Cleaning decades old oil stains off concrete floor

Status
Not open for further replies.
Joined
Jan 24, 2007
Messages
450
Location
LBP
o.k pretty much a good portion of the concrete floor in my garage is covered with heavy oil patches from decades worth of auto repairs and I'm kind of getting tired of it, it just looks really bad from the driveway with no car in there. Does anyone have a good method or know of a good product to clean it up or bring it close to being spotless. I want to eventually apply a heavy duty paint coating to the floor that is chemical resistant, but i have to clean up the oil mess first without having to put a new layer of concrete applied over top.

Thanks
 
Last edited:
There is no way to clean it up. I rented commercial space a while ago where a machine shop used to be, The floor was full of oil stains/ I rented a large orbital floor sander (wow very dusty work) and even with taking off a layer of the concrete the oil stain was still there. We put down vinyl floor for our office, and the oil stains "telegraphed" though the vinyl over a year or two,
 
Originally Posted By: Bluestream
There is no way to clean it up. I rented commercial space a while ago where a machine shop used to be, The floor was full of oil stains/ I rented a large orbital floor sander (wow very dusty work) and even with taking off a layer of the concrete the oil stain was still there. We put down vinyl floor for our office, and the oil stains "telegraphed" though the vinyl over a year or two,


What about those "plastic" or "rubber" sealants for concrete?
 
You can wet the floor and blow off excess water with a leaf blower. Then dust the damp floor with the cement that has no gravel, sand or stones in it. Wait 48 hours, and sweep the floor.
 
I've had some success using ATF, Simple Green and kitty litter to remove the worst of the stains on my driveway. What I did was to apply a thin coat of ATF on the stains, broom it back and forth till it looked dark. Next cover the ATF coated stains with a (thin) layer of kitty litter. Broom for a while, remove kitty litter. Apply another layer of kitty litter, broom a while and remove. Repeat until kitty litter doesn't turn dark. The last step is soaking the stains with Simple Green. Broom the simple green over the stains for at least 10 minutes, then rinse away.

This made a dramatic improvement in how the driveway looked. I repeated this treatment series the following weekend. I can still see the stains if I look for them, but at a glance it looks pretty good.
 
Last edited:
I used to have a powder product.

Commercial powder cleaner that we used to mix with water to degrease panels before painting. Would rinse completely off with water.

would make a poultice of this stuff, trowel it lightly on, then put a payer of cling wrap over it.

Worked great, but 20 years of not using it, and I'm lost.

Dad used to use lime for the same thing.
 
I have tried laundry detergent (Tide powder) and it clean up a lot, but is not completely clean even when I pour some water over the laundry detergent and let it sit overnight.

Concrete has pores and there is no way to clean it up 100%, especially it is decades old. Your best option is to apply an acid cleaner and then coat it with a sealant or paint afterward, and add flakes of some types to break up the pattern so it won't be that noticeable, which is exactly what the garage sealant does.
 
The old timers at the turbine repair shop used to tell me that if you mix powdered Tide with just enough water to make it slushy then trowel it on (like Shannow said) it will pull all the oil out of the cement. Covering with cling film to keep it wet for a few days may not be a bad idea. Sweep up what you can and spray the rest with water.

Of course the real problem with cleaning the oil stains out of your cement floor is that you'll make clean spots which stand out.
grin2.gif


Instead of cleaning the oil spots, you should get a few gallons of used diesel oil, pour it over evenly and let soak for a week. Then the entire floor will be the same shade.
 
In my parents garage the same problem existed. Years of oil stains. I use pour-n-restore. You pour the liquid on the stain spread it with a putty knife and let it dry into a powder. Once dry sweep up the powder. It works really well.
 
Try applying some lacquer thinner on the oil spot. Immediately after the lacquer thinner, put some oil dry or kitty litter on the spots to absorb the lacquer thinner and the dissolved oil. Leave it a day and sweep it up later.
 
Hi ranger,

I wonder if this procedure might work on oil-stained concrete. My brother in-law parked his MKII in my driveway and, as it befits a vehicle of British pedigree, it left a considerable puddle of oil behind. Unfortunately, the oil has already been absorbed into my brand-new driveway, and all the scrubbing with soapy water did not help much.

Cheers,
-J

Originally Posted By: ranger52
Try applying some lacquer thinner on the oil spot. Immediately after the lacquer thinner, put some oil dry or kitty litter on the spots to absorb the lacquer thinner and the dissolved oil. Leave it a day and sweep it up later.
 
In my experience, the lacquer thinner and litter will remove oil stains from concrete. You will notice the place at first. However, I do not remember my attention being called to those places after a while.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top