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I'm looking at a garage makeover in the spring and getting everything priced up ready to go

 

I fancy a vinyl tiled plastic floor in grey but prices seem to be very high. I'm looking at approx 5.2 x 5.3m, giving 30m2 and this seems to be costing over £1000 which is about twice what I was expecting to pay

 

has anyone any experience with this type of flooring, advice to offer and recommended suppliers

 

thanks

 

Gary

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No idea to be honest

 

http://www.bigdug.co.uk/mats-flooring-c402/interlocking-floor-tiles-c1789/interlocking-5mm-solid-vinyl-studded-floor-tiles-pp16714

 

Must be better than the old carpet, paint, cellulose thinners, methanol, white spirit, aerosols, pertol, paraffin, butane and God knows what else is in my garage already. I do have two fire extinguishers though.

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Yes the dense PVC floor tiles work well taking the chill off the concrete and making it much nicer to work on. They are about 5mm thick and will take using a trolley jack on without damage or permanent denting although one of the reasons I didn't go for a surface mounted scissor lift with a travelling foot on castors that traversed the surface was the thoughts of the damage it might do to the panels.


I bought these panels (over 200 of them)from the Autosport show at the NEC two years ago, they were the flooring on one of the stands of the exhibitors and I counted up and reckoned there was enough to floor my double garage (lengthways). I spoke to their stand manager and asked about buying some and he offered to sell those tiles layed they now being used items and being more difficult for him to sell. We had a haggle and I bought them for £240 and wondered the show until 4:30pm when they started packing up and I could help them lifting the flooring and dump it straight into the back of the estate.



I've checked on e bay and the closest I could find were these 111299818863 in varying colours. The tiles stand up to petrol and oil spillage well although I always mop up and if necessary lift a tile if any has seeped through the join, they join together easily if you use a heavy rubber mallet to tap the interlocking shapes together.

The shapes on the tiles are low profile, either diamond pattern or circular disc and only about 1/2 mm high so the castors on the mechanics stool travels over them ok, and in fact the shapes help the castors remain steady when you're applying some torque from underneath instead of the stool skittering around.

I lifted them last year and stuck this scissor lift in and relaid them.

 

Mick Richards

 

 

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There is a company on the internet called KIMPTON flooring which can do safety flooring ,which is basically the same but on a roll,for £15.00p per square metre. This would come in at less then £500 for the area you have to cover.Sorry I can't put a link on but if you do a search they will come up.

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There are a few on line but a basic start is :

 

http://garage-makeover.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/in-floor-scissor-lift.html

 

Mick's lift looks great & maybe a bit easier to fit in 2 sections than a full cut out as video.

 

Would be nice if he could up date the make & if hydraulics are fed under the floor too.

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The lift in the photo is a Strongman Clifton model lift. It is very similar to the Automotech lift (the blue one) shown in the video posted above showing cutting it into the floor. Incidentally the video is very good as a "how to" if you wanted to sink one yourself into the floor, it's how my builder fitted mine (he was rebuilding the end of the garage and I included the cutting and reconcreting in a deal).

If you look in the photo I posted in the top left corner you can see the hydraulic controller bolted to the garage wall and underneath that in the floor is a slot 110mm deep and 200mm wide carrying the hydraulic pipes and the airline from the ramp safety locks from the lift to the controller. I have a 4mm steel plate let into the concrete covering the slot between wall and the lift.

 

As I posted above I choose the Strongman because it's scissor action and moving foot is confined within the bottom cassette feet rather than a roller on a travelling foot which traverses across the surface which lifts the car in a curve, (Strongman sell another model called the "Tamar" which is similar and does this). Both the Strongman Clifton and the Automotech - 7530D1 has the enclosed feet and more importantly operate on a double fulcrum hinge which allows the ramps to travel only up and down absolutely vertical. Both the Strongman and the Automotech have twin hydraulic cylinders (one per ramp) which allows no junk or hydraulics to be fitted between the ramps giving absolutely clear access front to rear. Incidentally picking up on safety the Strongman (don't know about the Automotech) has "parachute" valves in line as standard in case of hydraulic failure which as per the name work by automatically closing instantly if they sense the hydraulic downflow is too fast, second line of safety is the mechanical safety locks released by air (small tyre inflator works fine).

 

Reason I went for the restricted height (1 metre) scissor lift is restricted space with my single width ( I think your garage is a single also Mac ?) double length garage and the ability to sink it in the floor out of the way.

 

Apologies to Gary for the thread hijacking I hope it doesn't make you even more Grumpy lol.

 

Mick Richards

Edited by Motorsport Mickey
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no worries at all, the information about lifters is also relevant as Im hoping to install one apart of the refit, although I'm looking to mount in on the floor not set in (partly due to our intention to move homes in the next 5 years or so). I'm looking at the Automotech one as I had a spider lift years ago when I did my MGB which was fantastic but in the way once the job was finished.

 

my garage currently looks like this.....

 

imagejpg4_zpsc1d3d355.jpg

 

imagejpg5_zps7811f8b7.jpg

 

and although magic happens inside I feel need to spruce things up a little

 

I'm going for

 

white painted walls

wicks kitchen units in grey with black tops, 3 floor units and 3 wall units

change my large old meddings pillar drill for a more lightweight model

gray tiles on the floor

low level open shelving to the last and right

racking and storage in the loft

car lift on the left where the mini/tr6 lives

 

my budget is approx £2500

 

trouble is the floor currently takes up £1000 and I need to reduce this to about £500 then everything works

 

Gary

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Both the Strongman and the Automotech come with small approach and depart hinged ramps (about 350mm long) which allows you to leave the ramp on the floor and drive over it and still use it, subject to under car clearance.

Trouble is it allows about 200mm of ramp 110mm high to stick out either side of the car at floor height, easy to trip over, ask to see the bruises and a contributory decision to put it into the floor.

 

The Strongman as shown is about £2200 new inc VAT and the Automotech about £1650 inc VAT, I was decided upon the Automotech until I spotted and won an E Bay auction for a Strongman Clifton spec used ex Hire model snatch back without the controller. I won the auction for just over £500 and bought a new controller (nefarious other make but they are all generic and work) for £250 also off e bay. There are used scissor lifts of all types coming up you just need to be careful about the work it's been doing, when I got mine it looked like it had only worked a matter of some hours.

 

Mick Richards

Edited by Motorsport Mickey
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Can I suggest 2 (or more) 2 drawer steel filing cabinets or other varieties eg some smaller ones have multiple filing drawers which are shallow) can usually be picked up cheap from second hand office furniture dealers. Robust and usually fairly rust free and can be sprayed up. The worktop could be made up from an external quality ply faced flush door blank up to 3' x 7' or standard 2'6" or 2'9" x 6'6". It can then be covered with something like a vinyl floor covering bonded with adhesive. In any event go for a light grey or similar that way you will be able to see small nuts and washers that will be invisible on black! A strong flush door will also usually allow bolting down of a desk vice etc

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Anyone used something like this

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/111504633587?_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2648&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

on their floor. I have the tiles down but they are forever lifting as the surface of the floor isnt great and they strick to the cars tyres and or the 3 ton trolley jack wheels (yep it weighs a ton....) when Im moving it about ?

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...trouble is the floor currently takes up £1000 and I need to reduce this to about £500 then everything works...

 

One of the more popular garage floor tiles over here is RaceDeck. Polypropylene, IIRC, and I don't know about FR, Tom, but I think not. At typical US pricing you'd be around £700 or so. There are other suppliers of similar systems. Most people like these a lot.

 

Another option could be epoxy paint. Many options, from professionally-applied to DIY. People report all kinds of results, from brilliant to disappointing -- much relates to surface preparation before coating. You'd probably be under £150 DIY epoxy.

 

One of the all-time great garages is Jack Olsen's in Los Angeles. He used ceramic tile on his (including his flush-mounted floor lift) and raves about the results. Discussed at length -- considerable length -- here on the Garage Journal Forum (a very good source of info, BTW).

http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=55006

622dlr.jpg

Edited by Don H.
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Anyone used something like this

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/111504633587?_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2648&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

on their floor. I have the tiles down but they are forever lifting as the surface of the floor isnt great and they strick to the cars tyres and or the 3 ton trolley jack wheels (yep it weighs a ton....) when Im moving it about ?

Robin, they look very cheap for 15m X 1.5, leaving a strip down the middle for oil slick, a single roll should do a single garage easy?

 

I have a rough old concrete floor. Both Ronseal and Wickes own brand concrete floor paint in grey sealed after a hoover - no more dust, neither has pealed, but cold and hard, so your rubber rolls look tempting.

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Robin says he has the tiles down (presumably the dense PVC tiles same as mine). If he's lifting the tiles or damaging with his jack they might be different sort, I can jack the car up on them and leave overnight and when car and jack is removed there is no dent left in the tile.

 

If these rolls are rubber you have no chance of jacking on them without damage, as you can see from the pictures of the rolls, the material rolls up quite tightly even for the reduced 3mm thickness only way it can do that is for a highly flexible open cell material, it's rubber it will be too soft.

 

Mick Richards

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When I had my garage built I had the floor slab machine floated level then a coat of floor paint gives a good easy to clean surface, jacking and moving cars on skates not a problem and I use a large foam rubber kneeling pad I bought several years ago at the NEC to keep the cold out when on the floor.

Graham

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this is how it looks now

 

IMG_1214_zps8l1d06r5.jpg

 

that little space has all been used up!

 

still not sorted the flooring situation, but I could go down the route of carpet - its what i have at the moment.

 

I'm also looking for a nice metal A3 sized TR6 wall plaque to go with the MINI, MGB and Stag ones I currently have

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Grumpy2:

Golly - looks like an Operating Theatre, but without the blood and the excised body parts!

I am impressed beyond words!

 

Ian Cornish

(Is one permitted to use that G...y word these days?)

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