Polished Concrete vs. Epoxy. Know Your Options

The floors of your indus­tri­al facil­i­ty might be the fur­thest thing from your mind as you assess the con­di­tion of your work­space. And yet, the con­di­tion and appear­ance of your indus­tri­al floor­ing play key roles in your busi­ness’ safe­ty, effi­cien­cy, and rep­u­ta­tion. If your floors are falling apart, the rest of your oper­a­tion won’t be far behind. Dust, debris, pres­sure, tem­per­a­ture fluc­tu­a­tions, and impact pose con­stant threats to your con­crete floor­ing. For­tu­nate­ly, invest­ing in the right floor­ing sys­tem can help pro­tect your floors from these threats, increase dura­bil­i­ty, and facil­i­tate maintenance. 

Epoxy Coat­ings and Resur­fac­ers remains the most com­mon option for floor pro­tec­tion, but con­crete pol­ish­ing has grown in pop­u­lar­i­ty as well. At Kaloutas, our floor­ing experts are equipped to pro­vide both kinds of floor­ing solu­tions for all types of indus­tries, and we’re hap­py to help you make the right choice for your facil­i­ty. Until then, it helps to know a thing or two about your options. So, here’s a primer on pol­ished con­crete vs. epoxy.

Pol­ished Con­crete vs. Epoxy

The Pros Pol­ished Con­crete Floors

The pri­ma­ry process of con­crete pol­ish­ing is grind­ing. Like sand­ing a piece of wood, the pol­ish­ing process involves grad­u­al­ly grind­ing down lay­ers of con­crete with fin­er and fin­er grind­ing bits until the con­crete is smooth, even, and strong. We use state-of-the-art dia­mond grinders to deliv­er the most effi­cient and glossy fin­ish. We then treat the con­crete with a sil­i­cate-based con­crete den­si­fi­er to extend the pol­ished floor’s nat­ur­al sheen with­out the need for an addi­tion­al coat­ing. Best of all, this process can be com­plet­ed in a rel­a­tive­ly short time frame, and the floor is usable imme­di­ate­ly after the process is com­plete — this means min­i­mal inter­fer­ence and vir­tu­al­ly zero down­time so you can get back to busi­ness. We work how you work and we under­stand the impor­tance of keep­ing oper­a­tions going. 

Ulti­mate­ly, a well-pol­ished con­crete floor offers a bright, vis­i­ble, dust-free fin­ish, high dura­bil­i­ty, pro­tec­tion from mois­ture, stain­ing, impact, etc., increased trac­tion, and is easy to keep clean.

Explor­ing Epoxy Floor Systems

Where­as con­crete pol­ish­ing is pri­mar­i­ly a process of reduc­tion (i.e. grind­ing down the floor), epoxy coat­ings are an addi­tive process, pro­vid­ing extra lay­ers of pro­tec­tion on top of an exist­ing floor. Epoxy coat­ings for con­crete floors are designed to absorb impact, keep mois­ture out, pro­tect against chem­i­cals, min­i­mize the effects of ther­mal shock, and increase trac­tion. From a pure­ly aes­thet­ic angle, these epoxy coat­ings also offer plen­ty of visu­al vari­ety, com­ing in a range of col­ors, tex­tures, broad­cast types, fin­ish­es, and style options to suit any busi­ness’ brand­ing and safe­ty mark­ing needs. Like pol­ished con­crete floors, epoxy floors are typ­i­cal­ly easy to clean and main­tain. These epoxy coat­ings can also be applied to mul­ti­ple sur­faces, includ­ing con­crete, met­al, pre­vi­ous­ly-coat­ed floors, and more. Con­crete resur­fac­ing can be a more labor-inten­sive process than pol­ish­ing, how­ev­er some floors are dete­ri­o­rat­ed too far to be able to pol­ish so resur­fac­ing is the pre­ferred option.

Is One Option Bet­ter Than the Other?

This brief run­down reveals that both pol­ish­ing and con­crete floor coat­ings deliv­er increased pro­tec­tion, beau­ty, dura­bil­i­ty, and safe­ty, just in dif­fer­ent ways. The right deci­sion for your facil­i­ty will depend on specifics like your bud­get, needs, pref­er­ences, and so on. For instance, facil­i­ties that deal with lots of chem­i­cals are typ­i­cal­ly bet­ter off with floor coat­ings, since pol­ished con­crete doesn’t offer the same lev­el of pro­tec­tion against cor­ro­sive mate­ri­als. On the oth­er hand, floor coat­ings might not cure prop­er­ly in cold stor­age facil­i­ties, so pol­ish­ing is the bet­ter option here.

As men­tioned ear­li­er, we at Kaloutas are com­mit­ted to help­ing each of our clients choose the best floor pro­tec­tion option for their needs — we work how you work. To learn more about us and all that we do, con­tact us online or give us a call at 978−532−1414 today.