Up in the air...It's a bird.....

[Artie]

Sorry, it's not a bird! But I finally got the car running well enough that I used the "blown headgasket again" fund for a good cause! I was a busy bee over the weekend and I'll let the pictures do the talking! This is what I should have done years ago!

Got a delivery Friday afternoon! Good timing, about 10 minutes before the rain started!

Edited September 19, 2011 by Artie

[rogerch]

Very classy, I'm very jealous !

[Simon350S]

Very smart!

[MPx]

Looks fantastic Artie. I did a very similar thing in our barn a couple of years or so back.

Dont want to rain on your parade or anything, but I hope your tiles are better than the ones I bought (mine are PAF7). They have been fine in most respects, but they are not heat stable. By that I mean they greatly expand and contract under normal weather conditions. If I open the door on a sunny day, within 10 minutes the tiles start rucking up. When I laid them I left the required 20mm around all the edges to allow for expansion, but this is irrelevant once you have heavy things in there like cars, lifts, tractors etc., which dont move. It was a significant cost to do, and was easy to fit, but I still wish I'd gone for ceramics instead.

[Artie]

Thanks for the replies. The idea is to keep most of the garage clear, now that I have the lift I won't need to have cars on stands! As for the tiles, it was 110degrees F the day I installed them and most days since and have had no issues with the tiles coming up or un.latching from each other. My next phase is to install an AC unit in the wall to keep me cool in our brutally humid and hot summers!!

[lotus4s]

Nice, Artie!

Edited September 24, 2011 by lotus4s

[Artie]

Thank you Jim! Makes work much easier on the cars to have everything organized somewhat!

[richardvg]

Now all you need is the air conditioning unit for climate control !

Very nice..

[mr.oogieboogie]

cool

[ramjet]

I just painted my concrete garage floors and will do the same again over here in Vic once we buy a house. No need to worry about expansion with paint.

[Artie]

Yessir! No expansion with paint! But if you look at my first pic with all of the boxes, You can see remnants of paint on the floor...... I had applied a product, to remain anonymous, to the floor when I was building the house back in 2002. I followed the instructions to the T! I even went so far as to blot the 657 square feet of floor dry with paper towels while wearing an automotive painters suit and rubber gloves as to not contaminate the freshly etched concrete. I applied said product, which by the way was not cheap and is sold regularly in the back of auto magazines in a bucket with special instructions. After the paint was allowed to cure properly, I used a climate controlled oil filled set of 4 radiators suspended from the steel truss that ran the width of the garage to keep the cure temperature at exactly the recommended mean temperature. I didn't move in to the house for another 2 weeks as we closed earlier than anticipated and finished the lease on the previously arranged house. After 2 weeks in the house, my RX7 rear passenger tire, pulled up a 3 inch piece of the product. I called the company and they obliged me with a "patch" to fix the piece. About a month later after a weekend track event, I was lowering the car with the jack and the front tire/wheel from the jack popped another 3 inch chunk of the product off the floor. Again, I called the manufacturer, but this time they sent a technician out to my house to inspect. The technician, after small talk and some admiration of my collection, notified me that I had VOIDED my warranty by using a jack on the floor! "The product wasnt intended to be a work surface" I was informed, just a "parking surface"! So, be warned my friend! The fine print is always fine! My floor tiles have not shifted nor expanded in the recent summer heat. I left the required space at the edge of the tile away from the walls and garage door. Just my experience, if you just park, then more power to you!

BTW, I DO have 2 air conditioning units that will be going in the wall this fall, to keep me cool next summer when I'm working on the cars!....Or sleeping in the garage!

Edited September 26, 2011 by Artie

[richardvg]

New floors are always problematic when coating,too much paint,too little paint and then there is the problem with moisture evaporation that is still occurring......best solution if you are painting a floor(new) is a pure acrylic (thin coat) followed by the polyurethane in a couple of days time.

Perhaps you should put a hammock and a tv in the garage,perhaps a fridge and kettle as well...........when you are banished from the house,no need to sacrifice anything!

[Artie]

Already have a 40" flatscreen in there!....no hammock yet........