Lopco Blogs

Many of us have concrete flooring around our home or business in one shape or form.

A few examples of this are concrete flooring that can be found in our basement, garage, or shop areas.

In a good number of instances, people elect to leave the concrete bare.

This could be for a variety of reasons.

Maybe they are concerned about the long term maintenance of it if they were to put some type of floorcovering over the concrete.

Maybe they are concerned of the permanence of the floorcovering once it is installed over the concrete.

Maybe they just like the look of the bare concrete.

Whatever the case may be, there is certainly nothing wrong with leaving the concrete bare.

For some people though, the desire exists to make the concrete as durable as possible without laying a solid floorcovering (carpet, floating floor, etc.) over it.

For these types of situations, an epoxy flooring system may be the perfect solution.

An epoxy system, when installed properly, protects the underlying concrete from grease, miscellaneous staining, moisture, and even from cracking.

There are typically a limited choice of colors to choose from.

If the epoxy system is not installed properly, one could certainly have a bit of a disaster on their hands to fix it.

When an epoxy flooring system fails, it can fail by the system peeling off in sheets from the concrete and what is required to correct the failure, is nothing short of a nightmare.

To correctly install an epoxy system, the concrete should be etched prior to any application.

This can be done with some type of abrasive blasting or acid etching and is EXTREMELY important in order to allow the epoxy system to properly “bite” and absorb into the concrete.

I have found that the best epoxy flooring systems are sold in 2-part kits (what we refer to as an ‘A’ & a ‘B’) where the 2-parts are mixed together and then applied in-line with the way the manufacturer lays out on their labels.

These epoxy paint kits generally do not stretch very far and are usually a bit pricey.

The coating system is ordinarily comprised of 2 coats.

After roughing up the concrete surface via the blasting or acid etching, the 1st coat is applied and should sink really nicely into the floor surface.

The 2nd coat is applied and should finish it off beautifully.

Some systems even come with fancy speckles that you can add in conjunction with the 2nd coat to add a bit of flavor to things.

There is a pretty good variety of epoxy floor systems on the market, but no matter which system is chosen, the most critical step is properly preparing the concrete before the system is applied.

If done properly, an epoxy floor system will not only make your concrete floor look super sharp, but it will robustly protect it for years to come.

If not done properly however, one can certainly chase their tail, as they work to correct the mess on their hands which often could have easily been prevented by properly preparing the concrete surface prior to applying the epoxy system!