Epoxy flooring

[brasilmom]

Hi everyone,
My basement got some water after the recent storms in our area. We had vinyl planks flooring and had to pull all of it out, damaging most of it in the process. We are certainly not looking into putting flooring down again, and we are considering epoxy flooring. I want to ask here your opinions, experience, and pros and cons. Ideally, we would prefer to do it ourselves as the cost to hire out appears to be astronomical. We saw a company called Everlast Epoxy and wonder if anyone here knows about them and their product. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and opinions.

 

[bud16415]

I would start with figuring out the water problem first if this is going to be living space. Do you have an idea how the water is getting in? Sometimes it is as simple as getting the gutters to extend out from the house or some grading to the yard.

I haven’t done DIY epoxy. Like any coating prep is 90% of the job and that is what the pros do well.

 

[brasilmom]

I would start with figuring out the water problem first if this is going to be living space. Do you have an idea how the water is getting in? Sometimes it is as simple as getting the gutters to extend out from the house or some grading to the yard.

I haven’t done DIY epoxy. Like any coating prep is 90% of the job and that is what the pros do well.

The water came in from a small window. The basement is dry otherwise. The concrete is in good shape, but it is an older home. We just do not want to put flooring at all, hence the idea of epoxy.

 

[oldognewtrick]

I'm always a big fan of contacting the mfg and asking the tech dept about your application. They would be best to give you info on how their product holds up to moisture. As Bud pointed out, I'd first figure out how the water got in and correct that situation before moving forward with any type of flooring. Just my 2 cents.

 

[bud16415]

Sounds like maybe a window well dug down with some drainage below and a drain pipe from that away from the house will keep you dry.



I would start like oldog suggests with at least the websites of the company that sells the DIY products watch some videos etc.

I know a guy that did his garage and it turned out beautiful. Before I retired I had hired it done in some of our shop areas and they held up to fork trucks running on them.

 

[PJB12]

There are companies who do floors without epoxy and use very low VOC products. (Some epoxy coatings are very high VOC.) Polyaspartic is the epoxy-alternative material I've seen used most often. There are others, too.

At the NFL stadium where I used to work, they tried everything. The polyaspartic coating seemed indestructible. Those floors got terribly abused by dragged items (100# CO-2 tanks mostly), hot tires, steel tools dropped from high on ladders (me) and, of course, very heavy foot traffic.

We didn't have to empty the building of workers during application & curing. (As opposed to the other high-VOC coatings we tried.)

I know some people who have it in basements, garages and sidewalks. They like the results & the low VOC. Cost versus epoxy? I haven't an idea.

Here's a link explaining a bit about it: https://www.familyhandyman.com/article/polyaspartic-garage-floor-coating/

If prepped properly, urethane is another very durable product used on floors, but the VOC from the methyl-ethyl ketone is terrible and lasts a very long time. Prep is also very tedious.

Whatever coating you choose, I'm sure you'll be happy with it and enjoy it for years to come!
Paul

 

[Steve123]

Possibly your floor looks bad now from the adhesive residue, so I can understand the desire to do something.

Really, the best option for a basement floor is to learn to like the natural grey of concrete.

If it stays dry, epoxy should be fine. If it spends time underwater, I would not bet that it holds.

The one thing I don't like about epoxy is that virtually every system is high gloss, which I don't like for a basement. Maybe the chips would make it look better.

And by the way, the one-part epoxy coatings is just paint.

 

[68bucks]

I had dozens of floor coatings applied at work over the years. The best, most durable were usually trowel down materials ofter fiber reenforceed at any joints. This was mainly chemical protection and often forklift traffic. As was mentioned prep is everything. The best preps were shot blasting. Usually there was a multi-step application process. So high prep level, expensive material, labor intensive install, all add up to high cost. Ever think about ceramic tile? We put slate down in our last place, just regular ungauged 12x12 slate tiles with thinset morter. It flooded twice and no issues. Pretty east to put tile over concrete but a hard to take up.