My wife and I are getting ready to purchase an older home and want to pull up the old flooring and stain and seal the concrete instead of going with carpet, wood or tile. I was wondering if anyone has done this and how it turned out. The house is owned by an older couple and has 5 or 6 different floor coverings down right now.
You ARE a redneck if... you knew someone whose last words were "Hey y'all, watch this!"
I've seen some of that done on the home improvement shows on TV, but I think most of what they did was color the concrete as it was mixed. I am sure you could paint or stain the concrete, I would bet you will have a lot of work getting the slab looking good enough to have it as a floor after all this time ( glue removal and patching where carpet spike strips were nailed in, etc ).
I've seen it done on HomeTime I think it was. They acid etched first and then stained and sealed.
But that was on new concrete. I agree that on old work that had glue and who know what else on it the results might not be too pleasing.
You might ask your question here: Concrete.com
Gary
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Hey! Aren't you supposed to be working?
I'll third the motion. Old concrete is going to be a mess. If you REALLY are sure you want to do this, I suggest trying it in one room first.
We went with laminate snap-down flooring instead of staining the concrete. We put down almost 800 sq. ft. in one day. The more carpet I pulled up the more I realized that we had made the right choice. Thanks to all for sound and honest advice. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]
You ARE a redneck if... you knew someone whose last words were "Hey y'all, watch this!"
Preping the old floor sufficiently to make staining successful would have been way more work than I would even want to seriously consider. There are degrees of perfection in finishing concrete floors when they are poured. It is not uncommon to find acceptable flaws in floors expected to be covered with something that would not be acceptable or desireable for a floor to be left visible. Like patches in plywood, if they aren't in sight they don't matter.
You say "SNAP DOWN" is that the full floating laminate that snaps together? I have a pallet of that to ferry upstairs and install over a thin pad material. Probably just a tad over 800 sqft in one room. Only place in the house I'm using that stuff. After I bought it I found out that it is EXTREMELY sensitive to moisture especially liquid spills and the slightest moisture getting into a joint will cause it to swell and be ruined.
The instructions for cleaning include using a spray bottle to lightly moisten a mop or "SWIFFER" thing. My next dissapointment related to this stuff was when I asked if I could top coat the floor with something to waterproof it and was told if I tried to "paint" it the "PAINT" aka urethane or whatever would get into the joints and they would swell up ruin the floor.
If yours is the moisture sensitive type it would have been good to do a simple moisture test. Virtually all slab on grade concrete floors transpire some water from the soil to the air in the room. Q: How much? A: It depends!
Q: How to test A: take a piece of heavy plastic sheeting (really tough trash sack, Visqueen, a large zip lock freezer bag or similar NON permeable i.e. water proof plastic and tape it down to the floor. Get a good seal all the way around. Let it go for at least 24 hours and then peal it off and observe the conditioin under where it was.
1. Was there no change noticed?
2. Was the concrete just slightly darker under the test area?
3. Was the surface way darker than the surrounding concrete?
4. Were there any visible moisture droplets?
These possible outcomes are liated in order of best to worst. IF your results are like #4 then you have to be very careful in selecting floor coverings. #4 condition can pop ceramic tile loose or breed a lot of mold and stuff. Condition #3 requires a permeable tile be used that will let the moisture passs through or carpet certified OK in moist locatioins. Porceline tile can't be used on a moist substrate as it does not pass water and will be eventually poped off. There are ceramic tiles that "breathe" and can be used in the presence of a little moisture.
Condition #2 isn't too scary but requires permeable coverings that will not trap moisture but instead pass it through and let it evaporate. Some laminate snap together floorings are OK in this situation and some aren't.
With conditiion #1 there is not enough moisture to worry about and you can use any floor covering you want.
As my walk-out basement floor is a couple feet lower than the prevailing water table in the surrounding dirt I was concerned that I might have a moisture problem. I went to some lengths to ameliorate the water problem with French drains and such but still was concerned.
I performed the plastic test, leaving it up for a week in several places on the floor and on the exterior walls down next to the floor. Every test patch turned out after a week to be bone dry. There was no detectable darkening of the crete under the test patches which would have indicated at lease a slight bit of tranpiring moisture. We cheered and I had a celebratory Diet Coke! the anti-water design work was a success.
Part of the basement (guest room, bathroom, and aux kitchen were then tiled with porceline tile which doesn't breathe (and doesn't need to.)
[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
Yes, it is the full floating that snaps together. I know that it is somewhat sensitive to moisture, but right after we got my daughter's room in place, she spilled her juice on it. I figured that we would be re-doing it, but it seems to be fine, so far (it's been two weeks and everything is still in place). We did not put it in the bathrooms, kitchen, washroom or living area, just the hallway and bedrooms. Supposedly, if you seal the joints, i is okay in the bathrooms and such, but that's not a chance I'm willing to take.
You ARE a redneck if... you knew someone whose last words were "Hey y'all, watch this!"
We have full floating snap together Pergo laminate all thru our house, the only problem we have had is one spot where a dog was peeing and it was hidden, that had a bit of buckling along the seams and another in front of the kitchen sink where we had a couple minor leaks which caused some water to get under the floor causing some minor buckling...
The dog is gone and the leaks are fixed, the buckling has subsided mostly...I think we might have been better off using ceramic tile in the kitchen. Occasional spills are no problem at all, we just wipe them up with no problems at all. It's when moisture is getting on or under a spot regularly and it's hidden or not removed is when you get some buckling along the seams..
Michael, What did yo hear was the "STUFF" to seal the joints with?
So far I have been thinking of doing some experiments with urethanes and such to see if I could put on 2-3 really light coats to seal the seams well enough to allow a regular (wetter) coat. This is for my wifes Tea room and there is a sink, counter and microwave. It would only be a matter of time and luck until someone spills a pot on the floor.
I would like to be able to waterproof it pretty well in additioin to using a non-skid additive.
Pat
"I'm not from your planet, monkey boy!"
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