What do you use to clean Concrete that has 20 years of oil and grease stains on it?

Question

I just bought a farm and am cleaning the shed. The shed has a concrete floor that the previous owners used as a mechinic shop. It has 20 years of grease and dirt on the concrete and a 3250 psi power washer does not touch it. How do I get the concrete to look new again. It does what it takes. Please help.

Thanks

Answer 1

Muratic Acid. I can assure you that NOTHING will work better. The kitty litter answer is ridiculous. Muratic Acid is the only option to restore concrete to its original condition.

Answer 2

Have you tried an industrial concrete cleaner? Some are pretty abrasive and contain muratic acid so use them with caution.

If nothing works, but you can get it pretty clean, you can do one of three things:

1. You can have it resurfaced with a very thin coat of concrete over the top. Usually this is successful.

or

2. You can apply one of the garage floor sealers/ finishes to the concrete that is found at Home Depot in three levels of quality. They are a resin (I believe) coating and come in colors as well as offer deocrative flecks. Friends of ours used this and found it easy. It came out looking really great even though at first we thought it would look stupid. Now anything spilt including oil or grease just wipes up without a problem.

Lastly, you can paint over it with a grey garage floor pain made specifically for garage floors. They even have a special grit (like sand) you can add to the pain to prevent slipping on the otherwise slick and shiny like paint. Lots of people that use their garages as a shop do this over a new floor even, to have it always looking nice.

If you put on a finish to the floor, if you go to sell your property, most people won't think the floor was finished to cover up something, but rather, they see it as a property that was well taken care of and had been given attention to detail even down to the garage floor.

Hope this helps and good luck!

Answer 3

I had the same problem, had to clean what i could, then seal the concrete with an indusrtial sealer, locking the stain in, and painting the floor with an oil based paint. The oil saturates old concrete to a depth of almost an inch. The etchers wont go to that depth

Answer 4

Throw clean kitty muddle on the oil stains. Then after the muddle units somewhat, sweep it off the stain. you should use a powerwasher to do away with the oil stains, utilising a detergent made for powerwashers. in case you shop at Lowes or abode Depot, they might have something to apply to do away with oil stains additionally. The kitty muddle does paintings extraordinarily lots.

Answer 5

Pour-n-restore may help but old, soaked-in oil and grease are almost impossible to get out once they have soaked into the concrete. Clean as best you can, then etch and paint it.

Answer 6

Get some Muratic Acid. I removed rust stains with it. Pool Supply stores have it. Probably WalMart too.

Answer 7

chad try a box of powder laundry soap pour it on the spots and add small amount of water to make a thick paste and use a stiff push broom to work it in and let it sit on there for along time working it with the broo and then hose it off i did this in my garage and it did a great job cheap dish washing powder will work to

Answer 8

there are commercial degreasers that would probably work. If you can find a cleaning supply store in the industrial part of town that sells supplies to schools, businesses, they would have this type of thing.

Answer 9

Muratic acid. It works great. And yes, it is safe and easy. Go to the hardware store.

Answer 10

take kitty litter and grind it into the floor with your boot heel or other means. sweep away.....repeat.