Garage Coatings
in Shenandoah
Most Shenandoah garages were poured somewhere between the 1970s and the 2000s, and they show it. The concrete dusts, paint from two owners back is lifting in patches, and there is a stain collection nobody picked. We grind all of it down to clean slab, take a moisture reading, and build a coating rated for the car you park on it every day. Connor or a senior installer walks the garage before any number is written.
Grinding Past Two Owners’ Worth of Paint
The typical call from Shenandoah starts with a broom. Somebody sweeps the garage and a gray film comes back on the bristles, even though the floor was swept last week. That film is the concrete itself wearing away at the surface. Add a coat of garage paint from a previous owner, maybe two, peeling where the tires turn, and you have a floor that looks dirty no matter what you do to it.
None of that can be coated over. Paint that is already letting go keeps letting go, and it takes whatever you put on top along with it. So the first day is a grinding day. Diamond tooling takes off the old paint, the stains that soaked in and the weak top skin of the slab until the grinder is cutting sound, clean concrete. Our grinders run shrouded and tied into vacuums, which keeps the dust off your shelves and out of the house, and we cover the walls and the water heater before the first pass.
Where the money goes on an older slab is mostly underneath the color. Grind depth, the number of cracks to repair and the moisture reading set the written price, and all three change from one house to the next on the same street.
Slabs Poured Before Vapor Barriers Were Routine
A lot of Shenandoah houses went up before a plastic vapor barrier under the slab was standard practice. Without one, ground moisture moves up through the concrete and out the top, and a coating laid over it sits right in the path. Owners are often surprised by the reading here, because this is inland ground and the garage feels dry. The meter tends to come back higher than people expect.
That is why the moisture test opens every quote we write in the neighborhood. It happens during the walk, on your floor, with you standing there. When the number is low, a standard primer goes down. When it calls for a vapor-tolerant primer, the whole system gets built on that primer, and the scope says so in writing.
Skipping the test is how coatings blister and peel off in sheets a few summers later. The resin was fine. The slab was pushing water into the back of it the whole time. We would rather tell you what the concrete is doing before anything is signed than come back later to grind off a failed floor.
Choosing a Finish You Park On Every Day
Most garages we coat in Shenandoah get parked in daily, often by two vehicles, and the finish should match that life. A flake system is the workhorse. Colored chips broadcast into the base and sealed under a polyaspartic topcoat hide dust and tire tracks, and the texture keeps a wet shoe from sliding. It is the first thing we point people toward for a working garage.
Solid color reads cleaner and brighter, which suits a garage that doubles as a workspace where you want to spot a dropped screw. It shows dust sooner. Metallic is the showpiece: hand-poured, glossy, with movement running through the finish. People who put metallic in a garage usually treat that garage like a room, and it rewards them for it.
Whichever way you lean, the decision happens with samples set on your own slab, because a chip blend or metallic tone looks different under your garage light than it does in a photo. Browse finished floors in our gallery before the walk if you want a head start, and read how the full system is built on our garage coatings page.
Hairline Cracks and the Ones That Can Ghost
Every older slab in the neighborhood has cracks. The question at the walk is which kind. Hairline cracks get opened up and filled with rigid epoxy before any coating goes down, and once the floor is finished you will not find them.
Wider cracks are a different story, and we say so up front. They get filled the same way. If the slab is still moving along that line, though, a faint trace of the crack can show through the finish over the years. That is called ghosting. The floor stays sound; you can simply see where the crack runs. We mark those on a crack map during the walk so you never discover one later and wonder what went wrong.
Edges and ledges get the same prep as the open floor. Old paint on a stem wall ledge fails just like paint on the slab, so if you want the finish to wrap up onto that ledge, it gets ground and coated along with everything else.
Two or Three Days With the Cars Outside
A garage recoat in an occupied Shenandoah home runs two to three days, and for that stretch your vehicles live on the driveway. Grind day is the loud one. After that the work gets quieter as primer, color and topcoat go down in order. We confirm the arrival window ahead of time, and each evening the crew sweeps the garage before leaving.
With a polyaspartic topcoat, tires can go back on the floor at 48 hours. Foot traffic comes back before that. On the last visit we do the finish walk together, standing on the new floor, and close out the punch list while the crew is still there.
The warranty you get at the end is specific. It names the system, the primer, the moisture reading and the use the floor was scoped for, so keep it with the house papers. After that, upkeep is a broom and an occasional mop. Oil wipes up whole, and the dusting that started the phone call does not come back. When you are ready to set a walk, send the details through our contact page.
Other floors we install in Shenandoah
- Flake epoxy in dozens of chip blends.
- Metallic epoxy with hand-poured pearl and marble looks.
- Anti-slip coatings for workshops, gyms and wet entries.
- Epoxy countertops for kitchens, wet bars and benches.
Shenandoah Garage Floor Questions
How much noise and dust should we expect inside the house?
Grind day is loud, and the rest of the job is much quieter. Our grinders run with shrouds and connected vacuums, so dust stays contained instead of settling on shelves and cars. We protect the walls and the water heater first, and the garage gets swept every evening before the crew leaves.
Our slab has paint on it from past owners. Do you coat over it?
No. Old garage paint that is already flaking will keep failing and pull any new coating off with it. We grind the paint, the soaked-in stains and the weak surface layer away until the tooling reaches clean concrete. The new system bonds to the slab itself, which is what makes it last.
Why does the moisture test matter on an older house?
Many slabs from this era were poured without a vapor barrier underneath, so ground moisture keeps moving up through them. Readings here often run higher than owners expect. The test happens at the walk, and if the number calls for a vapor-tolerant primer, the whole floor is built on that primer.
Will the cracks in our floor show after the coating?
Hairline cracks get filled with rigid epoxy and disappear under the finish. Wider cracks are filled too, but if the slab keeps moving along them, a faint line can ghost through over the years. We point out which kind you have during the walk, before you sign anything.
When can we park in the garage again?
Plan on two to three days with the cars on the driveway. With a polyaspartic topcoat, tires go back on the floor at 48 hours, and you can walk on it sooner. Your written scope lists the schedule for your specific slab, so nobody is guessing about the date.
What does the written warranty actually cover?
It names the floor system, the primer used, the moisture reading taken at your slab and the use the floor was scoped for. That level of detail is what makes the paper worth filing with the house documents, because it describes the floor you actually bought.
Garages East of Baton Rouge Proper
Shenandoah is an unincorporated community in East Baton Rouge Parish, just east of Baton Rouge proper, and it sits inside the daily metro routes our crews drive out of the Baton Rouge HQ. Site walks get on the calendar fast, and a punch-list item gets a truck in your driveway instead of a callback. Connor stays reachable by phone for the whole project. See more of our work in Shenandoah and across East Baton Rouge Parish, reach us through the contact page, or call (225) 456-9224.
A Clean Grind Under a Floor You Park On
Moisture reading, a crack map, samples on your slab and a written number that holds until you are ready to book.
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