# Refinishing Basement Shop Floor Part Deaux... Kicking up some dust...



## kinghong1970 (Jul 28, 2011)

Hello folks...

My basement shop was needing some tender loving care and what started with a simple patch up of peeling wall paint led to full peel, repaint, and resurfacing of the floor.

Condition of Floor:









Condition of Wall:









*Wall Paint Removal:*
well over 50% of the coverage was peeling by itself... so that was easy, for the rest, tried to chemically peel using smartstrip... this stuff works, but i would use it for non-porous surface such as wood or metal... cinder blocks just leaves a bigger mess to deal with... unless, of course, you are able to bring in a power washer... but being my basement with all the wiring in place... this was not an option for me.

good old heat gun and lots of elbow grease did the job... 










wall ready for paint...









*Dust Management:*
i have rented an edco concrete grinder for a week... and last i've used this, this does a fine job at quickly getting rid of layers of mess and leaves a nice finish on the floor... 
but it also does a fine job at creating dust and clogging up the shop vac.

being a windlowless basement... needed to work out a solution for getting rid of dust quickly... so borrowing my ducting for dust collector...
add a 6" vent...









some duct fitting from lowes...









and with the remote starter from rockler, i am able to turn on/off the machine from a distance when i have epoxy laid out on the floor.

now that i've taken care of that... getting some longevity out of my shop vac...

take 2 filters, duct tape them together for more surface area and air flow...









use a bag for my shopvac...









use a cyclone separator to get the big chunks out...









and use the festool to clean out the filter and fine dust in the shop vac every 200 to 400 sf (as needed) to keep the shopvac happy.

and when i've connected this setup to the edco, i find that the shopvac is capable of sucking up and containing most dust and debris and when the filter is starting to get clogged... i notice dust and heavier particles swirling on the floor... this is the time to clean out the filter and gently tap the bags to release some dust buildup...

worked well... a bit time consuming but did the job well.


















Before:








After:








After fine dust removed:









now i have a crack that needs to be addressed... 









and purchased some rustoleum epoxy patch from HD to apply and re-surface prior to laying down epoxy coat.

*Question:* It seems that the previous coating of paint was just laid over the crack and there are some areas where the paint is still visible in the deeper sections... do i need to grind it out or drill it out with an angle grinder prior to epoxy patch? or can i just patch over and epoxy-coat over it?

Well, that's it for now... i'm waiting for my epoxy to arrive... should be today.
we still need to finish grinding the corners... unfortunately, the edco cannot go into the corner and i can only get appx 1 1/2" to 2" from the wall... so waiting for my dust shroud to arrive and time to get on my hands and knees to grind out the corners.

As per Epoxy vendor's advice, i am going to grind and dry vac meticulously and forego the etching... i was told that this step is not necessary when grinding the floor.

well, i'll keep this thread updated with my progress... 

thanks for reading and any/all comments and advice is much appreciated.

Albert the clumsy Ape.


----------

