New Garage - Anyone Use Concrete Stain?

[jsssvt]

I developed a neighborhood where we used stained concrete as the finish floors in the homes. (Integrally stained, polished smooth in first day after pour, then scored in 3` squares on the diagonal. Beautiful--people thought it was a kind of Mexican tile.)



There are two ways to stain concrete. The pigment can be mixed right into the concrete in the truck (integrally stained). This is the way we did it in the homes. I highly recommend this. Even if something chips the concrete, you have color all the way through and it hardly shows. The color is rich. My floor looked like leather.



For floors that are already down, acid-etch stain is what is used. I used this in the community building for that neighborhood. The color isn`t as dense, in my experience, as with integrally colored. The prior poster said to acid wash the floors--for floors that aren`t new concrete--and then stain them. New concrete doesn`t necessarily need the acid wash. Make sure you use an acid etch stain meant for concrete. This sort of stain interacts with the alkaline in the concrete and really stains it. It`s not a pigment on top situation, where traffic will wear off the color. You may need to apply the product more than once to get the density/richness of color you want.



Acid etch stained concrete can be seen often in commercial situations. We`ve got a Whole Foods Market nearby that took an old A & P, the original floor, and stained it. It`s held up great to a lot of traffic. The colors that are easiest and least expensive to achieve are in the red/clay color range.



Topping it off--I`ve had some people use special polyurethane and like it. I`ve also seen polyurethne start separating from the concrete, especially where there is an impact, then it chips away. But in other spots, it stays really bonded, creating an awful mess that just needs to be ground off to start again. In my own home, I used an acrylic wax that could be topped easily (water based), and could also be easily stripped. In a garage, I`d be tempted to just stain it and leave it alone. Butcher`s wax can also be used, but that`s more of a maintenance item, I would think.



Sorry for a long post. I haven`t used any of the epoxy systems, but thought I`d throw my experience with stained concrete into the pot .

there are a few good points here, but the only thing i see that he didn`t clarify is the acid washing. if you have a trowel finished you would need to acid wash it. the concrete would be to smooth to get a great bond. if it was a brush finish no need to acid wash.

also if you just got new concrete. please wait at else 30 days till all the cream up to the top.

[Rogerm311]

Had to chime in on the floor question, hands down the most durable and lowest cost per sqft to maintain is a polished concrete floor, it can be dyed and various designs can be cut into the floor. Now I am biased being I`m a concrete floor polisher but we also acid stain and seal and epoxy concrete floors (no experiece with the tile system). I helped install my neighbors and parents epoxy floor, both about a year after I polished my garage floor and they both wish they had me polish their floors being that it is a little harder to sweep being not nearly as smooth, and one of the floors is starting to peal from where the tires sit (hot tires can pull up epoxy) epoxy also does not breath and any moisture that migrates up through the concrete will make it pop off. Acid stain and seal would be my second choice but make sure to use a top quality sealer. I`ll try and post some pictures of my floor as soon as I can, I wouldn`t hesitate and put my floor up against any other system on the market for durability, shine, and ease of cleaning

[Rogerm311]

Oh, and you shouldn`t acid wash the floor before using acid stain as acid staining reacts with the lime in the concrete and if you acid wash it before staining it uses up some of that lime, you can acid wash before putting epoxy down but the best way is to mechanically grind the floor so the epoxy has something better to bond to, what your worried about is making sure that all of the cure and seal is removed before doing either process. A hard trowelled floor may need a little bit of muratic acid added to an acid stain to help it penatrate but that is kinda rare

[Deep Gloss Auto Salon]

Had to chime in on the floor question, hands down the most durable and lowest cost per sqft to maintain is a polished concrete floor, it can be dyed and various designs can be cut into the floor. Now I am biased being I`m a concrete floor polisher but we also acid stain and seal and epoxy concrete floors (no experiece with the tile system). I helped install my neighbors and parents epoxy floor, both about a year after I polished my garage floor and they both wish they had me polish their floors being that it is a little harder to sweep being not nearly as smooth, and one of the floors is starting to peal from where the tires sit (hot tires can pull up epoxy) epoxy also does not breath and any moisture that migrates up through the concrete will make it pop off. Acid stain and seal would be my second choice but make sure to use a top quality sealer. I`ll try and post some pictures of my floor as soon as I can, I wouldn`t hesitate and put my floor up against any other system on the market for durability, shine, and ease of cleaning

What is the going rate per sq ft to polish the concrete?



I finally decided last week that polishing is the route I am going to go...



Thanks...

[paco]

For a garage. Stain isn`t a good option.



Go with with a high grade Epoxy .. either Wolverine or Ucoatit. I would personally avoid the Rustolieum option as it doesn`t appear to be as durable or resistent to tire pickup as Wolverine or Ucoatit. You don`t need to add chips if you don`t want to, you can stick with a solid color which looks nice as well. The chips just had dirt and imperfections etc.

[Rogerm311]

So why do think that stain is not a good option Paco? Actually if you liked the look of an acid stained floor you could put a clear epoxy over it and have the same durability, but basically it boils down to this ANY type of product that is topical will eventually wear off a cheap sealer/epoxy will be gone in 6 months to a year especially where the vehicle tires are driving over it, a high grade epoxy you`ll get anywhere from 1 to maybe 8 years (maybe) with the proper maintenance. A polished floor is different because there is nothing topical to wear off, during the polishing process the concrete is densified and hardens the concrete up to 40%, and increases light reflectivity to name a few, epoxys can yellow or discolor, get burn marks if using a welder, when you do fix or reapply/replace epoxy you have to stay off it for 1 to 7 days (a high traffic church floor that was about 20,000 sqft I polished over 10 years ago, I brought the shine back up to like new by burnishing it in 6-8 hours and people could walk in that area during the whole time I was doing it) I`m not trying to bash on epoxy like I said we install them, but we also do a lot of demo work removing epoxy floors a couple of years after they have been installed. I will give epoxy the edge on stain resistance and if you want a more "painted" floor look although you would have to be a complete slob to stain polished concrete, I had a bucket of used oil left in my garage that when picked up had a ring of oil that wiped right up.

Oh sorry and to answer your question, approximately how many sqft are you needing done deep gloss?

[paco]

Actually, that`s a good point about Epoxy clearing a stained floor. That would work but most people who stain are looking for a alternate to epoxy due to the multiple steps and time it takes.



However, you still need proper bonding to the concrete outside of the stain if you`re epoxying. So the prep would be the same with regards to cleaning, repairs, etching (chemical or mechanical)... not sure how the stain would look like on an etch`d floor. It would literally come to .. do you like the look of stain or painted floor with/without chips..



If you don`t etch properly, the epoxy wont have anything to bite into like it would with the base build coats and epoxy attachment to teh painted layers.