[western star]

I was thinking of doing my garage floor in the 12x12 snap lock flooring system. Can anyone tell me their experience with the several products on the market. I want to use the solid coin or checker plate pattern so I can take an air hose and blow off the floor. Some of these floors have an open pattern to keep the water off the flooring but I can see a lot of crud building up in there. Any info, price dealers etc would be appreciated.

[ChevyTruckGuy]

I took a look at that stuff, but if your going to cut and weld it seem to me it would not last long. The only thing I found that was some what ok was an epoxy floor.

Craig

[western star]

Epoxy was definetly on my mind. I just wanted to get some feedback on the tiles.

[ChevyTruckGuy]

Yeah, I did a basketball court for an in door play area. I think the tiles were 2.50 3.00 a tile. The only thing I would be woried about would be spilling oil on it because of the oil leaking in to the cracks.
It looks good held up very well after two year still looked nice.

Craig

[Kevin45]

Living in Arizona, I don't think you have to worry about the snow so that would be a plus. If all you are going to do is park in there then I would say the tiles would be fine. If you are going to do any type of work that involves dirt, rust, welding, painting, etc. then I would say go with an epoxy coated floor. I am speaking dirt from experience

Kevin

[Centerline]

Originally Posted by Kevin45

Living in Arizona, I don't think you have to worry about the snow so that would be a plus. Kevin

Hay, careful there fella....... we had 31" a couple weeks ago.

[Beenaway2long]

Tiles work good for areas where you just park a car, or shoot the bull with your buddies. Its not the product for a work area though. Even Epoxy won't hold up to jackstands, dragging stuff over it, repeated impacts, etc. Heck, CONCRETE has a tough time keping up with me.....

It all depends on what you do in your shop, and how often you want to repair it. I've labored over coating the floor for years. I came up with one conclusion. Let the oil stains, scuffs, dust, etc become badges of honor. In no way,shape or form, can my shop be accused of "posing". And the $1,000 I saved, will pay for the valvetrain for the bigblock.

[western star]

Thanks guys you are helping me greatly. I still work in the shop and I do drag jacks around but no welding in that side. I do use floor jacks but some of these tile manufacturers state up to 16000 lbs of weight per 1 sq ft without a problem. I was leaning towards epoxy with mats under the stands but the jack would be a concern.

[roger1]

Mats are unnecessary for epoxy. Jack Stands or rolling jacks or engine hoists will not hurt it at all.
However, if you DRAG heavy or sharp objects across the floor, it can scratch.

Epoxy is very tough and durable. I used the UCoat-It system but was not entirely pleased with it. My brother did his garage with the epoxy from http://www.griotsgarage.com/catalog....3080&SKU=90011 and he was very happy with that.

I've got pictures of my epoxy floor and my brother's in my gallery:
http://hotrodders.com/gallery/showga...0&ppuser=17782

[western star]

A friend of mine did his floor last Summer. The floor is so shiny that it looks wet. I don't like that wet look as it's very hard to see if you have water or oil etc on the floor. Can you get this epoxy in a flat or low luster finish.

[Rick 5150 69]

I agree with Beenaway, its easier to just hit it with laundry detergent and a hose and broom, or just a leaf blower, I have no stains, hense the laundry detergent I guess, but my floor is a very smooth surface!

[roger1]

Originally Posted by western star

A friend of mine did his floor last Summer. The floor is so shiny that it looks wet. I don't like that wet look as it's very hard to see if you have water or oil etc on the floor. Can you get this epoxy in a flat or low luster finish.

The Valspar (Quikcrete) 2 part epoxy system carried at Lowes is a semi-gloss.

I have seen this used before and it works well. However, the semi-gloss finish is more prone to getting dirty from car tires than the full gloss is.

[western star]

Ah yes good point the shinier the surface the less marks. Maybe the bare concrete is the best way to go.

[roger1]

Western,

I thought you might be interested what I had to say about the UCoat-it.

Scroll down to my posts on this page:
Be proud of your garage!

Roger

[dinger]

I'm with Jeff and Rick on this one, pretty floors look nice when they're well cared for butwhen you start getting scars it's much more obvious. I have enough problems getting work done without worrying about keeping the floor pretty. It's hard enough finding shop time let alone mopping the shop time. Keep a rag handy for the spills and git r done. Dan