If you’re a business owner that has a concrete floor in your facility, or a home owner that is looking to coat their garage floor, you’ve likely heard of epoxy. It’s one of the most popular and commonly used concrete floor coating agents in commercial floor coatings, with good resistance to most chemicals and abrasion.
But recently a new contender, polyaspartic, has made an appearance in the commercial floor coatings industry, and its growing in popularity fast. polyaspartic is a distant cousin of polyurethane floor finishes and has a few similarities with epoxy.
The Similarities
Both of these agents are similar in that they can be used as both mid coats and topcoats. However, despite this similarity, epoxy is the leading primer coating used in the industrial world. Both coatings are compatible with other resin types, like urethane mortars, and can be applied to nearly all types of concrete.
This means that they both give a huge benefit in cost and time efficiency when compared to other systems, as you don’t need to replace other flooring systems before installing a new one.
Both Have Options
Both epoxies and polyaspartics have many features that make them versatile solutions for concrete floor coatings. They can be customized to better fit the needs of a facility, and also have the ability to have many decorative elements like chips, flakes, and powders. Customization options can differ between manufacturers, so contact them for information.
Time of Installation
This is where differences start to occur. Polyaspartic has a much quicker coating time than epoxy, which can take between six and eight hours to cure. This is one of the biggest benefits of polyaspartic, as faster installations lower labor costs. They can be ready for foot traffic in one to two hours, and so making them perfect for facilities like hospitals where even brief interruptions can be dire.
Polyaspartic is a good flooring solution for those that need fast results of an equal quality as epoxy, and the two systems can even work together provided they’re from the same manufacturer.
So if you need coatings for your garage or business, contact your local garage floor sealing companies, or similar venue, to see if they have access to this coating solution.