Why I use ArmorPoxy 3 Coat System?
I own a garage epoxy business in the Charlotte North Carolina metro area. I started the business over seven years ago. When I first started taking on customers my goal was to offer a finished product that would withstand the test of time. My goal was to spend 95% of my time installing new floors and very little of my time doing callbacks. I know from my previous life as a general contractor that doing work twice is very costly (and frustrating to all parties involved). After extensive research and reading hundreds of product reviews I settled on the Armorpoxy ArmorUltra three coat system. Since starting the business I have completed over four hundred epoxy projects with the Armorpoxy ArmorUltra system. My customers have been extremely happy with the finished product. And do you know what extremely happy customers do? Extremely happy customers tell their friends and family and neighbors about your service. The net result of those warm referrals is that my business has grown exponentially. The other advantage of those referrals is that I have been able to save a lot of money on advertising. My advertising budget is literally next to nothing.
Now, I could have gone the cheap route and purchased inexpensive, inferior epoxy materials. And in the short term, I’m sure that I would have saved money. But I didn’t look at this business as a short-term endeavor. There are plenty of “cost-efficient” water-based epoxies that look very pretty in their packaging on the shelves of the hardware stores and paint stores. However, from my experience, that’s where the love story ends…..when you take it home and apply it to your garage floor. Because inevitably what happens to these thin mil water-based systems is that they experience hot tire pickup. Normally they experience hot tire pick up within one to three months. Hot tire pick up is when you pull into the garage on a hot day it causes the epoxy to peel up with the tires at a later time. So, over time the car tires peel up large swatches of the garage epoxy ( a little bit each day ) But, had you used good quality products such as Armorpoxy ArmorUltra three-coat Industrial epoxy system you wouldn’t be feeling this pain, would you? And it is a pain that you are feeling, isn’t it? Because any time you have to pay to have something installed and then that system doesn’t perform as advertised it’s painful. It’s especially painful because you then have to spend more money to have that inferior system diamond ground off of the floor. And then you have to pay again to have the job done the right way ( The way that it should have been done the first time )
Let’s take a brief look at why water-based epoxies fail. I have observed three main reasons why they fail. The first reason why I think that they fail is due to cutting the primer phase-out of the equation. The Armorpoxy ArmorUltra system includes a two-part primer as a crucial component of the system. What the Armorpoxy II primer does is it soaks down into the pores of the concrete. When this two-part primer (this primer is actually a two-part epoxy) soaks into the pores it in effect becomes an integral part of the concrete itself. In technical terms, it “mechanically binds” to the concrete. You have heard the old adage “Prep is the most important part of the project”. Well, this Armorpoxy II primer is the “Prep” of which this adage refers.
The second reason why water-based epoxies fail is the fact that they are so thin and flimsy. After the water cures out of them the average thickness of a water-based epoxy is 2 – 3 mils thick (about the same thickness as the coat of paint that is covering your walls in your house) Now, think about it in logical terms. Do you think that material with the same thickness as wall paint can withstand the weight and abuse of your 5,000 pound vehicle? By comparison, the second coat of the Armorpoxy ArmorUltra system is about 13.7 mils thick. This coat consists of 100% solids epoxy. This means that the same thickness that you spread out on your garage floor is also the cured thickness. In other words, there is no water (or solvent) that cures out of this material. This is one of the reasons why all four branches of the U.S. military utilize Armorpoxy products. Due to the fact that they are durable, time tested through decades of abuse, and all the Armorpoxy products are tested by their in-house lab staff. In fact, not just one batch is tested by the lab but every batch that is shipped out of the factory is tested by the lab. I think that it provides peace of mind that these tried and true materials which are made in the United States are also tested routinely at their lab which is also in the United States.
A third reason why the water-based epoxies fail is that they usually fail to require the application of a topcoat. A high-quality topcoat such as the Polyurethane topcoat that is included with the Armorpoxy ArmorUltra system has some important qualities that the epoxy doesn’t have. A couple of those properties are their high coefficient of friction (slip resistance) and their superior chemical resistance to many of the chemicals that are commonly found in the garage (such as oil, gasoline, antifreeze, etc.) In addition to the above important characteristics, the topcoat adds an additional layer of protection between the car’s tires and the epoxy.
Just this week I completed the garage epoxy work at the new home of one of the senior Executives for Lowe’s. The finished project turned out beautifully. One of the main reasons why she chose our company is that we use the Armorpoxy ArmorUltra Industrial three coat epoxy system.
If you want to talk to me about my experience working with ArmorPoxy please reach out to ArmorPoxy (info@armorpoxy.com) and they will make the introduction!
-Jack S, Founder of Garage Epoxy Floor Mooresville
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