Concrete Overlays
Stains and cracks happen in concrete. Between wear, tear, and natural settling, time isn’t kind to concrete. Concrete overlays are a great way to rejuvenate your space without completely replacing the subfloor of your garage, shop, or other concrete-floored space.
Concrete overlays provide a budget-friendly way to restore your concrete’s beauty and functionality while allowing you to add artistic flare if you desire. There are a variety of overlay options for your space.
What is a Concrete Overlay?
After cleaning up your concrete and making minor repairs, you can choose to implement an overlay. Using a combination of cement and resins, you create a new layer over the original slab in your garage, shop, pool deck, driveway, and more.
Overlays can be stained and manipulated to create smooth, fresh surfaces or textured imitations of other materials. You can work with the overlay to create the illusion of stone, wood, bricks, and more.
Types of Concrete Overlays
There are three primary types of overlays. Each has its use, and every type can act as a media to create works of art. You’ll see micro-topping overlays, self-leveling overlays, and multipurpose overlays. Each type serves a different end purpose, and all four give beautiful results.
Micro-topping Concrete Overlays
Micro-toppings come in coarse or fine grit. Coarse grit fills in cracks, dents, and wear spots in your concrete surfaces. The purpose of micro-toppings is to bring an old damaged or discolored surface to a fresh blank canvas.
Typically, a professional applies micro-toppings in a two-step process. First, a coarse grit overlay is used to fill in dents, chips, and cracks. Once that has dried, a fine grit will be spread over the entire surface to even it all out.
Self Leveling Concrete Overlays
This one is pretty self-explanatory. This overlay process is a thicker, slow setting overlay used traditionally to restore the structural integrity of worn or damaged concrete. This option works well for shop or garage floors, but not for angled driveways.
A self-leveling overlay is poured in as thick as an inch and fills cracks, dents, and chips before leveling out on its own to create a completely smooth and level surface
Multipurpose Overlays
Multipurpose overlays can be manipulated and formed using different tools to create artistic textures and patterns. These are created through the mixing of sand into the concrete, making them sculpt-able. They also take well to dyes and finishing techniques that allow more expression and creativity than other overlay options.
Preparations for Concrete Overlays
While it’s possible to lay an overlay on your own, it is best to hire a professional in most cases. This is especially true when you’re unsure of the intricacies of concrete, or the damage to the subfloor is too significant to repair on your own quickly.
The Prep Process We Follow
- Clean and assess the surface for damage.
- Prime the concrete, repairing chips and cracks as you are able.
- Using an epoxy filler base, fill holes and large cracks, allow full curing before moving on.
- Reinforce the subfloor with fabric or underlayment of your choice.
- Patch the repairs with a polymer resin based concrete overlay.
- Bring the concrete to an even smoothness to the concrete surrounding the repairs.
- Spray the concrete in an even layer over the surface with a hopper gun.
- Use a trowel to even out and texturize the surface as needed.
- Add embellishments, stamping, color, texture, and other design elements.
- Rest. We let the work settle and harden.
- Stain or seal the surface.
- Allow time for full curing before using the space.
It is essential to the longevity of your concrete overlay that full curing and settling occurs before use, or you risk causing damage and undoing the hard work you’ve put in.
One sure way to get spectacular results is to hire the right team to take care of the job. The experts at Armor Coatings are standing by to discuss your needs and can provide you a service quote today. Please send us a message, or give us a call.
We look forward to speaking with you about your Concrete Overlay needs.
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We have been in the industry for 39 years; providing beautiful custom concrete overlays, decorative concrete staining and waterproofing for interiors and exteriors of homes and businesses.
Armor Coatings is run by true artists and we take the time to customize our products to suit our customer’s needs. From epoxy flooring to concrete artistry, Armor Coatings can transform any concrete pool deck, walkway, garage, or floor into something truly beautiful.
