Substitute for polished concrete flooring?

[Barney12]

23 minutes ago, janedevon said:

thanks guys will ask the polishers today what they recommend, apparently we have a super strength concete so should be tough wearing, floor being damped down this morning to keep the machines cool !

should be some good colour though as we have local limestone so shades of yellows pinks and reds starting to show through against the grey concrete.

 

Thats sounds fantastic. Looking forward to more pictures

[jack]

We used corex to cover our concrete after polishing.  It was down for several months before we moved in.  

 

One thing to look out for is that you can get different colours appearing where the corex joins and air can get in.  We taped all ours, but in a couple of places had to lift it for one reason or another and didn't tape it down again.  There are a couple of light linear strips where the untaped join between pieces of corex was.

 

 

I doubt anyone else would notice the odd line, as there's a lot a variation across the concrete anyway.  What you don't want is a grid of lines in the shape of corex sheets!

 

Also, the lines do fade over time.  Our concrete's been down for over a year and it's not as noticeable as it appears in the pic above.

[janedevon]

So 3 days in and apperently its going to take another 4 days minimum, a really hard concrete is proving hard work for the diamond grinders floor keeps needing to be wetted to cool machines 16 grit to 3000 is taking its time some 10 bags of dust so far and hardly making a dent in the concrete, some aggregate showing through and looking good.

 

 

[jack]

Four weeks seems a long time to wait to do the grinding and polishing on hard concrete.  Our guys suggested ten days to ensure it wasn't completely hard, and in the end did it starting on the 8th day if I remember correctly.  

 

I'd need to check my notes, but I believe it only took the two of them two days to grind down to "pepper pot" (some aggregate showing randomly in patches, rather than across the entire floor).  You're taking quite a bit more than that off, so I guess that's part of what's taking the time.

 

Yours looks a similar shade to ours - very nice!

[janedevon]

So main house is polished and sealed took 6 days for the 2 guys, they ended up bringing in 2 machines that weighed a tonne each, through the grits then polished and sealed 100sqm back on Monday to do the garage which isnt aggregate show its a powerfloated finish with a high polished end result.

 

 

[jack]

That's a really nice finish!

[Stones]

Looks great, and the way the light reflects off it just adds interest.  

 

We had highly polished tiles (cream coloured) in our last house, and they looked a million dollars when clean, but within half an hour of any activity started to look dirty again.  Hopefully the colour of your floor is a bit more forgiving in this regard.

 

One technical question - will you have to reseal the floor at any point in the future, if so have the installers advised when this should be done?

[ProDave]

The house I am wiring this week (my plumber friend) he wants to do this. He has had a go DIY with a hired sander for a weekend and barely scratched the surface (literally)

 

The thing that strikes me however is there are two big cracks in his concrete slab. I assume he should fill thee first, and even then they will surely show in the final finish.
 

[Vijay]

That looks fantastic!! What maintenance does it need?

[janedevon]

Thanks guys, very little mainenance maybe a reseal after 2 years if it ever gets heavily scuffed it can be repolished and sealed, just got to keep it covered while boarding and first fixings finish.

 

incredibly skilled proud workers who,did,this job we are really pleased and monday the garage/ family room gets done with a different finish!!!!

 

glad we went for this option as it should last for years.

[Vijay]

how do they get into corners?

[AliG]

Thats a beautiful finish. Need to show it to the wife.

[Barney12]

7 minutes ago, AliG said:

Thats a beautiful finish. Need to show it to the wife.

 

+1  

[janedevon]

9 hours ago, Vijay said:

how do they get into corners?

The boss spent 10 hours on Sunday with something that looked like a big angle grinder with diamonds on the pad went around all edges about 7  times.

[jack]

I think you've gotten very lucky with these guys.  Definitely a better finish than we got, especially in the corners and around the edges.

[Mikey_1980]

it looks great, now you'll become obsessed with protecting it while the rest of the build progresses.

[Alexphd1]

wow, looks awesome! Do you know the spec of the concrete? We are using c25/30 in our slab.

[mafaldina]

That looks really great, well done. Also, thanks for the pictorial diary. What did it come to per m2 in the end?

[IanR]

That's a great looking finish, and obvious there's a lot of work required to get it to that level!

 

Just to follow up on an earlier name I "introduced" for poured resin floors:

 

On 6/24/2016 at 20:47, IanR said:

I was quite impressed with Senso Floors UK, but they have just bought themselves out from their Dutch partners and are now branded as Sphere8, should be the same quality, but I haven't been back to them yet. 

 

The Senso/Sphere8 price was very competitive and I did like the quality of finish that I'd seen, but their payment terms have stopped me going with them.

 

It's not clearly stated by them unless you ask, but their payment terms of 25% Deposit , 45% Staged and 30% Final are all required to be paid before any product arrives on site and any work has been started.

 

Searching for a few Reviews I found a few that had been caught out and hadn't found out the Final payment is required 2 weeks before the job starts, until they had paid the nonrefundable deposit.

 

These same reviews had issues with getting Senso/Sphere8 back to fix issues.

[Ferdinand]

1 hour ago, IanR said:

That's a great looking finish, and obvious there's a lot of work required to get it to that level!

 

Just to follow up on an earlier name I "introduced" for poured resin floors:

 

 

The Senso/Sphere8 price was very competitive and I did like the quality of finish that I'd seen, but their payment terms have stopped me going with them.

 

It's not clearly stated by them unless you ask, but their payment terms of 25% Deposit , 45% Staged and 30% Final are all required to be paid before any product arrives on site and any work has been started.

 

Searching for a few Reviews I found a few that had been caught out and hadn't found out the Final payment is required 2 weeks before the job starts, until they had paid the nonrefundable deposit.

 

These same reviews had issues with getting Senso/Sphere8 back to fix issues.

 

Total payment before the job starts is worrying in any circs.

 

Ferdinand

[Mikey_1980]

That would put me off using them, the company that we used for Microtopping invoiced us in full 2 weeks after they had finished.

 

There was another company I found in Hampshire that do concrete polishing and they will do a test area so you can see the fininsh for around £200 before you commit to anything.

[janedevon]

On 03/10/2016 at 18:31, Alexphd1 said:

wow, looks awesome! Do you know the spec of the concrete? We are using c25/30 in our slab.

 

 

The guys wanted c32 when they came to polish they reckon it was nearer c40 said great for us a so hard wearing not so great for them 7 days grinding. !!!

[janedevon]

On 03/10/2016 at 19:57, mafaldina said:

That looks really great, well done. Also, thanks for the pictorial diary. What did it come to per m2 in the end?

 

 

Roughly £90 per sq m  including steel reenforcing throughout, comcrete pour grind and burnish, seal.

[Adsibob]

On 25/06/2016 at 11:42, Mikey_1980 said:

We have a polished concrete floor on our passive slab from designs in resin, and it looks great, when I have given it a clean I will post a picture, its approximately 4-5mm thick is troweled on in layers and then polished and sealed and then waxed. It is concrete based so hard wearing it has been down for 8 weeks while people have been doing internal works and aren't very careful but there is no damage sustained.

@Mikey_1980, just wondered how you feel about your floor 5 years on? We are considering designsinresin and would be good to know whether you still like it and how it has aged/weathered with five years of use.