Epoxy Flooring in Dike, IA

A lot of the epoxy flooring we do in Dike goes on newer concrete. The town had 944 people in 2000. By 2020 it had 1,304, a jump of 38%. Housing units rose from 497 in 2010 to 536 in 2020. Many of those homes have attached two- and three-stall garages, and their owners want the floor sealed before winter salt has a chance to work on it.

Coat it while it is still in good shape

The best time to coat a garage floor is before it is damaged. A slab that has gone a few winters without salt pitting needs less repair, so more of your budget goes into the coating itself. On a newer Dike slab the work usually looks like this:

• Diamond grind the whole floor, including edges, to remove the smooth top layer and any curing compound
• Fill small shrinkage cracks and decide whether to fill or honor the control joints
• Lay a thick epoxy base coat
• Broadcast flake to full coverage, or leave it solid color
• Seal with a clear polyaspartic or urethane topcoat

If your house is very new, ask us when the slab was poured. Fresh concrete needs time to cure before it is coated, and we would rather wait than see a floor fail.

Shops and outbuildings in Grundy County

Dike sits in Grundy County, west of Cedar Falls, and is surrounded by farmland. Detached shops, pole buildings and machine sheds are part of a lot of properties here. Those floors take a beating that a house garage never sees: steel tracks, dripping hydraulics, a dropped bar or an engine on a stand.

For those floors we use thicker shop-grade epoxy. We can add grit for traction in wash bays and leave clear walkways marked in a different color. If the shop slab is older and broken at the edges, it gets repaired before it is coated.

One school district, two towns

Dike shares the Dike-New Hartford Community School District with its neighbor to the north. Many families here drive the same county roads every day in winter, through slush and salt. That brine dries on bare concrete as a white film that keeps coming back. A sealed floor stops it from soaking in. You can rinse it off in spring and the floor looks clean again.

Which service fits which Dike floor

| Space | What we usually suggest | |---|---| | Newer attached garage | Full flake floor with a clear topcoat | | Older detached garage | Crack repair, then flake or solid epoxy | | Basement | Basement epoxy after a moisture test | | Farm shop or machine shed | Shop-grade epoxy, grit where it gets wet | | Fall or winter job | Polyaspartic, within its temperature limits |

Living with the floor

A coated garage floor needs very little. Sweep or blow out grit, squeegee standing slush out the door during heavy snow, and rinse the salt film off in spring. Put a mat under any vehicle that drips. In a shop, wipe up fuel and hydraulic fluid when you see it instead of letting it sit. That routine keeps the topcoat looking good for years.