DIY Garage Floor Sealer

So here is another DIY project for you!  Last winter we noticed a leak in the ceiling of our bonus family space in the basement.  It is underneath our suspended garage.  After some investigation we noticed a LARGE crack in the cement.  The water from melting snow on the tires of our vehicles was leaking down into the crack and into the ceiling of our bonus room!!  NOOOOOOO!!!  So we knew we were going to have to fix that this year!  Well...spring and summer came & went.  The kids keep us running and we could never find the time to get it fixed.  So here it was the end of September and we finally started to research and carry out our DIY!  We decided to go with a Rustoleum epoxy product.

Before we could finish our floor we had some prep work to get done!  First we had to either pressure wash, acid wash or grind the existing sealant off.  Since we had a leak already we decided to go the grinding route.  Mostly you want to rough up the concrete enough that the epoxy will stick to it.  We rented a grinder from Home Depot and went to work.  It took us about 12 hours to complete our 3 car garage.  It was a longer process than we had hoped, but we finally accomplished our task.

And it does get DUSTY while you are using the grinder so be sure to use a mask.  There is a place to plug in a shop vac to the grinder and I would definitely do that!!

We filled the cracks with Sika Crack Fix.  It took a couple of tubes to get this sealed.   It works best if you clean out all of the loose cement from the crack and then vacuum up the dust BEFORE you apply the crack fix.  After that, you will need to let it dry for 24 hours.

Once that is dry you will need to mop the entire surface you are going to apply the epoxy to and wait for it to dry.  Next, tape off the edges and then you are ready to start applying the epoxy.  You are going to want to start on all of the outer edges first with a paint brush and then roll the rest with a roller.  We went over each section twice to be sure we got it covered well. 

Once you are satisfied with the coverage of the section you are working on then throw the paint chips down.  This makes the finish stronger and holds together the epoxy better!  We chose a blue, gray, black & white mix.  My husband rolled the epoxy on while I scattered the paint chips.  This part took us about 2 hours to complete.   This is what it looks like close up....

 

It takes 24-48 hours to dry.  You cannot park a vehicle on it for that long.  And the recommended temperature is no lower than 55 degrees.  It got a little cooler than that on the first night we did it so we let it dry for at least 48 hours.  They also recommend no direct sunlight to be on the epoxy while it dries so we closed our garage door!  Overall we are happy with the way it turned out.  Here's hoping it will bring us many years of dry ceilings!!  It was a weekend project, but we are doing ours in sections due to the amount of stuff we have in our garage.  So we did the 2 car side first and we are now tackling the 1 car side.


This is for sure a project you can do yourself and save yourself thousands of dollars, but be prepared to spend some time getting it done!  Happy sealing!!