Can you repair a cement floor? It has gouges, holes and very rough.?

Question

The salt water softner overflowed while we were away and laid on the cement covered with carpet floor and dried up that way. When I pulled up the carpet, the floor was all pitted and hunks of cement came up. I have swept up the mess but am now wondering what can make is smooth and ready to paint?

Answer 1

You can use underlayment cement to smooth

Answer 2

Most people underestimate the importance of surface preparation. No matter what you put down to "fix" the problem, it will fail if you don't do a good job of removing the flakes & dust of the existing failed concrete.

If you can stand the tedium, I suggest that you get yourself an 8x8 soil tamper (sold at home improvement stores) and use it to bang the crap out of the concrete throughout the area. (The idea is to get rid of the weak concrete, and unless you're Superman the tamper won't do anything more than surficial harm to sound concrete).

Then get a wire brush and shop vac and get rid of as much of the loose material as possible. Then coat as suggested in other posts or as recommended by someone knowledgeable at a home improvement store.

Good luck with it!

Answer 3

Concrete will not work.
There are two kinds of floor patch.

One is "Quick Patch", fast drying. Mixed with water. This can be used for leveling rough concrete. This can be scraped with a blade for smoothing. Sanding not necessary and will create dust.

The other is "Latex Compound". This has to be mixed properly with water, used to fill "holes" in concrete. It must be done in layers, 1/4", for proper drying. It still takes overnight to dry before adding coats. This can be sanded if necessary and with latex creates minimal dust.

Remove dust or particles before applying.

Both can be used to fill holes, but Quick Patch may be a problem in layers.

These should be available at Home Improvement stores.