garage car "mats" for winter

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HI all:
Does anyone have experience with those car mats you put in your garage to catch dripping snow, water and salt during winter months? The cars make a mess of my concrete garage floor during winter months and I frequently have to get out there with my mops and Simple Green. All that muck gets into the expansion joints too. Plus, the salt is not good for the concrete.

I've looked into floor coatings and the good ones are super expensive so I'm back to thinking about vinyl or rubber car mats. Has anyone used them? The ones I see online just look plain cheap. Another issue might be storage. Do they roll up at the end of the season? Maybe I'm just better off mopping the mess up a few times during the winter. Hard to say but thought I get some input from the detailing forum.
 
Don't use the matts, but what I found is a great way to clean up the garage floor is to just spread some clean snow on the floor, scrape it up, and deposit at the curb.

Clean snow is dry and makes a great absorbent.
 
Not a detailer. But I washed and waxed a few square miles of commercial floor space in high school. Wabbout a commercial grade of floor wax?
 
I have a squeegie, dustpan, and bucket that I use to sop up all the "car water". It really makes a difference.

If left to its own devices I get salt crystals in the former shape of puddles. It's not great, gets in the air, and corrodes parts left unattended on the lower shelves.

If you can get some old deep-channel floor mats (weathertech etc) under your rockers they might save you some time.
 
I have no experience with floor matts.

20 years ago, I painted my garage floor with a paint from Home Depot, advertised as being epoxy / no 2 part mixing.
It's ok, but any snow melting will puddle and the paint will fail, resulting in Spring time scrapping & repainting.
I would use a Squeegie and Mop.

For me now, if my vehicle has snow on it, I will park outside until it all melts (first sunny day).
What I did buy is one of those snow-brushes that are used at Car Dealers / have not had a chance to use yet.

The SnowJoe
https://www.snowjoe.com/products/snow-joe-telescoping-snow-broom-with-ice-scraper

Available at Home Depot
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Suncast-Telescoping-Snow-Sweeper-SB80024/207206768
 
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I have no experience with containment mats, but the guys over at the garagejournal forum have a few threads that may help: Google - garage floor containment mats site:www.garagejournal.com
If you are a diyer, maybe consider 60 mil EPDM roofing or pond liner. You need to come up with an idea to elevate the edges a bit to contain the snow melt off (wood or pvc?).
 
My garage stays above freezing most of the winter so most of the snow and salt stay in a liquid form, what I found that works really well is to take the filter out of your shop vac and just vacuum the floor when full take to the end of the driveway and empty.
 
Curious. My garage floor is a mess. Between snow, salt, dirt, and oil spills... lots of stains. Might power wash it in the spring.

Epoxy floors are very nice but I'm worried about the prep work and don't want to baby a garage floor after I'm done.
 
The other thing about epoxy is that it can be pretty slick when wet, I sometimes regret putting down epoxy on my garage floor because of that. I also used a generous amount of anti-skid additive in the clear epoxy top layer too.
 
Originally Posted by sxg6
The other thing about epoxy is that it can be pretty slick when wet, I sometimes regret putting down epoxy on my garage floor because of that. I also used a generous amount of anti-skid additive in the clear epoxy top layer too.


I found the slipperiness to be problematic too. Is there any way to make the surface less slick once the clear coat is set?
 
Another option you might consider is getting some old conveyor belts. In my area you can find them on Craigslist, and some of the suppliers will even cut them to length for you. I have seen some guys laminate black fiberboard to these and do so with brown side up. The fiberboard with the brown side up will absorb water, and liquids. When they get too bad you just can peel off the conveyor belting and glue new fiberboard to them.

Thanks
 
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