garage renovation consultation Archives

Maintaining the Garage Floor During Winter

February 19, 2019 by Rick Scully

Not only are driveways, walkways and sidewalks of our homes cause for concern, but we can’t help but bring in snow, ice, sand and salt into our garages. From the little feet of young ones running in from school to the vehicles we park inside the garage at night, the garage floor can become littered with salt, sand and snow almost on a daily basis throughout the winter months.

Depending on the type of garage flooring in your garage, there will be slightly different methods of cleaning the garage floors. If you have a bare cement garage floor, the regular collection of snow, salt and sand will likely cause pitting, cracking and other damage. In the spring, consider a garage renovation to get both an effective garage storage solution as well as a long lasting garage floor coating. A polyaspartic garage floor coating will protect the floor and ease the care and maintenance of the garage floor.

Keeping Salt, Snow and Sand Out of the Garage

To be prepared to clean the garage floor in winter, you’ll need some supplies. Here are some things you’ll want to keep hanging on your slatwall and in baskets hanging on your slatwall for the winter season.

It’s always best to look after the snow and salt dragged into the garage immediately after the vehicle has been parked instead of waiting until everything has melted and the run off water washes and spreads particles over the garage floor. Brushing off your vehicle and knocking the snow and salt build up from behind the tires of your vehicle before you even entire the garage or drive minimizes what gets dragged onto the garage floor.

This may not always be possible or you may forget to take this step before driving into the garage. If that’s the case, as soon as you’ve parked your vehicle get the push broom hanging on the slatwall. As you step out of your vehicle, you can knock or brush off excess snow and ice build up and then push it out of the garage with the broom immediately before it has a chance to melt and spread over the garage floor.

Protect a Bare Cement Garage Floor

While the bare cement floor of a garage is not ideal, this winter you may not have a lot of choice. One of the temporary fixes for the winter is to lay down some cardboard on the cement floor. This will help absorb some of the excess water and prevent some of the salt and sand from seeping into the cement. This also helps prevent some of the moisture build up in the cement. Reducing moisture absorption by the cement floor will reduce cracking and pitting of the cement floor.

In the winter, garage floor tiles are something which can be purchased and become a DIY project over a weekend afternoon. It’s a more effective solution to protecting the garage floor in the middle winter as it will cause water and salt to sit on top of the floor whereas wet cardboard will eventually allow moisture to seep into the cement floor below.

2 car garage, stouffville, left rear door, pvc floor tiles, punched aluminum baseboard, slatwall, custom overhead platform, shelves, bike rack, bicycle storage

Floor tiles come in a variety of colours and they are modular so that a variety of floor pattern designs can be created. It’s also easy to replace or repair a section of the garage floor if some damage occurs to the garage floor tile. The grip of the surface makes it safer for family members to walk through the garage without fear of sliding or slipping unlike loose pieces of cardboard or wet slippery smooth cement floors.

Tiles can be mopped to remove any excess moisture from the garage. Removing the moisture from the garage is important so that belongings stored in the garage remain dry and this prolongs the life of any of our family toys or equipment or supplies.

Using a dry / wet vac, any excess melted snow or road salt which you were unable to clean as you parked or as the kids ran into the house can be vacuumed off cement, tiles or polyaspartic garage floor coating. Some people like to use a leaf blower as a dual purpose tool in the winter to blow out light snow which has drifted into the garage. This is possible before things have melted and an alternative to the push broom if that’s not something that you might own.

Keep the Garage Dry during the Winter

With a blower fan, you’ll be able to reduce the moisture level in the garage instead of having melted snow dissolve road salt all over the floor. It will also help prevent cracking of cement floor if there isn’t either a polyaspartic garage floor coating or a protective garage floor tile. If you’re using cardboard as a temporary solution, it will reduce the moisture in the cardboard before it has a chance to reach the cement floor below.

Cleaning a Garage Floor

Garage floors such as garage tiles and polyaspartic garage floor coating can cleaned with vinegar and water. The vinegar does lower the freezing point of the water and with a blower fan running for a while afterwards, it will reduce moisture and prevent freezing of any excess water. Especially, if you’re using this method to clean off a bare cement garage floor, the blower fan will become particularly helpful.

A more thorough cleaning in the spring would be the ideal when the wet floor will be easier to dry with a little bit of warmth and sunshine. In the winter, the main goal is to avoid moisture and salt from further damaging a cement floor.

Getting a Polyaspartic Garage Floor

Ideally, a polyaspartic garage floor coating project by a garage renovation specialist helps protect the foundation of your garage. Each project starts by assuring the moisture level of the cement is adequately low before the application of a polyaspartic floor coating. This step assures that excessive moisture is not somehow locked into the cement. Cement which is too moist will expand and contract excessively during the changing temperatures of the four seasons. In addition to damaging the foundation of the garage, moist cement will also ruin a polyaspartic floor coating application.

Starting with an adequately dry cement base means the finished polyaspartic floor coating will have a beautiful and long lasting life in the garage. The beautiful colours of a polyaspartic floor coating are UV protected from sun and other weather elements means it is one of the best garage floor investments for any home.

This spring, consider either a full garage storage solution or just upgrading your garage floor with a polyaspartic garage floor coating.

Plan Now for a Better Garage Experience Next Winter

February 3, 2015 by Rick Scully

How many times did you awake this winter to discover that your car was covered in ice and snow because there’s no room for it in the garage? Trudging out in the harsh elements to brush away snow, chip off ice and warm up your car is the last thing you want to do on a busy weekday morning. Worse, it can leave you rushing to get to work or to get the kids to school on time, making winter travel even more dangerous.

Last year, perhaps you promised yourself that you wouldn’t spend another winter forced to park your car outside of the garage. The months seemed to fly by, and your plan to organize or renovate the garage never quite happened. Before you knew it, you were in the midst of another harsh winter. After our last blast of wintry weather, perhaps you’ve made the same promise to yourself again this year.

Next winter might feel as though it’s a lifetime away. But then again, remember how quickly last year seemed to pass? The first month of the year is already in the books, and Groundhog Day is almost here. Ontarians are eagerly awaiting Wiarton Willie’s prediction of whether spring is on the horizon. Wiarton Willie’s forecast of what’s to come is out of your hands, but the fate of your garage isn’t. Now is the time to start making plans.

Think it’s too early to start planning for a garage renovation? It isn’t. Garage organization and renovation services are in high demand and have been growing in popularity in recent years. Schedule your garage renovation consultation in February to ensure your project will be started as soon as spring arrives. Starting early allows plenty of time for consultation, design and the ordering of products.

The primary purpose of your garage renovation might be to rescue your vehicle from the harsh winter weather. However there are many benefits to getting your garage renovation completed during spring. Are you tired of tripping over bikes, bats, balls and gardening tools in your garage? Do you avoid tackling small projects around the house because finding a screwdriver or wrench is a small project in itself? Depending on the options you choose, you’ll be able to:

Safely store your winter tires.
Neatly store winter sports equipment like sleds, ice skates and skis.
Store family bicycles off the ground and out of the way of vehicles.
Organize and store tools.
Neatly house gardening tools and equipment.

Just as unprotected sun exposure can damage your skin, it can also damage the paint on your car. Over time, the sun can cause oxidation and premature fading. Prolonged exposure to the oppressive summer sun weakens leather seats and rubberized trim. The headlights of your vehicle are also impacted by exposure to the sun. Parking your car in the garage during summer keeps your vehicle looking newer longer. It also makes it more comfortable to get into the car on hot summer days.

Renovating your garage during spring means you’ll have a safe place to park your car next winter, but you’ll also be able to enjoy the benefits of an organized garage during spring, summer and fall. Each garage renovation is tailored to meet the unique needs of the client. So whether you need a simple wall organization system, overhead storage, garage cabinet installation or customized storage solutions, your garage renovation specialist can help your dream garage become a reality.

Complete the garage survey form to tell us a little about your garage and schedule your no-cost, in-home consultation.

Seven Ways to Make Your Garage More Green

April 22, 2014 by Rick Scully

Today, the world is celebrating Earth Day, a day for renewed appreciation of the earth and the environment. It’s also an excellent time to examine ways that we can live a more earth-friendly lifestyle. We often consider how to make our homes greener. Yet, an important part of our homes is often overlooked: the garage. However, there are several ways, big and small, that we can incorporate our garages in the plan to make our homes more eco-friendly.

Get Green Garage Doors

If you have an attached garage, a significant amount of heating and cooling energy escapes your home through the garage. A lack of insulation in the garage door, coupled with its frequent opening and closing, can make your garage extremely cold in the winter and uncomfortably warm in the summer. Any room sharing a wall with your garage will experience energy loss. However, an insulated, energy-efficient garage door can mitigate the temperature difference, reducing energy loss by more than seventy percent. This results in considerable savings on your energy bill.

Energy-efficient garage doors are more expensive. So do your research and check the R-value of any door you’re considering. This number represents the door’s ability to resist heat flow (in or out). The higher the R-value is, the stronger the door’s insulation properties. In addition to being energy-efficient, many green garage doors are made of recycled material.

Use Solar Power to Light Your Garage

Looking for a way to reduce your energy bill while also keeping your home safe? Install solar-powered floodlights and/or lanterns on the garage exterior. Install solar-powered spotlights along your driveway. These energy-saving lights are reasonably-priced at a local big box store and can be installed fairly easily. Solar-powered lights will make your home safer and more beautiful. The energy savings you’ll enjoy can quickly recoup the cost of the lighting.

Make the Switch from Incandescent Bulbs

You might not be prepared to invest in solar-powered indoor lighting. Yet, there’s another way to go green with your indoor lighting. Make the switch from incandescent light bulbs to compact fluorescent (CFL) or LED bulbs. CFL or LED bulbs will cost a bit more than incandescent light bulbs. However, an incandescent bulb lasts for about a year while a CFL bulb can last up to ten years and an LED bulb can last up to twenty-five years. CFL and LED lights are also more efficient in their energy use, unlike incandescent bulbs which waste up to 90% of their energy consumption on heat, rather than light.

Use Lighting with Motion Detectors

Take the energy-efficiency of your outdoor and indoor lighting one step further by incorporating motion detectors. Exterior lighting with motion sensors provides an additional layer of security to your home. Inside the garage, lights with motion sensors will automatically shut off when there is no movement in the garage. This eliminates the energy waste experienced when someone inadvertently leaves the lights on inside the garage.

Mind the Gaps

Another place where energy is lost in your home is through the gaps between the walls and floor of your garage. Over time the garage settles and the spaces between the floor and the walls widen. Heating and cooling is lost through these gaps as air escapes into the garage. This can be resolved with a relatively simple and inexpensive fix. Get some caulk and a caulk gun and fill in the spaces. Talk to the clerk at your local hardware store to ensure that you purchase the appropriate caulk for the job.

Put your hand near the perimeter of the door between the house and the garage. Do you feel a draft? If so, cold air is seeping into the house through the gap around your door. Close this conduit for drafty air with inexpensive weather stripping. It’s an incredibly simple job that you can do in less than an hour with a few simple tools. Weather stripping will make your home warmer and more comfortable, plus you’ll see a reduction in your energy bills.

There’s one more gap that needs minding. Since there isn’t a visible gap around your electrical outlets and lighting fixtures, you might not realize that air can also seep through the spaces around them. Additionally, carbon monoxide fumes can escape from your garage into your home through those fixtures. To remedy the situation, simply buy an inexpensive package of fire-resistant foam seals made for this purpose. Remove the faceplate. Place the seal. Replace the faceplate. Voila! You’re done. After you’ve sealed all of the faceplates between the house and garage, put seals on all outlets and light switches on exterior walls inside your home for maximum benefit.

Capture and Reuse Rainwater

Take your commitment to going green up a notch by capturing and reusing rain water for jobs that don’t require potable water. For instance, recycled rainwater can be used to water the lawn, wash the car or bathe the dog. Purchase a rain barrel and then install it in three easy steps. Measure the height of the barrel. Cut the downspout. Then install the elbow that will divert rainwater into your barrel. The next time it rains you’ll be collecting fresh water. The best part? You’ll be rewarded for your efforts with a reduced water bill.

Install a Car Charging Station in Your Garage

What better way is there to make your garage greener than to switch to an eco-friendly vehicle, like a hybrid or all-electric car? If you’re considering making the switch, there’s one more eco-friendly element you’ll need to add to your garage. You’ll need to install Electric Vehicle Service Equipment (EVSE), or what is often called a car “charging” station. This allows for convenient, overnight charging of your vehicle.

Doing our part to help the environment may feel overwhelming, at times. However, a greener lifestyle doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing proposal. Every little bit helps. Start by incorporating one or two green initiatives into your daily lifestyle. Do the options discussed here seem like more than you’re ready to take on alone? If you want to make your garage greener, but you aren’t sure how request a garage renovation consultation. Alternately, you can start smaller. Check our most recent post for seven easy ways to go green this spring.

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