Concrete Monkey pads

[Jim Nazarian]

In Dana's hot seat session he mentioned concrete pads were coming out, I was hoping to find out more about them & also that wax, concrete floors & counter tops are all the rage in LA so before I start offering it I want more info.

 

[breezeman]

Hi! Jim, you can find all kinds concrete countertop tools and supplies at concretecountertop specialties and also find pads and sealers at concrete solutions or concrete polishing solutions, there are numerous places. I'm, also located in Granada Hills.

Deron

 

[Jim Nazarian]

Since we are seeing more & more concrete in homes I finally decided to offer the service & of course the first job is a whooper, they just poured custom colored concrete in their backyard (2 colors) the concrete BBQ counter top is going to be polished to the highest gloss possible, but they want it enhanced (darkened) but that shows all of the imperfections & grooves from troweling etc...to avoid exposing sand while diamond polishing I am hoping to use monkey pads or something & finishing with a wax (trying to stay away from urethane type coatings)

The pool coping & patio is the second part, after they poured the concrete lots of work was done in the backyard (landscape, painting, sloppy pool tile installation etc...) so I need to get that concrete knocked down & cleaned before enhancing.

I didn't want this job but since they are celebrities they are fanatics about their privacy & don't trust many contractors.

Why is the first job so difficult?

 

[Jim Nazarian]

Hey Deron,

Thanks for that web site, I am trying to gather as much info as possible while not wasting a ton of money on useless supplies.

Its good to know I have a good inspector in the neighborhood.

Take care.

 

[breezeman]

Hey Jim,
Is the concrete at least 28 day old? the counters are at least puored in placed, and a wax will not hold up to the uv rays of the sun you might want to densify and polish up to 3500.Give me a call we can talk more.
Deron
818-307-7308

 

[Jim Nazarian]

Deron,

All of the concrete is just over a month old, I have 3 small slabs that I will be testing products on tomorrow to see what direction I take.

Well, I am hearing conflicting news about waxes, just today I picked up some Beeswax (Buddy Rhodes, food grade) I guess I will return the $60 wax if it isn't meant for outdoor use.

I will give you a call in the afternoon.

Thanks.

 

[breezeman]

Jim,
Is the patio slab colored and stamped?What about the countertop. Last year, I justed started fabricating concret countertops by going to cheng concrete, and just a few months back did a class using glass fiber renforced concrete using a hopper to spray first coat of concrete in to mold. Check out Decorative Concrete Institute , had a class with Bob Harris on stain and polish concrete.
Deron

 

[Jim Nazarian]

Hey Deron,

The concrete was custom colored not stamped, I believe 2500psi was used so its very high quality concrete???

This is a great client for me & they deserve the best, as I mentioned earlier I wanted them to use someone who has lots of experience in this type of work & who is a specialist, they wanted me too do it, The situation has been explained to them but since all the other services that I have provided for them has been top notch the expect the same with their concrete.

Honestly, I have been looking to pass this work on to someone else who will far exceed what they expect without any BS. I think I would like to bring you in on the counter top portion of the job.

I will PM you.

 

[floorguy]

NO WAX/FINISH!!!!!!!!!!!

did ya hear that??? just makin sure..

with that
1. its outside, you have any idea how slippery a waxed surface will be???

2. you want maintainence issues, imagine an old indian corn mill...rock on bottom (concrete) corn in the middle (wax) rock on top(what ever they happen to do on this floor)

3. adherence issues, you are closing off the pores of the concrete, thus there is nothing for it to grab hold of.

etc etc

with that, if it is colored, yes take it up to a 3500 grit, with the densifying it will look awesome....if needs be get some penetrating sealer, to help ward of oil stains...needs to be redone every so often...

hummmmm I may drive out there if you ask nice....

oh did they power trowel this down real good??? like does it already have a some what smooth finish???

and yes bob harris is the bomb, took a class of his 2 yrs ago at world of concrete...

here are a few web sites you can go look at

http://www.demmertandassociates.com/

http://www.concretenetwork.com/

http://www.decorativeconcreteinstitute.com/

call me if i can help you out...i have done about 10 of these...all have turned out great

801-898-6210

 

[floorguy]

here is a small sample i did for my 1st one....

see the difference in the floor??

 

[Ron Lippold]

hey doug was that with monket pads

 

[Jim Nazarian]

NO WAX/FINISH!!!!!!!!!!!


with that, if it is colored, yes take it up to a 3500 grit, with the densifying it will look awesome....if needs be get some penetrating sealer, to help ward of oil stains...needs to be redone every so often...


oh did they power trowel this down real good??? like does it already have a some what smooth finish???


here are a few web sites you can go look at

http://www.demmertandassociates.com/

http://www.concretenetwork.com/

http://www.decorativeconcreteinstitute.com/

call me if i can help you out...i have done about 10 of these...all have turned out great

801-898-6210

Wax was only for the counter top...not the floor.

The color was custom ordered concrete & was not power troweled, its already fairly smooth, a few areas are a bit rough & I plan to knock that down if grinding wont expose too much sand.

The plan is to use an enhancer sealer to darken & seal

Thanks for the sites, I appreciate the help!

Jim

 

[floorguy]

hey doug was that with monket pads

No that was with diamonds...4" flexibles.....like I said it was my 1st job, and I didnt know much..like you are suppose to use ridged pads...(funny thing is these flexibles have worked better then any ridged :roll: )

Anyway I did it with a 4" grinder 1st, to see if it made a difference. They had acid washed a different area, but screwed up and walked, put their old pads on, allowed to let the solution run over. Which of course made etch marks. I will find my pictures of it and put them up..



Also Jim, its not sand you would be showing, it would be the aggergate<sp> that would show, and sometime it looks cool "poor mans terrazo" but that is usually 1/4" -1/2" down..(if they did it right :roll: ) Yes sometimes it might be close to the surface but not that i have seen....Also when you are honing/polishing you are not removing all that much surface, i mean it is in the thousands of an inch range...unless you are running 0 grit metals or something.. Thats why I asked about how smooth it is. Sometimes, where to start with the grits is the hardest thing..

Here is a quick break down of how to do the grit levels...David Gelinas told me this....granted he may have switched to other methods by now, but it has worked for me so far.

this is figured on a fairly smooth surface.. with no lipage or adhesive type removal, ALL RESINS

These are WET flooding the floor like stripping, then sucking it up besure to get it all up, so you dont have diamonds from the other lower grits possibly screwing it up.

50
100
220ish grits #s in range differently in the last 2 numbers, so dont panic to make it exact.

densify, keep it wet for about 20-30 minutes, some say add water some dont, read the instructions...

now dry

220 again
400 range
800
1500
3500

My sqft production with a cimex, made for carpet so a 400 rpm range was about 500sqft per hr. I did a 2000 sqft job and it would take about 4 hrs to go over the whole thing which each grit.

Autoscrubbers work really well on this stuff...they help scrub in the densifier and keep it a little wet..they help suck up the slurry and rinse it.

the wet passes are what take off product, the dry passes take very little...and I mean little.

 

[breezeman]

If you are going to densify, I dont see a need to add a penetrating sealer since the densifier penetrates the concrete and binds to the free lime and thus closes the pores of the concrete.Polishing concrete is acually profling the surface, when you start with a 800 grit then you start to polish below that you are grinding the surface, at 400 grit you will expose the fines which is the sand and cement paste, the cap is about 1/4 inch.There is a wax made by Kemiko stains that is used for concrete floors only indoors and has very good slip resistance, it gives it a very natural look to the floor.
Hey Doug ,
What kiind of wax did you use on the contertop? A trick I was taught was to waxon and then Idmmeditaly wipe off then speed buff. Cheng concrete has a great finish products frist a penetrating sealer then a wax followed by a polish.

Deron

 

[floorguy]

AS someone who has done more stripping and waxing then he cares to think about...

putting a TOPICAL coating on anything is just a recipe for maintainence period...

with that being said, hey its what has kept me in business doing all that stripping and waxing..

now with that being said....when I first saw concrete polishing, i got all kinds of excited, A way to make a shiney yet protected floor with out putting crap on top..

so every time i hear someone wanting to put "wax" on a no wax surface...T&G, concrete etc. it makes me want to cringe

 

[floorguy]

here are some pics from that 1st job...I forgot to take the very 1st pic to show the damage..

 

[Ron Lippold]

nice i bet that auto scrubber makes life a bunch easier

 

[breezeman]

I, Agree with the less you put sometthing on the less the maintaince you would have to perfrom.However;every floor needs to be maintained, the topical treatrments are made for sacrafical layers to protect the sealers and whatever that was done to the floor like stains and dyes. DCI even recommends thier polish guard for polished concrete.

Deron

 

[floorguy]

Ron, it does....but

That 2500 sqt ft job i did, when i was done.....there was 8" of concrete slurry I had to stick my hand in there and scoop out...took about 45 m inutes to clean it out....but on the flip side it probably saved me hrs dealing with a wet vac, not to mention the time of just rinsing etc. with the auto.

Breeze,

I get that, but on alot of coatings, when it comes time to take off, they can ruin the under floor by the means to get them off...and really i dont like waxed over scratches, most times it looks worse then if not done at all...

with concrete its nice, black pads to scrub and/or a black pad on a burnisher, to run over it....

 

[Jim Nazarian]

Applying wax to counter tops was something I found while doing research, guys suggested to apply wax after your final polish to give it a "final kick" on granite & concrete counter tops, Dana from Innovative Surface Solutions & many others talked about applying the wax.

Luckily the counter top is fairly smooth so starting at 800 might be a safe start, the sides have some rough areas & might require metals.

The next issue is wet or dry? I have a Makita 9227C 7 Polisher but it looks like wet might work better, I saw this kit & I might get it http://www.bargainblade.com/concrete-co ... th=268_270 any thought on wet or dry or equipment suggestions?

 

[floorguy]

on the counter i dunno, on floor, go wet until dens, then dry...though some say wet all the way (new studies in airborne stuff, that silica is kinda nasty on the lungs)

also maybe try a orbital sander, then you dont get the splatter

 

[Jim Nazarian]

Looks like another client wants their concrete counter top polished, I haven't seen it yet but it sounded like wet polishing might not be feasible, has anyone heared anything about Monkey's concrete pads that he mentioned in the hot seat?

 

[Mikey P]

I have concrete counters myself.

I'll be giving the Monkeys a try this week end.

 

[Jim Nazarian]

With the regular monkeys or the concrete pads he mentioned?

 

[breezeman]

Hey Mikey,
Is your countertop pour in placed or pre-cast.
Deron