Epoxy Flooring in Lafayette, IN

Epoxy flooring in Lafayette, IN has to handle two very different seasons. The Lafayette 8 S weather station's 1991 to 2020 normals put the average January low at 17.7°F and the average July high at 83.6°F, with about 20.5 inches of snow and 39.83 inches of precipitation a year. In winter a garage slab takes salty slush off your tires. In summer a basement slab sits in humid air. We plan every floor around both.

Salt on the streets means salt on your floor

The Lafayette Street Department splits the city into 12 snow routes and plows and salts them in priority order, starting with emergency routes and then CityBus and trash routes. A WLFI report on the department described crews pretreating about 250 lane miles with brine mixed to 23.3% salinity, then spreading roughly 50 pounds of salt per lane mile, which comes to more than 60 tons to cover the city once. All of that ends up in driveways and garages. A 2008 literature review written for the South Dakota DOT by the Michigan Tech Transportation Institute found that sodium chloride drives scaling of concrete during freeze-thaw cycles, while magnesium and calcium chlorides can break down the cement paste chemically. A bonded, seamless coating keeps that brine on the surface so you can squeegee it out.

Older slabs in Lafayette, newer ones across the river

The two cities have very different housing. Census figures from the 2019 to 2023 American Community Survey, as summarized by Point2Homes, put Lafayette's median year built at 1971, with 17.6% of homes built before 1940. Neighborhoods like Ninth Street Hill, Perrin, Highland Park and Centennial are historic districts with detached garages and basements that have seen decades of patching and paint. West Lafayette's median year built is 1992, and 39% of its homes went up between 2000 and 2019. Those newer attached garages usually need less repair, though they still get salt every winter. That difference is why we look at a slab before we price it.

Basements and the ground underneath

Much of west-central Indiana sits on flat glacial till plains with slow-draining soils. The USDA describes the Toronto soil series, whose type location is in neighboring White County, as somewhat poorly drained with a perched water table 0.5 to 2 feet down in fall and spring. The Drummer series, common in northwestern Indiana, is poorly drained with a water table near the surface from January to May in drained fields. Ground that wet pushes moisture up into basement slabs. We test before we recommend a system, and we use a moisture-tolerant primer or tell you to fix the water first when the reading calls for it. The American Lung Association notes that every Indiana county is in EPA radon Zone 1 or Zone 2, so a radon test before finishing a basement is a good idea. A floor coating does not mitigate radon.

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Floors that work hard

Greater Lafayette builds things. Subaru of Indiana Automotive, Wabash National's trailer plants, Caterpillar's Large Engine Center and Evonik's Tippecanoe Laboratories are all here, and so are plenty of home shops, farm buildings and small contractors' bays. A shop floor that sees jacks, welding spatter and fluid spills needs a thicker, chemical-resistant system than a two-car garage. We size the system to the work the floor does.

Systems we install

• Garage floor epoxy with a clear topcoat: a thick base that bonds to ground concrete, sealed with a topcoat that resists hot tires and road salt.
• Full flake floors: vinyl chips broadcast into the base coat until it is covered, which adds grip and hides salt residue between cleanings.
• Polyaspartic coatings: a fast-curing option for when you need the garage back sooner, with strong UV resistance.
• Basement floor systems: moisture-tested primers and coatings for finished or storage basements.
• Shop and commercial systems: thicker 100% solids coatings for rolling loads, chemicals and daily traffic.
• Concrete crack and joint repair: patching pits, spalls and cracks so the coating has a sound base.

What happens on install day

• We protect walls and doorways and confirm what is moved out.
• The slab is diamond ground edge to edge and vacuumed.
• Cracks, control joints and pitting are filled and ground flush.
• Base coat, color or flake layer, and topcoat go down in order.
• You get written times for walking, moving items back and parking.

Lafayette and West Lafayette are the core of our service area. We also coat floors in Battle Ground, Dayton, Shadeland, Clarks Hill and Otterbein, and out to Delphi, Flora, Monticello, Brookston, Frankfort, Rossville, Mulberry, Crawfordsville, Linden, Attica, Williamsport, Covington, Fowler and Oxford. Each area is a little different. Lafayette's historic neighborhoods have older detached garages and basements. West Lafayette and the subdivisions along its edges have newer attached garages. Out in the farm towns we see more shops, pole barns and machine sheds. The town pages cover what we know about homes and floors in each place.