Hi All,
I need some advice on on fixing scratches in an interior colored concrete floor. In the house I’m working on we poured decorative colored concrete floors on most of the main floor of the house (about 3″). The color was added to the concrete and mixed (not stained), the concrete poured and hand-troweled. The floors were poured over a two-day period and after the first day, we asked the installers to use a power trowel on the section they were to pour the second day to get a higher sheen. The problem occured when they also power troweled the sections of floor they had poured the day before. It left very fine circular scrathes all over the cured concrete floor, especially in the areas that were slightly higher. To make matters worse, we didn’t notice the scratches until the floors had been professionally cleaned and 3 coats of water-based sealer applied. The owners of the house are not happy with the scratches and we need to find a solution fairly quickly. Any ideas?? I would love advice on 1)removing the water-based sealer, and 2) a method of buffing out or filling the sratches in the concrete.
Thanks in advance for any ideas you all may have!
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another 3 inch of concrete? good luck now that it's sealed.i did see them do our local lowes,they went in and took off the years of wax with a abrasive then polished the concrete to a high shine.they would do 1 asile a night. good luck
hand me the chainsaw, i need to trim the casing just a hair.
that is why I will not do acid stain floors for anybody. There is nothing you can do about it and if the customer not happy then you dont get paid. There is alot that just happen, you can't control. An epoxy clear will hide most of the scratch, but it has problems too. I think the best looking jobs has the most scratches, screwed up etc. Mine has a tennis shoe foot print in it. Hated it when we started, now would not change.. 2+3=7
Edited 1/5/2006 10:31 pm by brownbagg
thanks. I suppose a few scratches are better than a footprint! We may try and thin the waterbased sealer and do some kind of skim coat (though it will probably crack over time) if the owners remain unhappy. This could be one of those things that goes from bad to worse so we may not do anything.
Anybody else run into a similar problem??
Thanks again
feet. 2+3=7
I agree ..that the more "imperfections the better it looks... in stained floors this really adds effect/charcter.... in your floors where color was added... MAN.. i'd never even think of not doing something like that in anything but a single pour... alot of commerical strippers around ck with a janitorial supply house but if it's a high gloss slick floor they are after... there are many commerial floor polish "systems" that will fill and polish with a high speed buffer... I'm guess'n if they lived with it as is they'd never notice it after 2 days.... but if they are pay'n for something they aren't get'n...thats another story... don't think i'd ever do a colored/stamped or stained concrete job without a disclaimer like it was natural stone and that the charm in such is that it won't be all the same
p
Have the concrete ground/polished. Any competent concrete sub can do this. Abrasive will cut right through the sealer. For a real smooth polish find a sub who does Terrazzo.
DG/Builder
And will also remove the stain. And depending upon how well polished his results are, could result in adverse results in the restain. Which means he would be getting the whole thing redone.
There are a bunch of different sealers available. Although some nice things have come out aqueous based, some pretty incredible things are available in solvent.
I get my information from:
http://www.miracote.com
"The color was added to the concrete and mixed (not stained), the concrete poured and hand-troweled. "The color is through the concrete, not topical.Grinding should work.But would probably want to stop with a realatively rough grit. I don't think that you would want a polished look.
Thanks, I got thrown off by a subsequent poster mentioned acid stains.
But even a rough grit grind will leve the same circlular scratches, a lot more of them.
I'll bet if the original poster contacted that Miracote site I mentioned, they could get him: !. to a sealer remover and/or 2. a better sealer for the situation.
I'm just a homeowner who bought a home last year with stained concrete floors. Thought they looked OK except where carpet tack strips had been pulled up and the nail craters grouted in. Lots of grey spots along walls and thresholds.
After a year, we noticed the stain wearing off in high traffic areas. We found closet areas where the sealer had splashed up on baseboard during application (too lazy to mask it off, I guess). They looked like, well, the baseboard behind a toilet. I assume these floors need regular re-sealing because of traffic. We started to consider new flooring.
Bottom line is -we're redoing the whole floor with tile and berber carpet. The tile looks fantastic. Well thought out designs mixing 12x12, 2x2, listellos and nice color choices. Labor & material cost was about about $9 sf. This included grinding off 1/16" of concrete before installation. The tile-setter was one of the finest subs I've ever dealt with. The whole job looks perfect and everyone who visits the house compliments the tile.
I've simply never seen a stained concrete floor I thought was exceptionally attractive. What is the cost comparison with a quality tile job? What are the long term maintenance costs of sealing concrete? I know everyone has different tastes, but can someone make a good sales pitch for a stained concrete floor?
I can. 2+3=7
GTO Guy,
Stained concrete is never in competition with tile, in my experience. They are totally different looks, like carpet vs hardwood. I have never had a customer try to decide between the two. For a given space they like either one or the other. I also have never had a decorator propose stained concrete as an alternative to tile (or vice versa) for any given room.
DG/Builder
The finish can be stripped off. Check with the manufacturer of the finish, ask what to use. Then have the floors ground. This will all be costly but can also be beautiful.
If you do have the concreteground/polished, don't grind to much or you could expose the aggregate. which might be a different color like Terrazzo.
wyatt