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How is the race deck holding up? Do you like it? Would you do it again?
We are considering race deck. We have unfinished concrete that is cracked, stained and spalled in some areas. The house was built in 1996. I know race deck isn't perfect but it'll be an improvement over what we've got. The prep for epoxy would be difficult - it's more expensive - and with the condition of the floor I don't know if epoxy would look good because I assume the cracks would re-surface even if repaired.
I don't understand the pergo underlayment. What is it? We have a drain in the center of our 3 bay garage. Would the underlayment inhibit fluids from draining?
We don't wash cars in the garage but of course they drip condensation from the A/C. We drive two cars in the winter so the floor is subject to road chemicals and dirt dripping from the cars.
Does anyone with race deck jack up their car(s)? We do to swap winter/summer wheels and do track bleeds and rotate tires on the track car when necessary. I've gotten mixed reports - some say the jack stands will dent the floor - others say no issue. We use jackpoint jack stands and race type low profile jacks. Ours is definitely a "working" garage, in addition to an entertainment space.
I installed race deck in the garage of a former house. The garage floor was horrible, with cracks and spalling, efluorescence, etc. Epoxy would only have been an option if I removed and repoured the concrete floor. I used jacks, but made sure I put a piece of plywood under the jack or jack stands to avoid damaging the tiles with excessive point loads. I still think it was the best solution for a floor that is unsuitable for epoxy. One big advantage to the race deck was that every couple of years I would separate the tiles down the middle of the floor, and drag half the tile floor out of the garage so I could sweep and clean the floor under the tiles. Then I'd put the first one back in the garage and drag the other half out. This was mainly needed because of the spalling and efluorescence debris that would collect under the tiles. A tighter floor would need less maintenance.
Our concrete floor isn't nearly as bad as what you described. We have some fibers here and there, and it's mostly the cracks that are unsightly. With three bays we'd have to break the floor down into several pieces since even breaking it at thirds wouldn't allow us to drag it outside. We have three separate garage doors and I think they are 9 feet wide but the garage is 33 feet wide (plus a work area in one of the front corners) - so unless we could bend the floor by lifting the long edges to get it out the door - we'd probably have to break it into sections less than 9 feet wide.
It doesn't sound ideal - but at least it's doable if cleaning underneath becomes necessary. Normally we have good drainage for the little bit of fluid that reaches the floor. Thanks for the tip on putting plywood under the jack stands. The only issue I see there is the jack barely fits under the cars now so there isn't depth for plywood under the jack. Last time we had to drive the car up on some wood to act as a small ramp (I had a flat tire so the car sat lower than usual) in order for the jack to fit underneath. I guess we'll have to do the same for jacking over the race deck - but that's an easy fix.
Did you put underlayment down - or do you just live with the plastic clacking noise?
I didn't use any underlayment, as I wanted the floor to be able to "breath" under the tiles. Yes, I just lived with the clacking.
If space for the jack is a limitation, you could likely jack the car safely without any plywood. The wheels on my low Craftsman jack never dented the tiles. The only time I dented the tiles was when using jack stands that had steel angle-iron legs, which are pretty sharp. Even a piece of 1/8" steel or aluminum plate would likely work.
Sounds like you wouldn't likely need to remove the tiles very often if your floor is sound.
I definitely like the variety of colors and designs available with Racedeck floors. Here's a shot of mine (not colorful, but nice). Note that when I built my cabinets, most of them were hung on the walls and didn't touch the floor, making cleaning and floor removal much easier.
Those are the colors we want. A friend up the street has the same floor & colors - but did the tiles in 2'x2' pattern which we are considering too. We think that particular color combo will hide dirt the best and look good longer even though it's not the most colorful combo.
Really - we want the cars to be the focal point, and obviously they are.
We are also considering stopping the floor before the cabinets. We'll be buying new cabinets and re thinking about wall mounted versus those that stand on the floor. The wall mount makes a lot of sense. Whose did you buy?
I made my own cabinets. It seems there are only cheap ones that are terrible, or expensive ones. Mine were cheap but not as terrible as the Home Depot/Lowes varieties. Plus, I could make them the exact dimensions I wanted.
Agree with colors that show off the cars best. For a while I had a silver and a black car, perfect for my silver and black floor.
I had this floor for 4 years back in Canada before we sold the house and moved to California. Since the thread has been revived I would 100% say go for it. It held up to major and I mean major abuse for 4 years that you won't experience almost anywhere. Temperatures down to -70 until I put a heater in the garage. Then snowy/salty/sandy cars driving in from outside and melting all over the floor. Constant freeze and thaw. Super dry summers with temperatures in the 100+ range. After 4 years it looked almost as good as the day I put it down. The only thing I'd do differently is probably avoid the white tiles as mine was black and white checkered. The reason I say is it looked almost as good is some of the white tiles near the garage door got a bit cut up from gravel stuck in tires and eventually dirt got ground in and was hard to get those tiles back to a pristine white. The grey tiles dividing the parking spots and alternating black tiles looked fantastic after 4 years of abuse.
Edit - adding a picture I found in my iphoto library. Knowing when I bought the Shelby this picture would be roughly 3 years after the racedeck was installed and had gone through at least 2, perhaps 3 abusive Canadian winters at this point.
I put Race Deck down in my new garage in 2007. The only regret I have is that I didn't allow enough room for expansion in the heat. If the floor will be exposed to direct sunlight when the door is up make sure you pay attention to expansion tolerance. My floor fits a little too good, and if in direct sun for too long it tends to buckle.
We ordered the race deck. We plan to leave a few inches at all edges partly because it's easier to leave the space rather than cut lots of tiles - but it sounds like the extra expansion space will be perfect. Our garage gets afternoon sun so it's good to know it'll "grow".
We found the Race Deck folks easy to deal with (so far). Very helpful in our effort to figure out what we want, and they are willing to hang onto the tile until we can accept shipment. We are in the middle of construction on the house and have nowhere to store it and would prefer to accept it in several weeks - maybe a couple months. The sale ended yesterday and we saved considerable $$ by ordering now. If they weren't willing to delay shipment we probably would have skipped it and waited until another time.
Does anyone have linoleum tile in their garage? I met someone tonight whose father put it in, and they say it works great and holds up to Pittsburgh winters. It never occurred to me to research linoleum.
I moved into a new house in the spring with a connected double and single garage. The single was for the Porsche so I was always going to make it look nice and install some sort of flooring. After issues with epoxy previously I eventually went with RaceDeck. I was afraid to pull the trigger because of concerns about plastic clacking sounds and how it would hold up to the weight of the car and dropped items. I am so pleased with this product. I went with the free flow tiles with a border of solid tiles. Colors were gray, black and blue. It looks - literally - as good as the day I put it down. No clacking. No issues. For me this product was as good or better than advertised, but one word of caution for those installing: while you can cut an edge tile down by a large amount (say more than 3 inches) with a miter saw, if you try to cut of smaller amounts the blade will more than likely catch the tile, rip it out of your hand and throw it about 20 feet away. Very dangerous. Using a jigsaw is much safer!
Just Racedecked mine. We'll see how it holds up but I'm really confident. Especially with a 15 year warranty.
Great people to deal with. Super fast delivery and easy as pie to install. Left 1" of space all the way round for expansion.
I'm deciding to between epoxy and race deck as well. I plan on washing my car in the garage, should I avoid the race deck? I see they make tiles where water can get between, if i got these tiles would the water flow to my floor drain or would it get blocked by other tiles?
The water will be able to find its way under the tiles to the drain. But if it were me, and I intended to wash my car in the garage, I'd use epoxy. I'm afraid any residual water laying under the tiles could cause mustiness and potentially mold under the tiles since the tiles may not allow it to evaporate properly.
The water will be able to find its way under the tiles to the drain. But if it were me, and I intended to wash my car in the garage, I'd use epoxy. I'm afraid any residual water laying under the tiles could cause mustiness and potentially mold under the tiles since the tiles may not allow it to evaporate properly.
It's not a concern. In the constant freeze/thaw that is Alberta this really was not an issue though I was worried about it at first. During the summer it would dry very fast and most garage floors are slightly slanted. I can tell you that with the garage getting wet(soaked) on a daily basis no mould or water damage was caused. We would drive snowy vehicles into the garage on a daily basis where they would thaw due to the garage being heated. The water would flow under the tiles to the garage door and re-freeze from the cold. Not even those conditions had any effect whatsoever on the floor. In the spring I would take an hour to move the floor out of the garage(by splitting it in two) and then power washing the floor to clear sand and grit from under the tiles. During the 100+ degree summers I would wash the cars inside every few days, again no issues.
Edit: jw1977 - It will flow to the front through the other tiles as they have a channel system underneath. It doesn't sit under the tiles it will flow.
09-03-2014, 12:51 PM
