A coating inherits whatever the slab gives it, so the grinder leads the job. It reduces the bay to clean concrete and lifts off every layer that has accumulated: floor paint, a shop-bought coating that has started to peel, the curing membrane from the original pour, and oil driven into the pores under a parked car. Grinding does a second job at the same time. Concrete is troweled to a dense, closed face when it is laid, and epoxy will sit on that face rather than in it until the tooling has opened it up.
What the grinder uncovers is put right next, and none of it waits until after the coating starts. Cracks are chased out, filled and rubbed level so the finished floor passes over them without a line. Expansion joints are reproduced in the coating rather than sealed across, since a slab that cannot move will crack where you least want it. If moisture is reading up through the concrete, that is dealt with underneath the epoxy rather than on top of it. A slab in poor shape is not a reason we would decline the work. It is written into the price.
The build itself is three coats: an epoxy base carrying the color, flake or pigment dropped into it while it is open, and a clear polyaspartic layer sealing everything below. Six to nine hours is normal for a two-car Altadena bay. A floor that has lost its level is a different problem, and leveling it comes first, because otherwise the new surface simply copies the old shape. And if the concrete itself turns out to be worth showing, polishing is the other way to finish a bay.
Three epoxy finishes cover practically every Altadena garage we are asked to price, and choosing among them mostly comes down to how much the floor is expected to conceal. Every blend has a physical chip you can hold, and putting one against your own slab settles it faster than any screen will.
Flake accounts for most Altadena garages. Chips of colored vinyl are broadcast into the wet epoxy base until the slab is completely buried, and a clear coat seals them down for the life of the floor. The result is a surface with a little bite to it, which matters when a car brings rain in, and a pattern busy enough to absorb the marks and grit a garage in use puts on the floor. It is also the most tolerant of the three over concrete that has already had a hard life.
Solid color takes the chips away: a pigmented epoxy base under the same clear seal, holding one unbroken tone across the whole bay. Of the three it looks the most deliberate. But a plain surface conceals nothing, so grit and rubber show up quickly, and it suits a slab that came off the grinder clean. Mid grays and quieter neutrals are what people usually settle on. Where the garage has become somewhere you actually spend time, a single tone across the floor is what makes the difference.
Metallic is the odd one out. Pigment suspended in the resin is worked while the floor cures, so the pattern that emerges cannot be repeated on another job. People choose it for exactly that, and it is also the risk you accept, because there is no preview. Save it for a bay that is looked at more than it is worked in, and know that a repair in metallic never quite disappears.
Most of any quote comes down to two things. One is how big the floor is, and Altadena bays generally measure out between 450 and 700 square feet. The other is what shape the concrete is in, because a sound slab only wants grinding, while a broken one wants cutting back, packing and a second pass with the machines before an epoxy base coat earns its place. Expect $5 to $7 per square foot on an Altadena garage, and a full day on a two-car bay.
The finish shifts it too. Solid color is the least work for us, metallic the most, and flake lands in the middle. The sealing resin matters as much. Polyaspartic sets far harder and far faster than an epoxy top coat, and unlike epoxy it keeps its color in daylight instead of drifting yellow over the years. The number we give you is worked out on your own concrete, not taken from a list.
Our reviews average 5.0 across more than 120 of them, and we are usually about a fortnight out. Give us the measurements and a photograph showing the floor as it is now, or phone (818) 359-3932, and an epoxy or polyaspartic price for your own bay comes back rather than a generic one.
GET A FREE Estimate
Please give us a call or fill in our contact form to receive more information about our flooring services.
For instant reply you can call us, text us, or connect with us on social media.
