sealing concrete floor of shop

[Vondawg]

[member=76735]craftsmanconcrete[/member] ….thanks for all the good info !

 

[mino]

I would go the other way here.

Walking /and working/ on a hard concrete floor is no fun for your body. You need soft shoes and those are rarely stable and vice versa.

I would still seal the concrete - but not to have it look nice/be smooth etc. but just enough to protect it from damage. Would make sure the surface is still kinda rough, or is antislip. E.g. by sanding it lightly after sealing is way cheaper than using a special anti-slip coat.

Then put on some rubber surface on which I would be walking on, placing the movable/wheeled things on etc. Would put it everywhere except where heavy machinery will be. The rubber surface is where I would invest the most in.

Ideally, would go with big tiles so they can be moved out of place when machinery/cabinets are being rearranged.

One thing - if the floor is fresh-y. I would not treat it with any vapor-closing sealant for the first few years. Some single-paint of acrylic sanded over to protect the surface would be all.
It takes a couple years for concrete to properly settle and it changes shape (contracts) during this time ever so slightly. Ideally, one would give it the time, then, 5-10 yrs later, plan to hire a crew with concrete flattener to flatten it again and only then put on some final sealant. When sealed, water escapes more slowly and CO2 cannot get in to hard-cure the surface, so it makes the "shape-changing" period longer but is still happens. Un-leveling any precisely leveled floor.

In our shop the concrete contracted after flattening so is now about 1/2" lower in the center of the 10'x10' pieces and it is a pain. Unfortunately in a rented space fix is a no-go ...

 

[tallgrass]

I use horse mats in my shop. indestructible, and easily replicable. The best thing about them , you do not have to tear your shop apart and so on.

 

[dwillis]

I recently built a house, workshop, and garage using a slab on grade with a steel trowel finish. The design called for a finished concrete slab and I used a product from Prosoco, LS Premium concrete sealer, hardener, and densifier (https://prosoco.com/product/ls/). It's a waterborne product, applied with a simple garden sprayer. Application is quick and easy. So far I'm pleased with the results after two years of of use in all three spaces. Since I had excess product I also applied it to my concrete driveway and it seems to have held up to rain, snow, traffic, and spills.

 

[MarkTwels]

I think it's a great idea. But test it first

 

[Packard]

On one of the home improvement tv shows, a homeowner was advised against polished and sealed concrete.  With the contractor saying it cost more than porcelain tile to do, and required periodic maintenance.

I have no experience to back that up, but with all the equipment in my shop, and all the dust, prepping for a periodic recoat sounds unappealing to me.

P.S.:  It is also possible that the contractor had good vendors for tile setting and none for concrete polishing and was steering the client to a product that they were comfortable with.

 

[mino]

And the contractor was right.

For a normal homeowner who does not expect to move 500+ lbs equipment on wheels around that floor ..
[smile]

 

[Cheese]

On one of the home improvement tv shows, a homeowner was advised against polished and sealed concrete.  With the contractor saying it cost more than porcelain tile to do, and required periodic maintenance.

P.S.:  It is also possible that the contractor had good vendors for tile setting and none for concrete polishing and was steering the client to a product that they were comfortable with.

I think it's the later, why would HD seal and polish the concrete floors of all their stores if it cost them more than simply installing porcelain tile?
That's a pretty foolish decision if once porcelain tile is installed, then the maintenance is done?

And that brings me to the fact that the internet is a vast source of both accurate & unfortunately, even seriously inaccurate information. Unfortunately, it seems there are more people offering inaccurate information because it's easier to just copy and paste  and it requires more work to substantiate. 

 

[mino]

I think it's the later,
...

Would not be so harsh here. Industrial applications call for uniform and super-strong surface and are willing to pay for it. Not so much with home garage where no heavy equipment is presumed ..

Over here, quality artificial stone (no chipping of the top layer) go €6 per m2. That is cheaper than a proper coat of paint of any quality. Not to mention any flattening work needed etc. etc. One can lay it over rough concrete in a one day job in two people.

That artificial stone tile floor, done right, will last 100+ years while resist oil spills etc. way better that any pain will. What it does not suport is rolling around a 800+ lb planer pieces ... but that is not a normal home owner concern ...

From me +1 for a sealed concrete slab, assuming one has the budget.

Should one ever change the mind, tiling, covering or in any way re-surfacing a flat concrete floor is the easiest thing. Re-tiling or re-flattening a tiled one .. umm .. not a pleasant thought.  [blink]

 

[Svar]

I think it's the later, why would HD seal and polish the concrete floors of all their stores if it cost them more than simply installing porcelain tile?

Because they have sky high multi-ton shelving units sitting on that floor and occasionally drop metal girders, cast iron bathtubs, cement blocks and whatnot from that height, plus drive around heavy equipment. Porcelain tile would shatter to pieces in no time.

 

[Crazyraceguy]

You can see it by the swirlyness on the floor in most of the pics I have ever posted about the shop where I work, the entire shop is sealed. They did a polish finish with the powertrowel and clear sealer after....60k sqft. before anything else happened. It has been 4 years in an industrial environment, with trucks, vans and 2 forklifts. It is covered up with 1/4" MDF in the laminate countertop area, because of spray contact cement, but that's the only place.
The pics always make it look darker than it really is in person.