VCCA Home Forums GENERAL DISCUSSION General Discussions PAINTING A GARAGE FLOOR

Don, how about nice polished marble with red plush carpet runners between the cars? and a nice alcove with a DVD projection system and an automatic drop down screen over the garage door. One of the Lone Star Members has such a setup and the couch is the rear of a 1957 BelAir, He has that Doo-wop music piped all around in a surround sound system.

My new Shop-Garage has a floor that needs painting, I don't like raw concrete, it has a 4 post lift, three work benches, 3 roll around tool boxes,two welders, two air compressors and a bead blaster, machine tools, and a bookshelf full of mechanic's books and it will only store three old cars and 5 engines and a complete 54 rear end and several transmissions, three cabinets full of car parts and 3 sets of pull out bolt bins. I need to build on, I already have the slab poured, now I need to go to a couple of swap meets and sell enough junk to buy the materials to do the building. You can never have too much room!

I do have some stuff hanging on the walls, like my grease gun collection, a Sears & Roebuck saw blade clock, a Coca Cola clock and other hangables.

Hi Mack. You have a working garage and I bet you enjoy every minute you are doing work on your cars. It Is alot better then doing honey do chores. The house we sold had a two car garage and I did do alot of car work In It. The floor had vinyl one foot square tiles and I did It In a black and white checkerboard style with a big chevy bow tie at one end. The mistake I did was to put about six coats of wax on the floor, and when I drove the cars Into the garage with the tires hot, They kinda like burned the tire tread Into the tiles permantly. These were commercial tiles made my armstrong which Home Depot sells. Doing ceramic tile on the new garage floor, I do not plan to do anything that would crack or destroy the tiles, I hope. I know a couple of car dealerships that have the ceramic tile floors and they get alot of cars on them with no problems at all. I would not even think about trying to lift a car with a floor jack unless I had a piece of plywood or some other support to lift with. My biggest problem Is moving out of my old house and three storage sheds Into a smaller house and even with the new 1360 square foot garage, I at this point cannot even get one car Into the garage because of all the stuff I have and because of the junk my wife has collected over the years. She thinks her stuff Is gold, But my car stuff Is junk and should be easy to part with. I think I should get a couple tips from the Junkyard dog, Because with his Bark and Growl, He has the say, I think. Ha Ha

Grrrrrrrrrrrrr.......!

Don,
I as well as others have built garage and storage space only to find that we will take any action to make sure that it is overfull. I have a 40x100 foot metal building that now has 14 vehicles in it plus a three car garage and a 25x50 shop. Can't hardly find a path through them.

I also thought that I was in control until I had realized that the "boss" actually was the supreme authority. Now everything is much better. I understand where I stand and so does she! If the dog wants to think he is in control just ask Charlotte.

A Junkyard Dog always has control...........always! I know that because Mrs. Junkyard Dog told me so!

I know the feeling Don, Until summer before last we had two homes, one in Midland with a 2 car garage in front and a 2 car garage in back and 2500 foot of living space, at the same time we had the lake place with a two bedroom one bath house (we built on and now have 3 bedrooms and two baths)with a garage and a large shop. we sold the place in Midland and live here all the time. We sold a lot of stuff but not enough! We sort and shuck and still have too much stuff, both of us are pack rats at heart.
If you aren't going to be rolling heavy stuff around and spilling oil and stuff in your garage ceramic tiles should be a good choice. know I had some problems at one place that had a terraso tile patio, trying to roll anything around.

I just can't understand dudes who have houses bigger than their garages. Heck, at the old mutt's place, the garage is twice the size of the house! That's how it should be! ha ha!

May I add my own advice here?

Start painting in the middle & work outwards!

See! we're back on thread, Bill! :)

Dum!...De Die!...De Dum!...De Dum!
That works good in a round house!

If there is a problem that your house is larger than your garage, just build some more garages!
Then paint the floors! Gotta go find a place to stuff some parts!

Mack, I know the feeling when you say you hold on to everything and find It hard to let things go. When Lynn goes to Costco four times a week and who knows how many other stores she goes too and hauls stuff home every time, And then complains that when I want to order and buy things automobile related, Well It kinda gets to you. Like I mean how many purses and pairs of shoes, Coats and makeup does a woman need, And all I want Is a car to restore and 50.000 Dollars to do It. Now Is that asking too much. Then again If I was Chipper, There would be no problem doing that kind of restoration. Actually when I met the bugle player at Grand Junction, I think maybe he was the one who was second In command at his house. Chipper does tell some good stories, If you have enough time to listen to them. The Junkyard Dog growls alot, But I really think he Is a puppy at his house. At least that Is what I noticed the last time we stopped and had dinner with them. He does pour a good beer though.

Yep, we are all kings of our domain, whenever the queen is out sight and out of earshot.....but I always seem to have to pay up later, and I ain't talking about the Fram filter thinge either!

Stuart,

How bad (loose) is the paint on the floor?

Is it bad enough that a scraper attached to the end of broom handle will get the looser (?) paint up? Or is it still attached tight enough to require you to rent a sand blaster to get it up?

How nice do you want it to look after you repaint it?

The answer to this decides if you can leave patches of tight paint to be painted over or if you will need to remove all of the paint from the floor.

Are there other "things" (oil, grease, known and unknown fluids etc) soaked into the concrete?

I'm sure there are more then a few of us here who have had to do something like this and can help you.

Louis C., There is still a lot of paint that appears to be well stuck on the floor, particularly in the third bay that was used mostly for an old car so did not get winter snow and salt dumped on it. I was thinking of renting a high pressure water cleaner and getting all the old paint up that I could using that. Then I planned on finishing one bay at a time and using that for a year or so to see how it held up. There is no or very little grease on the floor. I am not shooting for a show room floor, just one that looks fairly nice while protecting the concrete from any further degredation. At this time, the best product I have seen is an epoxy sealer/paint with a sprinkled finish. The only thing is most of those require bare cancrete so I would actually have to remove all the paint to use one. Thanks for your interest. Stuart

Have any of you used this garage flooring product?
it is:
VersaTile Interlocking Tiles- Gray - 50 sq. ft. and sells for $145.45 for 50 sq foot




Uguly Red car not included

it is sold by SAMSCLUB online. ( samsclub.com )

You might be surprised at how much paint a high pressure water cleaner will get up...it just might get it down to a 'bare' concrete floor for you. Sounds like a good way to start the project.

Good luck.

...add a sand blaster attachment to your pressure washer and have a sculpted concrete floor!

MrMack, I think that would be called exposed aggregate concrete......the architects like that stuff.

...that would not be quite the expected result, I am afraid!....

The one thing I have to find out, Is what are some of the good concrete sealers to put on the concrete floor before I lay the ceramic tile.I do not have a water problem where the concrete gets damp, I would think that sealing the concrete from that happening down the road Is a must. My garage floor has been poured In 12 foot square sections to eliminate cracking of the concrete and that has worked perfect because the concrete sections can move without the cracking of the concrete. I will lay the ceramic tile on each section and leave the cracks exposed so that I can lay a rubber seal or a finished oak wood trim over the exposed sections which should look good and eliminate the tile from cracking. I think that If I was to lay the tile solid across all the concrete sections that cracking would happen with the tile. The guy who will do the tile work says that the tile will definately crack unless I do the sections seperately, Because of the movement of the concrete.

I don't know Don, but I do know that if you spray the Thompson water seal, the clear stuff, paint won't stick to it, My wife did a concrete bird bath and the only place that paint will stick is where she DID NOT put the waterseal.

Don I would have thought that your concrete would have a damp membrane beneath it. Here in the UK after the floor foundation a plastic membrane is layed on top of a sand blinding to protect it. The concrete is then poured on that, if there is no problem now it is unlikely to occur in the future.
If damp is a problem then you may have to tank it. (A rubberised liquid membrane [Synthapruf] painted on & left to dry) This normally has a render of fine concrete to protect it but if tiling I would have thought the tile adhesive would do that with the tile also an exterior floor tile adhesive would not go amiss.
The concrete expansion joints may be required to breath if your concrete is very damp you can get a moisture venting compo which should help with that but I'm unsure of the wear resistance of it.

Hi Kipper Sarnie. Thanks for the tips. The expansion joints I will not tile over, I will use about a 2 Inch wide rubber or wood over the joints to hide the gap and that sould look good and give a little more character to the floor. Don