean up from because most of the tools/brushes you use on it will be trashed when it is over because of the nature of the product.
I made the decision to use the epoxy with color chips and then I have a clear second application to put over the top to keep the wet look and maintain a shine.
When I originally doing the epoxy in the room 3 years ago I really didn’t put down a thick coat and went more for stretching out the product, the problem I had was that some of the very thin areas chipped off a bit. This time I purchased more material than I would need and hope to get a nice thick application. This will make the color chips adhere better as well. The one thing I did do was grind down the concrete with a floor grinder I rented from Arvada Rent Alls. This really helped with the surface adhesion and gave me a more rough surface to work with. It also made a giant mess in my basement as far as dust goes, but doing this helped me not used the acid etch that others may recommend. I also added in the anti-slip agent to the pot when mixing and that was a smart move because the floor does have a nice grip to it when wet.
You are more then welcome to come over and check out how this ended up for me once it is installed. After doing it once and using it for years I really saw many of the flaws I made with my original installation, I am really hoping to up my game with this second go round and get it damn near perfect.
I am not sure I even answered your question rather just rant about my experience. I would definitely tell you do not buy the rustoleum product they sell at Home Depot, I have seen plent of installs with that product and I assure you it doesn’t hold up. When you are looking I would suggest looking for a product that has over 80% solids if not 100% solids, that will give it a better color and thickness that will hold up over time.
Wow! ……love the detail Evan, great info here! When do U anticipate installing your latest epoxy floor in the new brewery?
Ok… Duh Jim….your floor is going in this week! I really should read more carefully. I have many questions for you Evan!
Hey Evan, I’m slowly getting closer to my cellar epoxy project and I am learning a lot about this as I continue to research it. I wanted to lay down where I am now so U can tell me if I am on the right track…..
At this point, I am leaning towards the Norklad 200 100% solids kit. It appears that will easily cover my 100 sq ft cellar. My hope was to go with a low VOC product to avoid much of the odor….is the 100% stuff less stinky? For a glossy final top coat, I wanted to use a non flammable, low VOC product for that as well, so Color Chips is recommending their Norklad 100M clear coat epoxy. I noticed you chose a polyurethane top coat instead, so I wanted to pick your brain on this.I have a dust shroud and a diamond wheel coming this week for my mini grinder, so I will be able to start removing the old floor paint soon!
….here are the epoxy items sitting in my cart at the moment.
Attachments:
I like the looks of the Norkland 200. Even though there is no VOC’s it will still smell would be my guess. The only concerning thing I see is how short the pot life is, good prep work would easily help you get it all down before that time is up. It will be a race thought. How do you plan to put it down? I see that you can squeegee it which would cut down the application time quite a bit. Are you planning on putting it on any vertical surfaces, or just the floors? Are you using the color chips? This epoxy seems to be some of the best adhesion for the color chips.
I wish I has a better reason for using urethane other than it was cheaper and seemed to have most of the same chemical resistance and clean up as the epoxy. I knew I needed to use a top coat to seal in the color chips and prevent dirt from building up around the color chips. From the spec sheet of the urethane I used I knew it would roll super thin and I could get 2 coats out of one box. Also being clear I could mix in the clear anti-slip material for a slip proof product. The clear epoxy does seem like a bit more rugged product in comparison. I was mostly looking for a compatible product that could be laid thin and have the option of reapplying in the future.
Hmmm, ok. I figured you used the Norklad 200 as well since u indicated it was 100% solids epoxy. Do they have a different version of that?
I don’t have any vertical surfaces and as U Kno, my cellar is small, so working quickly, I feel like I can get it down before it starts to set up. My floor has expansion joints that form a giant X in the floor, all sloping down to the floor drain in the middle of the X, so I figured I’d just mix up about 25% of the product at a time and do one section of the X with each mixing.
I think I will purchase one of those notched squeegees and if it’s ok, I’d love to borrow your spiked shoes, just in case I need to walk on part of the floor to correct an issue. Either way, I would like to review the entire process with you over a bier or two prior to jumping into this!!
I didn’t use a 100% solids material, I ended up using the Devran 224-v; as it has a high solids count but could be applied really thick as I wanted to make sure it was industrial grade but could also adhere to the old epoxy. In hindsight, I probably thought this one through to much but I didn’t want to risk a different brand product not being able to adhere to what I currently had down; I used another product from their series the first time I applied epoxy. I really just didn’t want to be left having to do this project a 3rd time.
You are on a really good track with what you have in your cart. I am assuming you have 1 or 2 lbs of color flakes in your cart? Make sure you know how to spread this prior to mixing the epoxy; you really have to pitch it up into the air so it floats down. If you can I would recommend only mixing what you need for the top coat, this way you can probably get away with doing more than one coat. You also might throw in some anti slip agent to add to the clear coat.
I am interested in seeing this project come to life in the near future. Let me know when you need the cleated shoe attachments.
Ok, gotcha. Yep, I think I’ll get a pound of color flakes. I’m thinking that should give my small project plenty of flaking. If it’s a little light, I’d be ok with that. A couple of questions just came to mind:
1. Do I need to put some kind of primer down or is it just one coat of the colored epoxy followed by a second coat then finalized with the clear top coat??
2. When do the colored flakes get sprinkled on?
3. I like the idea of a clear silica for anti-slip. Sounds like you added that to the clear coat application, correct?
You should be fine without a primer. Since you are mechanically grinding down the surface it should be very porous. This will mean that the epoxy will really be soaked up into the surface and should have great adhesion.
As for the flakes I would do them right after you finish the colored base epoxy. That way the color chips will adhere to this first coat. You can let them sit for a moment and brush them into the surface if you want all of them to stick, otherwise you will have to sweep up the ones that landed on each other or that didn’t stick. Out of my 4lbs (about the volume of a basketball) that I put on my floor maybe a handful didn’t stick to the base coat; I didn’t sweep my flakes into the surface for fear of leaving any marks.
Yes, I did add the anti-slip to the top coat of urethane, this way the traction is closest to the surface and isn’t covered up by additional layers. The flakes will give a light amount of traction but the silica really makes a difference when the floor is wet because the epoxy is very slick when wet.
- The forum ‘General Chat’ is closed to new topics and replies.